An idea was popularised last century, claiming that all truth is God’s truth. This idea was used to allow Christians to credit secular ideas embraced in the community which seemed like good ideas.
The sense was that God would reveal key things to people who were not Christians which enhanced our way of life. So when non-believers, or even God haters, came up with something seemingly beneficial and widely appreciated we were to assume God used those people to bring ‘Truth’ to the world for the good of all.
If it is truth, we were told, then it must have come from God. All truth is God’s truth. No matter who the voice that brings that truth we must accept it and thank God for it.
However this idea is fraught with difficulties and bad fruit.
The first problem is blurring the lines between God’s revealed truth and popularised secular ideas.
God is God!!! And what God knows and reveals is of supreme divine standing and importance. God is the ultimate moral being, and is ultimate wisdom and knowledge.
God’s ways are as far above our ways as stars in the sky are higher than the highest mountain.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8,9
Human ideas are weak and sickly compared to the amazing and powerful ways and wisdom of God.
And Jesus, Himself, is Truth. So truth has a moral quality, built on the person of Jesus Christ.
“I am the way, the truth and the life.” John 14:6
The second problem is a matter of perspective, or different value systems. God’s perspective and value system is based on ultimate truth and holiness. What is true to God is truly true. The highest standing man can have is to live on the basis of God’s truth and God’s value system.
Yet to the human heart and mind there are things that are appealing, and that appease the human mind. They make sense to the human mind and they seem absolutely like the right thoughts to think and right way to go. Yet we are warned that the way man thinks is right leads to the worst possible outcomes.
“There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.” Proverbs 16:25
What man thinks of as ‘wisdom’ and truth is from a completely different starting point to the wisdom and truth of God. Man’s wisdom sees things from the human perspective, and appeals to man’s emotional filter for what seems right, but is actually serving the devil’s plans.
“This wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish.” James 3:15
We can try to convince ourself that ‘all truth is God’s truth’, but what we are calling ‘truth’ is likely to lead to destruction and be merely ‘earthly, sensual, devilish’.
So the whole idea that all truth is God’s truth is nothing more than a smoke-screen to allow lesser ideas to stand beside God’s truth. It is treating the water as if it is wine and chaff as if it is wheat.
“Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let him who has My Word speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? declares the Lord.” Jeremiah 23:28
Back last century Christians were told to follow the ideas of pop psychology, since they were ‘truth’ and ‘all truth is God’s truth’. Yet the child-raising philosophy of Dr Spock was contrary to God’s Word. And ideas about all manner of things to do with human behaviour were also opposite to God’s Word. Ignorant church people were drawn away from the truth that sets them free, to devilish ideas that enslave.
Jesus, Who is the Truth (John 14:6), brings us truth that sets us free.
“You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” John 8:32
The devil’s plan is to ‘steal, kill and destroy’, so he is ready to lie and cheat and steal, including to deceive the whole world, in order to keep you from God’s truth.
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10
To those Christians who are sensual, living according to their human desires, the ideas and values of the world are appealing. They want to believe that ‘all truth is God’s truth’ so they can ignore God’s wisdom and follow the world’s values. However we are warned that loving this world separates us from God.
“Love not the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” 1John 2:15
You live in a war zone, where the kingdom of light, God’s Kingdom, is in conflict with the kingdom of darkness. You have been delivered from darkness, but satan is keen to snare you back into things that steal from you and kill your spiritual life. And satan is a liar, ready to deceive you if you are silly enough to listen to him.
“You are of your father the devil, and you will do your father’s wishes. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” John 8:44
You cannot glibly accept the ideas popularised in the world. You cannot glibly accept the world’s value system. You cannot glibly give value to the things in this world, no matter how much the general public is enamoured with something or devoted to it.
You belong to a different kingdom that is not of this world. The wonders and powers of that kingdom, the Kingdom of God, are yours while you live in this world. Yet if the world can seduce you to love it and to live by its values you are like a bird with clipped wings. You can’t fly. You can’t sour into the heavenly powers and blessings Jesus bought for you on the cross.
There is truth that sets you free and it is definitely not the world’s truth. That doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy technology and all manner of things on the earth, but it does mean you need to KNOW the truth, God’s Truth, and live by is so you can live in the wonderful freedom Christ purchased for you.
Following the world’s pop culture and the ideas that seem to be wise in the eyes of man is no way to know God’s Truth, because all things upheld to be truth in this world are not necessarily God’s Truth.
You need to KNOW God’s Truth, in order to be Free.
“You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” John 8:32
It is time to dig into God’s Word and search out truth and wisdom that is quite separate to what the world calls truth and wisdom. It is time to keep pressing into what God has said in His Word (the Bible) and keep finding that the truth, God’s Truth, continues to set you free.
And keep in mind as your internal wisdom and perspective that All Truth is Not God’s Truth.
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