At Issue Index   In Touch Index  July Index   Previous   Next

IN TOUCH WITH GOD    by Edward Heppenstall

 
Christian Obedience JULY 28

WHAT IS TRUTH?

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. John 17:17.

Christ bids us to love God with all our minds. God desires from us the enthusiastic use of our minds, intent to know the truth that God has given to us in His Word. When you come to worship and to serve Him, do not leave behind the noblest part of your being, your mind. Insist on understanding all that you can of the Word of God. The mind must learn to love truth and to hate iniquity. No Christian completely and worthily loves Jesus Christ unless he loves Him with his mind as well as with his heart and soul.

A second factor involves the personal attitude of the individual. Pilate asked the question, "What is truth?" But did he really want to know? He wanted his own way, not God's. He feared the multitude. He had his reputation and standing to think about.

The love of sin draws a veil over our minds. Indifference and continued ignorance also darken the mind. Men cannot see the truth except they look for it. The battle between Christ and Satan is a battle for the mind, either to enlighten it with truth or to darken it with error and ignorance. Satan hates the light. He seeks to move our minds into the shadows where truth becomes vague and indistinct.

We are to hold fast to the truth of God. This is certainty. God leaves no room for doubt. The only fixed and dependable truth is that which comes from God and not from men. We talk of men falling into sin. Actually men slide into it. Rarely do people take some precipitous action that plunges them into the darkness all at once. Truth is not abandoned. It is compromised. It is diluted. People are drawn aside by ways that fall short of the will of God.

"I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies" (Ps. 119:59). When the psalmist saw that he was wrong, he turned his feet unto God's testimonies. Men are not too ready to think about their ways. It is not so easily done as we may imagine. The Word of God casts divine eyes on our own lives. How far short have we fallen of God's truth? What is His Word of truth to us now? We have a right to ask these questions only when we intend to obey the truth.

At Issue Index   In Touch Index  July Index   Previous   Next