Daily Meditations on the Bible / We stand with Israel
He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.
By now we have seen that James is a salt and pepper kind of guy. His writing is not bland or detailed. He is a man with a mission and he wants to fulfill that mission with as few words as possible. This sentence in James 1: 18 is a perfect example. Let’s unpack it a bit and look at all the treasures James has placed here.
Continue reading “Salt & Pepper – James 1: 18”
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth.
Back in the beginning, way back in Genesis 3, we are told the story of What Went Wrong. In verse 5 we hear the Serpent telling Eve that if she ate the Forbidden Fruit, “… you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” What the Serpent didn’t tell Eve was that she would not be able to tell the difference. It is a small detail, but very important.
Jesus calls the Serpent, “…a liar and the father of lies.” (John 8:44) The purpose of a lie is to deceive. Not being all-knowing like God, we are easily deceived. We see the lies, we just can’t tell the difference between what is true and what is not true.
For us to be able to know the difference between truth and lies requires that we look to God. Proverbs reminds us:
Continue reading “Antidote – John 14: 16-17”
A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. “Give glory to God by telling the truth,” they said. “We know this man is a sinner.”
He replied, “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”
John 9: 24-25
Have you ever noticed how some people will try and change the subject when they are losing an argument? In this story, the Pharisees are on the losing side of the argument, and whether they admit it or not, they seem to know it. When they demand to know the “truth” they are really saying that they think the truth is a lie. When they claim that Jesus is a sinner, they are making a claim to something that they really do not understand.
Continue reading “Facts”
Each one of us has a sense of what “Truth” is or isn’t. Yet how many of us are right? If one hundred people each have a different idea of “Truth” then there are one hundred different definitions of truth. What are the odds that even one of those is right, let alone one? Certainly there can be no more than one true Truth.
Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me!