God gave me a love of the truth, and I am ever grateful for it. It kept me in reality when delusion wooed me. For instance, I entertained the thought of becoming an atheist while at college. Within minutes of this contemplation, a single thought rose through the din of my mind and obliterated that path: “That’ll show Him!” How ridiculous to nurse a belief that there was no God when I was so very, unmistakably angry with Him. That was truth I could not and would not deny. But a love of the truth is no substitute for faith, and only IN faith does it become a love of the One Who IS Truth.
Love of the Truth Isn’t Everything
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Hebrews 11:1 KJV
I confess that this verse runs through my head and my heart with great frequency because I struggle with it. How do I reconcile this achingly beautiful mystery with the truth assessed by my senses? When I first found myself wrestling with it, the Holy Spirit gave me an understanding of my inability to perceive the WHOLE truth. “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known” (1 Cor. 13:12). I come back to this verse again and again and again – and usually as a chastening to some “I know…” that I’m holding. Why can’t I get this once and for all? Why does this struggle resurface in my heart over and over again? I have the beginning of an answer at last!
A love of the truth in the flesh is always opposed to the whole Truth, Who is Jesus Christ!
Love of the Truth vs. Love of TRUTH
I’ve been holding fast to a natural gift instead of believing and receiving the eternal Gift. What a glorious humiliation of my “I know”! The love of the truth is the means to salvation: “…those who are perishing, because they did not welcome the love of the truth [of the gospel] so as to be saved [they were spiritually blind, and rejected the truth that would have saved them]” (2 Thess. 2:10 AMP). I’ve made an idol of my love of the truth, believing that it would keep me safe. And of course, that idolatry has been death instead. Because I was clinging to the signpost pointing to the Truth, I was missing the Truth!
I saw every flaw and crack and ugly feature of the vessel that is Jennifer, and I held that to be the truth. And it is! But it isn’t the whole truth. When I confined the truth to what I could see, I was blind to “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” My idolatry of the natural truth blinded me to the power and beauty of the divine Truth at work in my earthen vessel.
I am not confined to the truth of my wretchedness. Jesus saved me, and that salvation opened a whole new reality that my flesh can never access. The Truth is bigger and more mysterious and more magnificent than my senses could possibly grasp. I can no longer be defined as the sum of my parts, because I am now His. And so are you. That’s the TRUTH. May we see it!
Guide me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; I wait for You all day long.
Psalm 25:5 HCSB
Amen, Jennifer! The truth about us does not consist in adding this and subtracting that… For we are ” In Christ”‘ and Christ is the sum. May we never forget that! Love
Now that’s a prayer I can join you in wholeheartedly – may we never forget that indeed! Much love to you, Marsela!
Isn’t it interesting, Jennifer, that the verse from Ps 25 where it begins with “Guide me in Your truth…,” also has the phrase, “I will wait for You?”
For many (including myself), waiting is a most difficult discipline. But from what I read in your post, there seems to be a succession of wrestling, waiting, watching that, ultimately, leads to worship [of Truth].
Bless you, Jennifer for imparting your seeing of the whole Truth to us.
Love you!
Well, Pauline, I don’t know whether waiting on God is a full-body contact sport for everyone, but certainly that is often the case with me. However, the result is always more of Him – in love, in relationship, in trust, in knowledge, in FAITH – and that’s more than worth the dying that comes first! Love you!
“my Life flows on in endless song above earth’s lamentation. I hear the sweet though far off hymn that hails a new creation. Through all the tumult, endless strife, I hear the Music ringing. It finds an echo in my soul, how can I keep from singing?” … thank you Jennifer for your prayer and this beautiful seeing and sharing of Jesus. How can we keep from singing?! Love and Joy. Bless you
Jesus is all I have that’s worth sharing, and I agree with you completely: He IS beautiful! Love you, Lori!
Thank you Jen, for this poignant insight. How often we take pride in standing for the truth without considering if it is by the Spirit of Truth – ouch. Love your willingness to just be.
Ouch is right! But I must say that the revelation and the outpouring of Love that followed the chastening all but obliterated it. So, so worth it!
This is so beautiful Jenn, full of HIS TRUTH and full of HIM. Thank you, bless you for the prayer, “May we see it!!!”
LOVE U
Thank you for seeing my prayer, Sue. It is my heart’s cry, really. Every time I’ve seen something or someone with God’s eyes, Light and Love flood into me like a healing hug from Jesus Himself. Priceless! Love you!
Bless you Jenn.
I love you.
❤️
Love you, too, Tammy!