What is Truth?

Allow me to take you to the happenings in the trial of the man called Jesus, who lived between 4 B.C to 32 A.D. Almost two thousand years ago, Truth was put on trial and judged by people who were devoted to lies. As Jesus, the Truth, stood before Pilate, more lies were brought against Him. His enemies said, “We found this man misleading our nation and forbidding to pay taxes to Caesar, and saying that He Himself is Christ, a King” (Refer Luke 23:2 Bible). This was a lie, as the Truth had told everyone to pay their taxes (Refer Matthew 22:21 Bible) and never spoke of Himself as a challenge to Caesar. The Sanhedrin, the official Jewish council under Roman rule, was convinced to get rid of this man Jesus because of the amount of truth He embodied. They were not able to resist the truth and manipulated the Roman government into thinking that He is worthy of death.

But the truth of the story is that this man Jesus had already predicted not only the nature of His death but His resurrection too. This is one of the greatest facts and happenings, which shook the entire world to know that the man Jesus who raised several people from death, Himself rose from His death after three days. He attributed this incident to mankind’s redemption and salvation from their sins, giving a hope to life after death. A person’s belief in Jesus gives him/her a different ending i.e., the ones who believe in His resurrection and repent of their sins get eternal life with God after death but those who refuse Him, do it at the risk of spending in Christless eternity.

 I found this very important to put what truth is "not" in order to understand what Truth "is":

• Truth is not simply whatever works. This is the philosophy of pragmatism—an ends-vs-means-type approach. In reality, lies can appear to “work,” but they are still lies and not the truth.
• Truth is not simply what is coherent or understandable. A group of people can get together and form a conspiracy based on a set of falsehoods where they all agree to tell the same false story, but it does not make their presentation true.
• Truth is not what makes people feel good. Unfortunately, bad news can be true.
• Truth is not what the majority says is true. Fifty-one percent of a group can reach a wrong conclusion.
• Truth is not what is comprehensive. A lengthy, detailed presentation can still result in a false conclusion.
• Truth is not defined by what is intended. Good intentions can still be wrong.
• Truth is not how we know; truth is what we know.
• Truth is not simply what is believed. A lie believed is still a lie.
• Truth is not what is publicly proved. A truth can be privately known (for example, the location of buried treasure).

Recently, it is not the celebration of Easter (the resurrection story), but the greatest happenings of mankind that needs our attention. And I want to close with a bold claim of Jesus who said, “I am the way, the truth and the life…”. If you want to find hope in your life, put together now and after death, then you need the Savior to forgive your sins and indwell your heart. I guarantee your life will never be the same again.

 

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The Resurrection revolution!

Today, Easter is celebrated all over the world. However, contrary to our understanding, it is not a just a celebration of religious festival that recurs every year or about Easter eggs. It is about resurrection event that is historical and has proved all fabricated stories by the world, wrong. Every religion has a story irrespective of whether it is tale or a narrative story or found validation in history and archaeology. One of the recorded facts in the Bible and in history is the record of this statement which says, “They went in (to the tomb where Jesus was buried) but did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.” (Luke 24:3 Bible). This, is the greatest undisputed fact recorded in the Bible, in history and more importantly by the all the world’s historians and archaeologists, including the records of the renowned Roman Historian, Cornelius Tacitus.

Every single detail in the Bible is a verifiable fact. For example, the phrase "under Pontious Pilate" is possibly the smartest phrase recorded in creed. It takes Christianity from being like any other religion where these tales could have been at any time, if they happened at all, and puts it at an exact historical time. It makes Christianity a historic religion that can use history as proof to its claims. Christ lived, and died under Pontius Pilate, a real life Roman prefect of Judea. This is fact, and it makes Christianity truly special, and historically real.

Many in the past, challenged and took all effort to disapprove the resurrection, because it is one of the greatest breath-taking happening in the entire history of mankind that stood distinct, thereby giving hope to mankind to follow a living God and make Him the Lord of their life.

Let me name few of them:

1. French philosopher Voltaire in the 17th century. He predicted in 1776, “in one hundred years from my day, there will not be a Bible on earth except one that is looked upon by an antiquarian curiosity-seeker.” As the story alleges, within fifty years after his death, in an ironic twist of Providence, the very house in which he once lived and wrote was used by the Evangelical Society of Geneva as a storehouse for Bibles and Gospel tracts and the printing presses he used to print his irreverent works were used to print Bibles.

2. Gilbert West lived in 18th century. He did not like Christians growing in numbers so he decided to write a book to disprove resurrection because by disproving resurrection, one can disprove Christianity. So, he started researching and writing the book. Halfway through the book he met Jesus. He ended up writing a book with a reverse focus.

3. American atheist in the 19th century: He didn't like it that Christianity was growing. Had a great friend who was very famous general called General Wallace. He said to his friend, “Lew you've got to help me out. Let's damage Christianity and let's damage the church. Why don't you write a book disproving the resurrection?”. So, Lew begins to write his book. Lew's wife was actually a Christian. She was praying while he was writing. When he got to chapter 4 of one of the Gospels in the Bible, he met Jesus. He ended up writing a book with a reverse focus and it is called “Ben Hur”.

