Saving TruthSample

The Son through Fog: Clarity’s Hope

The word “controversy” comes from two Latin words—contra, meaning “against,” and vertere, meaning “to turn.” Controversy arises when we turn against something or someone. And indeed controversy has flourished in our day when autonomy is the ultimate goal and individual autonomies collide. Although some of these controversies are public, many are internal and private, for our preferences have not granted us the sure footing of clarity that we often seek.

These internal controversies make the gospel’s simple clarity appealing yet difficult to embrace. And the gospel really is simple. It is the good news that you and I are sinners in need of a savior and Jesus is that Savior. Because He is perfect, you don’t have to be. He will perfect you. 

To say that the gospel is simple yet all-encompassing seems contradictory, but it isn’t. We must embrace this paradox to find clarity: the comprehensive answers to life’s complicated questions emanate from one straightforward worldview. G. K. Chesterton observed that one can be convinced of something when he or she finds that everything proves it. But the inverse is also true. We can be convinced of something when we find that it proves everything else. 

The gospel says we are not automatons slavishly responding to external stimuli but are beings with physical bodies, nonmaterial minds, and free will. This validates humanism. The gospel tells us that our sexual and gender identities are not our ultimate identities. This satisfies our desire for intimacy. The gospel embraces scientific inquiry as a means to investigate the natural world because that investigation satisfies our God-given sense of wonder. The gospel allows us the dignity of differing on matters of faith while claiming to be the sole spiritual truth. This addresses our desire for coherence. Life’s innumerable complexities are marshaled under one clarity: we are made in God’s image; the cross and empty tomb demonstrate how valuable that image is. In short, everything “proves” the gospel and the gospel “proves” everything.

Clarity will return most fully when we see the gospel for what it is, see Jesus for who He is, and see ourselves for who we really are. We are created to have fulfilling, everlasting intimacy with God. That relationship entails the freedom to embrace or reject God. To be clear, God doesn’t need us to have relationship. As a triune being, God exists with three distinct personalities—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—and has always had perfect relationship. This means that He creates us not so that He can have relationship, but so that we can. We often think of the consequences of rejecting God as one-sided: we reject God and we suffer for it. But that ignores a fundamental truth: our rejection affects God as well. To God, we are immeasurably valuable, whether we embrace or reject Him. 

There can be no freedom without truth; there can be only chaotic autonomy. Jesus goes one step further and identifies Himself with the truth (John 8:36). He is the truth our minds seek and the person our hearts embrace. He validates facts and personal preferences without sacrificing either. His words expose the fact of our sin. The fact of His sacrifice demonstrates His unbounded love for us. And the fact of His resurrection provides us with the joy of knowing our desires can be fulfilled. Coupling together joy and knowledge, feeling and fact, is how we go about saving truth. "What is truth?", we may ask in a world that elevates personal preference over truth. The answer is Jesus—the truth who is personal. He is the Saving Truth.

Questions

• Why can we have faith in what God will do in our futures based on what He has done for us in the past?


• Why does Jesus’ resurrection make biblical hope sure and secular hope so uncertain?

Bible Passages

• 1 Corinthians 13:13


• Psalm 116:15


• Ezekiel 33:11


• John 8:32–36