Good Friday
March 30, 2013
Reflection on John 18:28, 33 - 40
Ask anyone today, what is truth? And you’re sure to start an interesting conversation. Try it on a university campus and you’re likely to receive laughter, scorn, and derision. The concept of truth has clearly fallen on hard times, and the consequences of rejecting it are ravaging human society. So let’s go back to the starting point and answer the question: What is truth?
Today we heard one of the most profound and eternally significant questions in the Bible posed by an unbeliever. Pilate—the man who handed Jesus over to be crucified—turned to Jesus in His final hour, and asked, “What is truth?” It was a rhetorical question, a cynical response to what Jesus had just revealed: “I have come into the world, to testify to the truth.”
Two thousand years later, the whole world breathes Pilate’s cynicism. Some say truth is a power play, constructed by the elite for the purpose of controlling the ignorant masses. To some, truth is subjective, the individual world of preference and opinion. Others believe truth is a collective judgment, the product of cultural consensus, and still others flatly deny the concept of truth altogether.
So, what is truth?
Here’s a simple definition drawn from what the Bible teaches: Truth is that which is consistent with the mind, will, character, glory, and being of God. Even more to the point: Truth is the self-expression of God. That is the biblical meaning of truth. Because the definition of truth flows from God, truth is theological.
Could it be that Truth is a fancy way of saying it is the way things really are? Reality is what it is because God declared it so and made it so. Therefore God is the author, source, determiner, governor, arbiter, ultimate standard, and final judge of all truth.
Perhaps there are two aspects of truth – facts and stories. For example, the facts of Dee Tucker are – I was born into a two parent, two child picket fence, southern Baptist home in Missouri….my world was shattered by the death of my sister at age 17…..now I live and worship in Santa Ana CA. I am testifying to my truth. Yet, that does not tell you my journey from then to now and what’s happened to me because of that unexpected death, and what it means to live after your family changed so drastically and discover the living breathing power of being a human being.
And you know whenever there is a crisis, like 9/11; do you notice how the whole of the United States turned towards the stories in order to learn the truth of that horrific event? We knew the facts – planes flew into the buildings. We knew the number of deaths. Yet, what we wanted to know was what happened in those buildings, what happened to the people who were connected to the people in those buildings? Because that is the only way we can make sense out of life, is through the stories. And the facts are a certain number of people died there but the stories are about the greatness of being a human being and the vulnerability of being human. These are the truths of that event.
How many of us can own our own story? How many of us can stand in vulnerability to share our truths with others? Do we wear the armor of the Roman soldier or the power of a Pilate rather than the simple garment of Jesus.
Our challenge is to own our story – and to love ourselves thru the process of owning our story. To stand in the truth in all our nakedness…. That is the bravest, most courageous thing we’ll ever do.
What is courage- the word comes from Latin word cur – meaning heart. The original definition is to share your whole story with your whole heart. This act of courage is an act of storytelling….the truth of your story.
How many of us can listen to another’s truth? Another’s story? Or are we uncomfortable? Are we feeling we must do something to make it ‘better’? Or can we simply be the Christ like presence, the witness to that story?
A Few Good Men is a 1992 American film revolving around the court martial of two U.S. Marines charged with the murder of a fellow Marine and the tribulations of their lawyer as he prepares a case to defend his clients. Do you remember the famous line uttered by Colonel Nathan R. Jessep (Jack Nicholson) in response to Lieutenant Junior Grade Daniel "Danny" Kaffee (Tom Cruise), “You can’t handle the truth!”
Is this us? Can we handle the truth when someone shares they have been abused? Can we handle the truth when someone says I am a recovering alcoholic? Can we handle the truth when faced with a homeless person? Or do we squirm and shift in our chairs wishing the topic could return to how gorgeous the day is today?
Jesus used stories to teach us truths in the parables. Jesus' parables are seemingly simple and memorable stories, often with imagery, and all convey messages. Scholars have commented that although these parables seem simple, the messages they convey are deep, and central to the teachings of Jesus.
Many of Jesus' parables refer to simple everyday things, such as a woman baking bread (parable of the Leaven), a man knocking on his neighbor's door at night (parable of the Friend at Night), or the aftermath of a roadside mugging (parable of the Good Samaritan); yet they deal with major religious themes, such as the growth of the Kingdom of God, the importance of prayer, and the meaning of love. These stories revealing the truths for us to live by.
What is truth? It is what every human being wants - to be seen and heard. To be valued. They want to know - Do I matter? And does what I say mean anything to you? This is the truth of Jesus as he stood before Pilate. Do you see me? Do you hear me? Am I valued? Do I matter? Does what I say mean anything to you?
There is a Jewish story - In the beginning there was only the holy darkness, the Ein Sof, the source of life. And then, in the course of history, at a moment in time, this world, the world of a thousand thousand things, emerged from the heart of the holy darkness as a great ray of light. And then, perhaps because this is a Jewish story, there was an accident, and the vessels containing the light of the world, the wholeness of the world, broke. And the wholeness of the world, the light of the world was scattered into a thousand thousand fragments of light, and they fell into all events and all people, where they remain deeply hidden until this very day. Now, according to the story, the whole human race is a response to this accident. We are here because we are born with the capacity to find the hidden light in all events and all people, to lift it up and make it visible once again and thereby to restore the innate wholeness of the world. It's a very important story for our times.
Can we see the light? Can we handle the truth?
No comments:
Post a Comment