If we are to believe that truth is something more than factual statement, then what exactly is the definition of truth? Truth is reality. It is all things that are real. Reality is not something that we merely believe in. Reality is something that we experience, that we can interact with, that we can live. The battle for truth is the battle for reality. Sobriety and sanity are expressions of truth. Because we live in reality, perceiving as things actually are, even if that perception is mocked or opposed, we are able to live in sobriety and sanity. We are either insane for believing there is something beyond this physical universe, or we are heralding ultimate sanity.
Nothing gets the secular, atheistic populous to foam at the mouth more quickly, nor more heatedly, than to insist that what we see and experience is not all that there is to the story. To insist upon the existence of God, and the necessity of His existence, is in their eyes the ultimate deception. Not only are we deceiving and deceived, we are a hindrance to society and the moving forward of our culture. Either we are promoting the ultimate reality, blowing the whistle on the lie, and therefore causing the father of lies to gnash his teeth in response, or we are indeed the very thing that we are accused of.
A restoration of truth in this generation is a restoration of reality. The prophetic and apostolic foundations need to be laid, even in this generation, if the next generation is to have any testimony at all. What is prophetic? What is apostolic? Why are they considered the foundations in Ephesians 2? To be either prophetic or apostolic is to perceive things as they actually are. You have priestliness, which demands an identification and compassion upon those being ministered to and interceded for. You have had a vision1 of heaven and eternity. Your whole way of thinking is moved by a jealousy for the glory of God, and the demonstration of God’s wisdom to the principalities and powers of the air.
These things, which all require a seeing past this temporal world, are what constitute truth and reality. To forfeit these fundamental insights is to forfeit the faith itself. We need a restoration, and not a reformation or revival. It is the Gospel itself that is lost, and not simply “truths”. The Gospel is of a Kingdom, of a King, and of a specific people. We have exchanged our glory for shame, exchanging it for the image of a calf, blessing God who brought us out of Egypt, only to shamefully dance naked before an image of our own imagining.
God is truly after something within the realm of theology. I don’t think that God cares so much about our correct apprehension of “truths”. What I think God is more captured by is when truth itself apprehends us. When we have moved beyond the desire to understand truth, and have entered the realm of walking in the truth, we have truly began to come into fullness. Our lives will reflect that which we love. If our love pants after sound theology, and correct doctrine, then our lives will look just like the rest of the world, but with a little Jesus sprinkled on, and maybe a bit more morality. Yet, if our hearts flutter and long for “the truth”, for reality itself, then our lives will be governed by a completely different mindset and purpose.
Shifting from one side to the other is what it looks like to move from Sinai unto Zion. We no longer live under a law, whether of the world, or of religion – even Christian religion – when we are no longer caught up with doing the right thing and knowing God’s plan for our lives. Truth itself speaks and dictates. To walk in the truth is to keep in step with the Spirit. There is no variance between walking in truth, putting on love as a garment, or being led by the Spirit. All these are synonymous, for they all manifest a demonstration of the character and heart of God in all aspects of life.
The Law is summed up in two verses, according to Jesus. 613 commandments were reduced down to two. And those two could be reduced down to one: love. One of the Jewish sages, I have heard from Rabbi Dovid Goetlieb, believed that Messiah would compact the Law into one command, which would expound the heart of all the commands. This is what it means to walk in truth, to love the truth. It isn’t about correct statements, but about a life correctly lived. It isn’t about “truths”, but about He who is truth.
1 This doesn’t mean an actual vision, but rather that you have perceived something. It might be that you have an actual vision, like some of the prophets are recorded as having. Yet, that is not a requirement of being apostolic or prophetic, as opposed to they who are called to be prophets and apostles. To be apostolic and prophetic demands a comprehension that is personal, where you have truly touched and been touched by eternity.
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