How Do We Arrive at Truth?

By Melissa

On the day of Jesus' crucifixion, in John chapter 18, we see an interesting exchange. Pilate is questioning Jesus' about His identity because he is trying to determine if Jesus is worthy of death. After Jesus reveals to Pilate that he is a King, He tells Pilate why He came into the world. John 18:37 reads: "You say correctly that I am a king For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice." Pilate responds with a question that I think that we all have asked at one time or another in our lives. In verse 38 when he responds: "What is truth"?

Many today are still on the hunt trying to define what truth really is. There are three main approaches that people tend to employ when dealing with the subjects of knowledge and how we can arrive at the truth (epistemology). For the sake of argument, I am not including relativism. Relativism is the belief that there is no absolute truth and that truth is relative to each individual person. So for instance, what is true for me, may not be true for you. Not to go down a rabbit trail, but this is a self refuting statement because in order to impose that there is no absolute truth is to affirm an absolute truth, namely that there is no absolute truth (if that makes any sense). The point is that I as a person have no bearing on what is & what is not. We merely discover truth & do not determine truth. For instance, someone may not want to believe that I am married, but that has no bearing on the fact that I am married. For the purpose of this discussion however, we will focus on the three perspectives that do point to the fact that there is absolute truth and that truth is knowable.

The first method that people employ when dealing with the subjects of knowledge and truth is rationalism. Rationalism holds to the view that knowledge starts in the human mind. There is an emphasis on thinking and ideas because after all, our minds are the source of all truth. Rationalism falls apart; however, because there is a built in assumption that our minds have the capacity to know everything. In other words, if we can't think it with our minds, then it can't really be. Therefore, there is no such thing as the unknown. The unknown simply represents those things that we have not explored with our minds yet. This view fails miserably because things don't exist merely because we can invent them with our mind. For example, gravity was not discovered by Sir Isaac Newton until the 1600's, but does that mean that gravity did not exist before then? Certainly not. Rationalism is a valuable tool for daily living, but are we willing to ultimately say that no truth exists outside of us? Truth and natural laws exists regardless of our awareness of them or lack thereof.

The second method that people employ when dealing with truth and knowledge is empiricism. Empiricism can be summed up with the phrase "seeing is believing". In other words, all that we can know is what can be determined by the use of our senses- what we see, hear, feel, taste and touch. Scientific experiments start from this perspective. However, this method is also limited because we can't reproduce events from the past. Neither can we see these events occurring. For example, none of us were around to see the Revolutionary War take place, but no one would question its' occurrence because of the historical evidence. But if I was applying the empirical method in this case, then I couldn't be certain that the Revolutionary War actually occurred because I wasn't actually there to see it happen. As I stated earlier, scientists approach experiments from an empirical perspective. Don't get me wrong, this is highly effective in dealing with observational subject matter (things that we can observe today in nature or in a laboratory). However, when dealing with forensic science (when scientists try to determine what happened in the past), empiricism falls short. Not to get off on another rabbit trail, but it's amazing how some scientists, who hold strongly to the empirical model, try to make dogmatic claims about the theory of evolution, when they were not around the supposed billions of years ago to see these supposed chemicals supposedly randomly arrange themselves together into a self-replicating molecule that supposedly was the spark of all life. There is a bit of hypocrisy there. Anyway, empiricism is useful, but ultimately it falls short, because truth then is limited to what we can see, hear, touch, taste and smell. Again, this leaves no room for the unknown or the past.



The third perspective is what is known of as revelatory knowledge. This would describe the Christian view of knowledge. This view holds that truth does exist outside us and is revealed by Someone also on the outside. You see, God is a transcendent Being, which means that He exists above and beyond His creation. However, rather than remain outside, He has penetrated within His creation to reveal truth to us. There are two clear ways that God has revealed Himself to mankind. The first is through general revelation, which is through nature. Romans 1:20 declares: "For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse". So through His creation, we can clearly see that there is a Creator. Nature would include all of the created world so this would include our minds and our conscious, which point us to truth as well. Secondly, God also reveals Himself more specifically in His Word, the Holy Bible. Ultimately, we can know things about God from nature such as the fact that God is all-powerful, eternal and immaterial, but there are some truths that one will only ascertain by reading the Bible such as the Doctrine of the Trinity. When I say this, I am not saying that people can't know anything apart from God's Word. For instance, even atheists know that 2+2=4. So one can know particular truths even if they do not read God's Word. However, to know ultimate truth, the foundation on which to build one's life, you must come to realization of who Jesus Christ is & be in His Word. We use both Rationalism and Empiricism in our daily lives so they are not completely wrong, but rather are just incomplete because they are dismissing how knowledge works as a whole in the context of revelatory knowledge. To hold that all that we can know is what we can see and/or what starts in the mind is limiting and inconsistent. In the counter-examples that I pointed out earlier, there are things that we can know that can not be ascertained through Rationalism or Empiricism, yet it is only when we approach the subject of God that these views are leveled as the ultimate standard of knowledge.

The reason it is so essential to believe in God as the Source of knowledge is because as an all- knowing Being, God’s knowledge is comprehensive and exhaustive. He alone is aware of the breadth and depth of His own knowledge which equates to all knowledge. “Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or as His counselor has informed Him? With whom did He consult and who gave Him understanding? And who taught Him in the path of justice and taught Him knowledge, And informed Him of the way of understanding?” (Isa. 40:13-14; cf. 1 Cor. 2:16; Rom. 11:34).

So what was the answer to Pilate's question. What is truth? Jesus tells in John 14:6 that He is the Way, the Truth and the Life and that no one can come to the Father, but through Him. This is not a passage that we want to glance over abruptly. You see, Jesus was telling us that how we approach the subject of truth holds eternal consequences. It determines where we will spend eternity. My prayer for you is that you may know the truth and that the truth will set you free. I would like to close with words of one of Jesus' last prayers recorded in John chapter 17. He is praying on behalf of his disciples because He is about to be arrested, murdered and they will be alone, but He had been faithful to teach them the words of Scripture during their three year journey together. Verse 17 reads: "Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth". His Word is truth. If you've never studied God's Word, I challenge you to do so. As you read the pages of Holy Scripture and as the Holy Spirit illuminates your understanding, you'll come face to face with the real Jesus.

If God is so good, why is there evil?

By Carole

This is a real question in the midst of the human struggle. I think as Christians, we sometimes feel embarrassed to admit that we ask questions like this. It’s easy to live intellectually satisfied by the knowledge that God is good, and yet experience some emotional uncertainty when something tragic happens, like a family member dies. I admit I’ve questioned God’s intentions at much less than the death of a family member. Sadly, it is the problem of evil and suffering that causes many to walk away from God. The argument from a non-christian goes something like this (paraphrased from the book God’s Problem, by Bart Ehrman, who himself left Christ because of the problem of evil):

If God is sovereign, this means he is in complete control. If God is good, that means he does not cause evil. A good and sovereign being cannot exist if there is evil in the world. There is evil in the world, so either God is not sovereign, God is not good, or God does not exist.

Here’s the problem with Ehrman’s argument. It’s not just that there is evil in the world, there is evil in me. If God deals with the evil in the world, the way Bart Ehrman wants- get rid of it, destroy it- He would have to destroy every person. He would have to destroy me and you, for the evil in us. The fact that God allows the evil in the world is to give us time to repent and turn to Him so He can cleanse us, before He ultimately judges the world.

“The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)