Great Truth

“In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” “What is truth?” Pilate asked.   —John 18:37-38a

As soon as my alarm goes off, I turn the TV to my wife’s favorite show, the Weather channel and the all important Local on the 8’s. Then I turn to WJAC to catch the “real” local weather. If we are running a little late, we may catch a bit of the national morning news show with its usual sensational but insignificant stories. Last Thursday’s went something like this: Mother of 14 including octuplets is here in the studio. Also coming up is the 42 page report detailing how singing great, Whitney Houston, drowned face-down in her bathtub in 10 inches of water.

We are either bombarded with controversial but insignificant details of someone’s life or overwhelmed by scandalous and painfully personal details about a celebrity. Although some may find it interesting whether octomom is on or off welfare, I couldn’t care less. I hurt for and am praying for the Houston family but really feel the personal details of her death are none of my business.

Living in the technology and information age, one would think we would be more judicious in our use of information. We know more, have instant access to more, but discern less. Leo Tolstoy, author of War and Peace, wrote another book called A Confession in 1879 in which he tells the story of his search for meaning in life. In his time, as well as ours today, few persons were asking the first order questions of life. “Where did I come from?” “Where am I heading?” “What is life about?” Although Tolstoy rejected Christianity early in life, he eventually found that the peasant people of Russia had found the answers through their Christian faith. He came to realize that only in Jesus Christ do we find the answer.

If you want to talk about great news, listen to how people are finding the greatest truth of all in the Good News of the Gospel. James Rutz in his book, Megashift, reports on the revival of Christianity in our world. In Acts 2, 3,000 people became Christians on the Day of Pentecost. Today, that is happening around the world every 25 minutes. In one meeting in Lagos, Nigeria, 3,400,000 recorded their decisions for Christ out of the six million that came. Campus Crusade for Christ estimates we’ll see a billion new converts in the next 10 years.

As Pontius Pilate interrogated Jesus, he asked, “What is truth?” He might have asked a better question, “What does it matter?” Theologian and Catholic Cardinal, Jean Danielou, once wrote, “Truth consists in the mind giving to things the importance they have in reality.” Just knowing facts doesn’t matter as much as knowing the importance of those facts. What does the fact that Jesus is the King of the Jews and the Son of God matter to you and me? The Bible declares, “There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). Amid a culture of insignificant facts, let us ask ourselves important questions. What we are doing with the fact of God’s great love for us in Jesus Christ?  “How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation?” (Hebrews 2:3) Jesus came to save you and me and to give us meaning and abundant life. This is the great truth of the Good News.