Tag Archives: A Few Good Men

The Truth Is Assaulted Every Single Day. So What?

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Yesterday we focused on “I am the WAY” in John 14:6; today we will look at “I am the TRUTH”, which is a little more complicated these days than it was when this was written… Truth today is deemed to be almost totally subjective, and there are fewer commonly accepted universal truths than ever before in my lifetime.

Veracity today is treated much too casually, and we are lied to all too often. Our perception of truth is colored far too much by culture, advertising, and media. In a year of confusion about the pandemic, when misinformation seemed more common than truth, why does this matter? Here are a few random scatter-shot thoughts about that:

Sheer Volume

First, think about advertising, which is ALL slanted to try to influence you or change your opinion. “The average American is exposed to 500 to 1,000 commercial messages a day (Arens 1999). That’s anywhere from 182,500 to 365,000 commercial messages that a person will view this year alone.” (And that’s OLD research, so it’s a very conservative number, what with internet banners and Facebook ads bombarding you as you surf online or use your phone…) We see, read and hear hundreds of lies, Every. Single. Day. Do you think that doesn’t blur the line even just a little bit?

Living out the Truth

Second, and totally unrelated, they called basketball player Paul Pierce “the Truth” because he was able to score against anybody. Shaquille O’Neil gave him that nickname after he dropped 42 points on the Lakers. Pierce was a solid player, and he could indeed score. But for the rest of us, the truth is this: if you’re going to identify someone as the Truth, it should probably relate to something bigger than basketball.

The name doesn’t make the man as much as the man makes the name. Even though he has my respect, knowing Paul Pierce (the Truth) won’t make me free. However, knowing the Man who made this claim in John 14:6 certainly has (Free from worry, free from guilt, free from hate). Jesus understood that a life unsupported by truth is pursuit of an illusion. Living a lie only results in dead ends and disappointments.

Can You Handle THIS?

Third, I think of Jack Nicholson’s famous line in “A Few Good Men”: “You want the truth?! You can’t handle the truth!!” (Kind of ironic when you think of the fact that he is an actor pretending to be a Marine, but we believed it…) If the absolute truth was presented to you, could you handle it? Would you really even want to hear it?

And finally, Zig Ziglar used to ask an audience, “How many of you read the newspaper every day?” (Lots of hands went up). Then he said, “How many of you believe everything you read in the newspaper is true?” (Almost no hands) “Ok, how many of you believe everything in the Bible is true?” (Lots of hands) “How many of you read the Bible every day?” (Almost no hands) Point made. Then think about those thousands of media messages you absorb; how much ‘less than true’ information hits your brain there every day? With all media combined—you have commercials, politics, Facebook posts, magazines, the news…. Really, there’s an amazing amount of stuff.

No Counterfeits

How well do you know the truth? How much time do you spend getting to know it? In Politics, in Social Media, or even in commercials, every side seems to have an agenda that obscures truth and promotes something else.

In all of the subtle (and blatant) misrepresentations in commercials (a deodorant is so good that it makes girls attack you, or all beer drinkers are fit, active people), in news (whatever happened to objective journalists?) and in politics (Politicians provide spin to “recalibrate” actual truth), we totally forget John 8:32: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Jesus said, “I am the Truth”: maybe it would make sense to listen to what he taught. Fact-check JESUS. Seek the truth. Live by it,and be free.

Truth Under Fire

Today you’ll see a thousand things that really just aren’t true;
Facebook Ads and stores will try to sell their stuff to you.
Out of all the messages and ads that you will see,
Remember, no one ever said, “The Spin will make you free.”
So out of all the things you’ll hear, and stuff that you will read,
Just get to know the Truth, and He will make you free indeed.

