John 18:37 - "For
this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear
witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice."
During
His interrogation by Pontius Pilate, Christ says that He came to bear
witness to the truth, and He says that everyone who is of the truth
hears His voice; those who are of the truth listen to Christ. The Bible
declares that God is true and therefore truth is that which corresponds
with His nature and character. Truth is the self-expression of God. To
the extent that something matches up with who He is and what He says it
is true, and to the extent that it is contrary to His nature and His
Word it is false. So God is the foundation and the ultimate standard of
all truth. Truth is not a matter of taste or preference, and it's not
subjective or relative.
Now, there are those
in this world who would agree that we need to pursue the truth. They
would say, "Absolutely, we need to examine the facts, look at the
evidence and find out what is true." The problem is that many of these
people have already rejected God's existence. They say that we need to
pursue the truth but they've rejected the one who is Himself Truth. God
is the Founder and the foundation of truth; all truth comes from Him, so
when you try to pursue truth and yet reject God you have no solid basis
from which to discover truth. And yet, ironically enough, this
mentality is prevalent in our institutions of learning. We seek to
educate people in the truth while at the same time rejecting the very
existence of God. These teachers and professors are all about knowledge,
but God's Word says in Proverbs 1:7 that - "The fear of the Lord is the beginning
of knowledge." When you try to pursue knowledge but you don't start
with God then your efforts become futile. You have to begin at the
beginning, and the beginning of knowledge is the fear of the Lord. They
profess to be wise, but as Proverbs 9:10 states - "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,
and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." They don't start
with the fear of the Lord, instead, as Romans 1 says - "They exchanged
the truth of God for a lie." And, "Professing to be wise they became
fools." Every pursuit of truth begins in one of two places. There are
two foundations on which we build our understanding of truth; either
truth originates with God, or man decides truth. What you believe on
this foundational issue of the origin of truth effects every area of
your life. Your belief on this issue defines your worldview. Either
truth originates with God or it originates with man. And if you decide
that man determines truth then you'll be building your life on a
foundation that is continually shifting, and in the end you'll find your
life in ruins.
I
saw a copy of National Geographic this past week and the cover caught
my attention. In big letters across the front cover it said "THE WAR ON
SCIENCE" So, I was interested, I decided to pick it up and read about
the war on science. Now, the article opened up by saying that what we
believe effects what we do. What we believe to be true has an affect on
the way that we live our lives. So "we have to decide what to believe and how to act on it."
So how do we decide what is true? According to this article, we need to
use science. So far so good, no one should be opposed to science,
but we need to remember what science actually is. Science is a process
of learning that is based on observation and experimentation. The
dictionary defines science like this, "Systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation."
Too often though, things like the big bang or the origin of life from
non-life are called 'science,' but these things are simply theories.
They haven't been observed or discovered through experimentation, but
many people will still refer to these things as "Science" even though
it's not science, and if you reject their theories they accuse you of
being opposed to science. Anyway, this article said that we need to use
the scientific process, examine the evidence, use
observation and experiments to find the facts. Sound good? Sounds good.
But this article goes on to show how unstable this foundation really is.
The author says "Scientific results are always provisional,
susceptible to being overturned by some future experiment or
observation. Scientists rarely proclaim an absolute truth or an absolute
certainty. Uncertainty is inevitable." So, according to this
article we need to use the scientific process to determine truth, BUT,
what we determine to be truth, we may find out in a couple years that
it's not really true at all. What we discover truth to be is subject to
change, according to this article. We're not going to say that truth is
absolute, because, really, we don't know.
It goes on to say "Science
will find the truth. It may get it wrong the first time and maybe the
second time, but ultimately it will find the truth." So scientist
might declare something as true today and then tomorrow find out that
they were wrong. But science will ultimately find the truth. How long is
it going to take? Well, we don't know, but it will get there
eventually.
One professor that was interviewed in this article said this "We
believe in scientific ideas not because we have evaluated all the
evidence but because we feel an affinity for the scientific community."
I love that honesty. Basically he's saying, our beliefs aren't solely
based on an honest evaluation of the evidence, but we have an attraction
to the scientific community, so the way that we feel about this has an
affect on how we determine what is true. He goes on to say "People tend to use scientific knowledge to reinforce beliefs that have already been shaped by their worldview."
This is great, usually they don't admit this. As a Christian who
believes that the Bible is the authoritative Word of God, the ultimate
truth, I look at the world through the lens of Scripture, and I
interpret the world based on what the Bible says. So, for instance, when
I'm flipping through an instruction manual looking for the directions
in English, and I ask myself, "Why are there so many languages?" I can
say, "Because in Genesis chapter 11 God came down at the tower of Babel
and confused the languages of the people." When you consider questions
like, why are there fossils found in rock layers all over the earth? You
can look back at Genesis chapter 6 when God flooded the entire world
and see how this would cause fossils to be laid down in rock layers all
over the world. I look at these things through the lens of Scripture
with the assumption that God's Word is truth. But those who reject God
and His Word have their own worldview through which they interpret the
world, and they come to their own conclusions on the basis that man
decides truth. And this article admits that your feelings, your affinity
and your worldview affect how you interpret the scientific evidence.
The article draws to a close by saying, "Science tells us the truth." And it tells us that we need to "trust people who are using the scientific method to decide which way we fall on these questions."
Do you realize what just happened there? "Science tells us the truth."
Does science tell us the truth? Yeah, we can discover certain truths by
using the scientific method. But then it goes on to say that we need to
"trust the people who are using the scientific methods" to decide what
truth is. Science will tell the truth, so trust people. They're not
calling on us to trust science, but to trust people. People who,
according to this article are being influenced by their feelings and by
their worldview. People who are using what they find to support what
they already believe. People who are using a process that isn't without flaw
either, right? They admitted, it might get it wrong the first time, it
might get it wrong the second time, but they'll get it right eventually.
But this article states that you and I need to trust something that is
provisional, that's susceptible to being overturned by a future
experiment or observation. We're not going to say that this truth is
absolute because we might find out tomorrow that we were wrong, but
that's what they tell us we need to trust. That doesn't sound like a
very secure place to put our trust. But that's where we stand when we
believe that man determines truth.
Jeremiah 17 - "Thus says the Lord, “Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from the Lord... The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds. As a partridge that hatches eggs which it has not laid, so is he who makes a fortune, but unjustly; in the midst of his days it will forsake him, and
in the end he will be a fool.”" All those who are making their living
on deception, on undermining the truth of God under the guise of
"knowledge" in the end they will be found to be fools; for the fool has
said in his heart, "there is no God." All the so called "knowledge" that
doesn't match up with God's truth, He's gonna set it aside. Oh, it may
reign in our day, it may be a part of the talk show's you listen to and
the articles you read, but one day, as 1 Corinthians 1 says, all this
supposed wisdom of the wise, and the intelligence of the intelligent,
God's going to set it aside. "Where is the wise man? Where is the
scholar? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the
wisdom of the world?" Why? "For since in the wisdom of God the world
through it's wisdom did not know God."
Everyone
is building their lives on some foundation of truth. Those who reject
God are building on the shifting sand of mans reason, the ever changing
standard of "man decides truth." The only solid foundation of truth is
the true God Himself. He is the solid Rock that never changes.
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