What is Truth?

A lot of folks think that something becomes true just because they happen to believe it. In other words, believing in something makes it true. You have your truth, that person over there has their truth, and I have my truth. It doesn't really matter what you believe in so long as you believe it. As long as you believe in something, that something is "true" for you and that makes it okay.

I am here to tell you that is incredibly wrong, lose your life wrong, on the bad side of eternity wrong. If me saying that steps on your toes, you really need to read the rest of this blog post. 

Real truth has a quality all its own. Whatever is true, really true, is true with or without me. That's the way it is with the physical world and the spiritual world, the seen and the unseen. 

Truth never needs my agreement. It doesn't depend upon me believing in it or acting upon it. It doesn't bend if I disagree with it or wish it were different. It doesn't become "more true" if I do believe it. I can believe whatever I want, but my belief or unbelief doesn't have anything to do with whether something is true. 

If something is true, it is that way before I believe it to be so. If something is untrue, it doesn't matter what I believe, it's still untrue. From a philosophical standpoint, this means there is absolute truth. 

Unfortunately, modern culture holds that it doesn't matter what you believe as long as you believe in something. Modern culture holds that as long as you have some kind of spiritual belief system, any kind, well, that's good, because it's all about what you believe. Philosophically, this is a system of relative truth.

Your truth is true for you, or so they say. Someone else's truth is true for them. It's sad, but that is very, very wrong, and everyone will ultimately know it. I have legs; that is truth. Austin is the Capital of Texas; that is truth. I filled my car's gas tank with a gas/ethanol mixture yesterday; that is truth. Mathematically, 2 + 2 = 4; that is truth. Those things are all true whether I believe them or not.

If I strongly believe that my legs are airplanes, that doesn't make them airplanes. If I passionately believe that Montana is the Capital of Texas, that doesn't make it so. If I emphatically believe that I filled my car's gas tank with cement yesterday, that doesn't make it so. If I believe so much that I'm willing to bet my life that 2 + 2 = 57, it still doesn't make it so. 

There you have it: truth does not exist because I believe in it. And if believe in something that's untrue, it's still untrue. My belief system doesn't affect truth.

I do not impact truth, but truth will impact me.

Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, "What is truth?" One of the best responses I know is this: Truth is whatever God says it is. But truth can be summed up in another way. 

Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life." (John 14:6). He made it very personal. He did not say "I will show you the way, I will teach you the truth, I will point out to you the life." No. HE is the way, HE is the truth, HE is the life. Knowing Him and loving Him is the only way out. 

Movies and TV shows about the end times, featuring the Antichrist and Armageddon, have become big sellers. One wonders how people will be so deceived by Satan. The Apostle Paul wrote that it will be because those folks "did not receive the love of the truth." (2 Thessalonians 2:10) Whatever else that means, it means that deceived folks don't love Jesus.