On the great rocks and crags of the California coast near Monterey are Cedars of Lebanon, growing in the very midst of the rock. In some way the seeds found a place in the rock and, with nature’s mighty and mysterious power of germination and growth, drove their way straight up and through the heart of the rock until they found the sun and the light and waved their branches over the surges of the Pacific Ocean. So is the power of one single seed of divine truth.
When Jesus stood before Pontius Pilate, He said: “For this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the TRUTH” (John 18:37). It was then that Pilate asked the question that is really at the foundation of all other questions: “What is truth?” (John 18:38). But Jesus had just told Pilate what truth is! There is only one Source of truth in the universe—and that is from the eternal God. Jesus Christ, God the Son, came to identify truth and to share that truth with the world.
One day on the Oprah Winfrey Show she interviewed Steven Covey, author of “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.” During the interview, Mr. Covey asked the studio audience to close their eyes and point north. When the people opened their eyes again, they were all pointing in wildly different directions. The Mr. Covey pulled out a compass and said, “THIS is how we know which way is north. You can’t know which if north from WITHIN yourself.”
And his point is well taken. You and I need something we can trust that points to the truth. At the heart of all apostasy is a false view regarding the authority and trustworthiness of the Bible. Distorted interpretations, misguided viewpoints and hollow opinions—are all based on human thinking—and will never hold up before the Judge of all the earth.
The Word of God needs to be our “Compass” since its trustworthiness and accuracy will point us in the right direction. If you and I fail to base our Christian walk upon the authority and trustworthiness of the Bible, then we’re left without an answer to Pilate’s question, “What is TRUTH?”
–Paul W. Brubaker
September/October 2010