4. Frank Morrison lawyer and a journalist in the 20th century: He decided that he would shatter Christianity and the only way you can do that is to disprove the resurrection. Being a lawyer, he knows how to play around with the material. He got so much of evidence, half way through the book he met Jesus and he ended up writing a book with a reverse focus. The book is called ‘Who Moved The Stone?’.

The disciples of Jesus and Roman soldiers were amazed to see the sealed tomb exist but Jesus’ body was not there. The resurrected Jesus lived with people for 40 days appearing to many and eating with His disciples. He promised abundant life and eternal life. All this is possible because of His resurrection. You can find Him to be the Savior and Lord of your life.

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The half bad and the half good!

 

The beautiful poem 'Two Kinds of People' by Wheeler Wilcox brings out the great analogy of the good and the bad divide. It says:

"There are two kinds of people on earth to-day;

Just two kinds of people, no more I say.

Not the sinner and saint, for it's well understood

The good are half bad and the bad are half good.

 Not the rich and the poor, for to rate a man's wealth,

You must first know the state of his conscience and health. . ."

The problem of bad is that it is embedded in the good. This is why people often mistake good for bad and vice versa. One of the characteristics of the God of the Bible is Love. The Bible says, “God is love.” But if we have to find one word that captures the essence of God’s nature, it is 'holiness'. It is written “Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts”, And again it says, 'Be ye holy, because I am holy'. This means anything bad or evil cannot survive in holiness as much as good does.

God’s holiness makes us unreachable, hence religion suggests techniques, advice and rituals to work out our salvation. But sadly, religious dogmas don’t guarantee salvation. The reason being it gives us vague assumptions that through constant births and rebirths, at some given point, we will attain salvation with our ongoing religious rituals, giving us no definite assurance. And some religious beliefs even say, it is the will of the sovereign one to grant Salvation or withhold man from finding it.

There are countless suggestions to reach God, but no one has given definite assurance like Jesus, in human history. Coming week, the world will celebrate Good Friday. Have you ever wondered why it is called ‘good’? The reasons being He was a holy God who is “the way, the truth and the life”, was in human form embodying innocence. He healed the blind, deaf, mute, lepers, and all kinds of sickness and raised people from the dead, but ended up being crucified on the cross. He was God who lived among us as a human, predicting the details of His death and resurrection on the third day. This is what we celebrate as Easter, as we know, globally. He said, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” Do you believe this?

One may wonder, how does His death and resurrection help human kind? It is because of the hope He gives in this life and after our death too. We find salvation when we believe and accept Him as our Saviour. It is in the Person Jesus; this is achieved and not in any religion including Christianity, as we often misunderstand. He died and rose on the third day, which makes Him a living God. The Bible says, "For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.". I highly recommend you to refer to the Bible first and to further feed your curiosity, you can read the writings of Cornelius Tacitus, the finest Roman Historian and Josephus, the Greek historian, whose writings are accepted worldwide.

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Trusting on God- Does it matter?

 

The world we live in and the age that we are in are continuously being revamped and modernized with unimaginable alterations. I don’t intend to comment if it is getting better or worse but the ones who belong to the time period before 1970’s or 1980’s would say, life was simple and enriching, when compared to the present. Though the present world looks modernized it is filled with doubts, fears, challenges and uncertainty. We have become gods of our generation. Trust in God is either deteriorating or it is not making much sense, today. We live in an information age, which means things are swifter to an extent that we don’t have to wait much. And moreover, each one of us to a larger extent can independently manage things faster, by ourselves. In such situations our need for God usually tones down drastically.

We choose to do things that has the ability to make us happy, and that’s all that matters. One of the main reasons that we trust God too little is because we trust our own wisdom too much. We think we know far better than God and do things that make us happy. Every human being who has lived into middle age knows how often we have been wrong about that. Yet our hearts continue to operate on this same principle, year after year. We remember how foolish we were at age twenty but think now that we are forty we know better, failing to acknowledge that fact that only God knows.

Humans are not god, though in most cases we humans elevate a particular person to be called as god. And we have stories of such elevated godmen indulging in all evil things including abuse of children and women. Jesus’ story has revolutionized the entire world because of the history that validates every single event. The way He lived was matchless. He lived a holy life and demanded people to repent of their evil deeds, healed the sick and raised the dead people to life and most importantly predicted His own death, was crucified, buried and was resurrected. Soon people around the world will be celebrating ‘Easter’, the only event of a man resurrected from death and is a living God. If this doesn’t fascinate us, then nothing else will. His priority was not building empire or encourage His followers to erect Cathedrals, but giving hope to people about life after death. And that makes sense because of His own resurrection. He made this fascinating claim by saying, “I am the way the truth and the life”. You can trust this God and accept the salvation offered on the cross of Calvary. Trusting Jesus matters because of the difference He made in human history. He is in absolute control including the minute details of your life. You can get a copy of the Bible and read the book of John to understand for yourself in this Easter season.

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