Thought for Today
Exodus 20:16 You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
Psalm 89:35 Once and for all I have sworn by my holiness; I will not lie to David.
Matthew 15:18 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles. 19 For out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander.
“The nature of the lie is found much deeper than in the contradiction between thought and word . . . A lie is a contradiction of the word of God that he spoke in Christ and upon which the creation rests . . . Our words have the requirement, in unity with God’s word, to assert what is real as it is found in God, and our silence is supposed to be a sign of the boundary that is drawn through what is real as it is found in God.” (I Want to Live These Days with You, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, pg. 275)
It seems that we encounter almost daily some assertion in the media or in public discourse that a person is spreading ‘false news’ or ‘fake news.’ Implicit in all the current buzz about AI is the reality that it is becoming increasingly difficult to discern the difference between truth and lie. AI is capable of creating digital images of almost anyone saying almost anything. In our increasingly digital age, it is even possible to delete digital records, to erase any electronic record of any information. We are not yet to the extreme presented in George Orwell’s 1984, but the possibility of what he wrote is more than imaginable today.
When I think about the issue of truth, I always remember the almost iconic words of Jack Nicholson’s character in A Few Good Men, “Truth! You can’t handle the truth!” Reading that line pales in comparison to the impact of Jack Nicholson’s saying those words. Was that character correct? Can we handle the truth?
In order for us to handle the truth, we must be able to discern the truth. We must know how to distinguish between the real and the digitally manipulated. Those words from Dietrich Bonhoeffer were written in the middle of the last century. Much of what is presented for devotionals this week in that book deals with the very topic of truth versus untruth. Bonhoeffer approaches the topic from the perspective of being a Christian.
I must admit, Dietrich Bonhoeffer is one of my personal heroes. His were some of the first words of theology I ever read and his words still form the core of much of my Christian belief. I must also admit, however, that I began to learn theology at a much younger age. The essence of my core of Christian belief was formed at the feet of my parents and the family of faith that nurtured me as a child. The minister who baptized me, the Sunday School teachers who introduced me to the wonders of the Bible, and my parents were all my earliest instructors in truth, in bearing true witness and in knowing and living the truth.
Truth must begin and end with God. Truth must be firmly based on, “Genesis 1:1 In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth.” Our ancestors-in-the-faith lamented, “Psalm 137:4 How could we sing the LORD's song in a foreign land?” For us, the question is not that, but, rather how can we sing anything other than “the LORD's song in” any land? Watching television, listening to the radio, reading in any news report makes it abundantly clear that some are singing other songs. Sometimes, even listening to public discourse, even listening to ‘discussions’ in our own family makes it equally clear that some are singing other songs.
What are Christians to do? How are we to discern truth from lies, to discover the true witness in the proliferating weeds of the world around us? We have made astounding advances in communication. We have opened up the world of electronics, of computers, of social media. How are we to tell the real from the imaginary, the truth from the lies? When we do, can we handle the truth?
For me, Dietrich Bonhoeffer in those words above offers an answer. The lessons I learned from my parents, those Sunday School teachers and in my faith journey offer the answer. “A lie is a contradiction of the word of God that he spoke in Christ and upon which the creation rests.” “Our words have the requirement, in unity with God’s word, to assert what is real as it is found in God.” Sometimes it is hard to discern the nuggets of truth in what we read and hear. The Bible and the Holy Spirit are always there to help us find our true path through all of those weeds.
Stay safe, read the Bible and pray, trust God,
Pastor Ray