BIBLE VERSE FOR THOUGHT
Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, look and take note! Search her squares to see if you can find a man, one who does justice and seeks truth, that I may pardon her.
Jeremiah 5: 1, ESV
DEFINITION FOR THE DAY: truth
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/truth
1. a. the body of real things, events, and facts
b. the state of being the case
c. a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality
2. a. the property of being in accord with facts or reality
b. fidelity to an original or to a standard
3. a. sincerity in action, character, and utterance
b. fidelity, constancy
God sent his prophet Jeremiah through the streets of Jerusalem in search of one man who practiced justice and sought truth. His promise was to spare Jerusalem if even one faithful, obedient, and upright man could be found. Of course, the people of Judah had abandoned their historic faith and adopted evil and wicked ways o neighboring and threatening nations. They were eventually defeated and many of them, including Jeremiah, were taken into Babylonian captivity. My purpose in this context is not to recount the history of God's people. It is to provide an example from Scripture of the value of being people of truth. Jeremiah was sent to find just one!
My Christian worldview acknowledges that God's people in the New Covenant are to be people of The Truth, that is, the truth of the Christian Gospel--Christ's birth, perfect life, vicarious death, glorious resurrection, and imminent second coming. Under that purpose, however, there is the expectation that we be people of truth, a population of humans devoted to the pursuit of honesty, decency, and sensibility. My personal submission to The Truth should awaken in me a deep, abiding commitment to the joys of upright behavior, including how I respond to the fake news that disguises truth and hinders it. People of The Truth should not be people of lies, rumors, gossip. fictitious data, and misinformation. Our mission to speak The Truth in love should always condition us to communicate truth in every contact. Truth should be a distinguishing mark of those of us who hold to The Truth. Sadly, that is not always the deal!
There is an article by Ed Stetzer titled Being People of Truth in a World of Fake News published in The Exchange by the reputable Christianity Today magazine. If you would like to read this article, click here. The closing paragraph is challenging and inspiring---
Ultimately, remember that we follow a Man who claimed to be the Truth. He told Pilate
that He came to testify to the truth. Pilate then asked, “What is truth?” That is the
question of our time. The truth will be clearer if it isn’t hidden among the clickbait in
our lives.
This is a matter of spiritual discipline. In my mind being resistant to fake news is possible only as we know matters of truth and practice them. Useful to me on a daily basis are the words the Apostle Paul wrote to the Roman believers---
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,
that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable
and perfect.
Romans 12: 2, ESV
Being informed begins by being transformed and resists being conformed. And, that transformation should position us to be being people of truth.
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