Distinguishing Truth
A few months ago, I heard a familiar line to a song that made me pause. The words, “Rumors of a Son of man” stood out from the rest. Now the direction my mind went was not necessarily parallel to the message of the song. But all the same, I couldn’t help contemplating the word “rumors”.
A rumor is something you hear second hand from someone, that may or may not be true. It is not something you experience first hand. It is not necessarily fact. Often it is something that is misconstrued, misinterpreted, or exaggerated in a negative way.
We hear lots of things these days. Lots of different perspectives. There are so many avenues for us to hear different sides of the story. We have our parents, teachers, news, media, influencers… They are all saying lots of things, especially about faith.
In some ways so much of what I hear about faith, God, Jesus, and the Church feel like rumors. Things I hear in podcasts, instagram captions, on the news, even things I thought I was understanding as a kid.They feel like they could be true, but are still slightly (or greatly) off center from Truth in scripture.
Thankfully Jesus is the only constant unchangeable thing. He remains the same, even as my understanding and perspective changes.
What I used to think even seems more like rumors in contrast to the character of Jesus that I have come to experience through the Word and through the Spirit. As I grow, I see more of my sin and need. Thankfully in our sin He gives us grace and understanding.
In my own understanding I know so little. In my own experience, I lack so much. But with the Spirit, scriptures can come to life. The Word becomes living and active. I am given eyes to see and ears to hear what I could never on my own.
The Bible says that if you seek Him you will find Him. That He desires for us to understand. He gave us His Spirit that we can know Him. But we must seek Him. We must hear His call and turn to Him.
He never wanted us to blindly follow Him. But we do need to acknowledge that we may have false misconceptions. We may have tried to understand Him with our own understanding.
We need to humble ourselves to admit that He is Holy and other than us.
So without Him helping us to understand, we are almost certainly going to misconstrue what He says. Even who He is. We must even admit that those who mean well may have communicated things, intentionally or not, that missed the mark of what is True.
And maybe more so than ever, we need to acknowledge that the world is trying to tell us who Jesus is. The media, politician, influencers. They all have an opinion. But they may not be the best source of information.
Let us go to the source of Truth. Seek Him out. Let Him tell us who He is.
So for those who, like me, knew God as a child. For those that never meant to walk away, but have found themselves in a place where God just doesn’t seem that relevant to their everyday lives. To those who feel like worship is a “cultural norm” reserved for Sundays, and God is a character of their youth.
To those who think they have outgrown the Church.
In this Easter season, I urge you to take another look. You may see things through new eyes. You may look at the Jesus you thought you knew and stand in awe. You may read familiar scriptures that seem to say something completely new altogether.
At least that is what happened to me.