To purchase my newest book Real People, Real Christmas: Thirty-one Days Discovering the Hidden Treasures of the Christmas Story, go here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1729034918/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
For Slaying Giants: Thirty Days with David, go here: https://www.amazon.com/Slaying-Giants-Thirty-Devotions-Ordinary/dp/172568327X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1535814431&sr=8-1&keywords=Slaying+Giants%3A+Thirty+Days+With+David
To buy my book, Beggar’s Bread, go here: https://www.amazon.com/Beggars-Bread-Devotions-Ordinary-Guy/dp/1535457392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473336800&sr=8-1&keywords=Beggar%27s+Bread

You Want the TRUTH? Well, Maybe You Can’t Handle THIS

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Above the doorway to the old Library at the University of Texas, there was a quote: You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” It’s a reference to John 8:32, which is a pretty familiar verse. But do you remember what Jesus said just BEFORE he uttered those famous words? “Jesus therefore said to those Jews that had believed him, ‘If ye abide in my word, then are you truly my disciples; and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:31-32 ASV)

In a world where tons and tons of slanted opinions are tossed at us (read: Facebook, Twitter, CNN vs Fox, TV commercials, politics), the truth is becoming a rare and precious commodity. Unlike what you are reading right now, AI will ensure that much of what you see is curated and slanted to reinforce opinions you already have. Every day you are presented with tons of information. How much of it is factual and how much of it is questionable? How do you know what is authentic and true versus what is twisted and spun?

There is a famous movie line from “A Few Good Men”, a movie starring Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise. Jack Nicholson, playing an arrogant Marine Colonel, was on trial for an incident that resulted in the death of a young Marine. The prosecuting attorney, (a young) Tom Cruise, pushed relentlessly to get answers about what happened. Challenged to deliver the facts, Nicholson finally snarled, “You want the TRUTH?! You can’t handle the truth!” The truth has consequences, as the story went on to demonstrate. But then, so does falsehood…

A Modern Example

I still remember being encouraged several years ago because Congress declared that they were giving us a tax cut. Naturally I assumed that my taxes would therefore be lower. When my tax bill came, I found I was paying MORE in taxes! I actually called a congressman’s office to ask what happened to the tax cut. I wanted the TRUTH!

Their answer was classic congressional double-talk: they told me that even though my total tax bill was higher, I was paying “less” in taxes because they had reduced the amount my taxes were scheduled to go up! There was a “tax cut”, alright, but it was a “cut” that INCREASED what I had to pay.

Art or Science?

The art of prevarication is more sophisticated and subtle today than it has ever been in history. Over a century and a half ago, Mark Twain said “A lie will make it halfway around the world before the truth has had a chance to put its boots on.” That was before we had the internet, BEFORE information could travel at the speed of lies. What is spin and what is factual? What headlines matter, and what is click-bait? As Bill Clinton once said (https://youtu.be/j4XT-l-_3y0), “It depends on what your definition of the word “is”, is… In our politics and in our culture, deception has been raised to an art form, and it is far more common and pervasive today than it was when Mr. Twain made his astute observation.

With the advent of deep-fake videos, AI-generated headlines, and gas-lighting, I think it’s only going to get MORE difficult to determine what the truth IS, much less handle it.

How do we know what is true and what is not? I have heard it said that when the Treasury Department trains agents how to detect counterfeit bills, they don’t waste time studying every possible variation. They invest time in knowing the original backwards and forwards. They are so attuned to the true original that they develop sort of an inner “truth meter” that detects flaws and irregularities in the counterfeit script. This sounds a little simplistic, to be honest, but the principle makes sense. By being intimately familiar with the real thing–with TRUTH–Treasury Agents can then detect the phony variations of it.

Here’s the Key

Most people remember Jesus said “the truth shall make you free.” What they forget is that he prefaced that remark not by saying, “read lots of men’s opinions”, or “watch the nightly news”, and certainly not, “get on Social Media”… He said to abide in his word. Give that a try. Know who Jesus really is. Bask in his words. Be intimately familiar with the truth. Then when you hear a variation of it your Truth Meter will go off like crazy!

Handle It Well

The truth, I’ve said, and I’ll say it again
Is harder find than “A Few Good Men”,
When our culture tries to dismantle it,
And Jack Nicholson says, “You can’t handle it!”
It gets to be so strenuous, detecting the disingenuous
When things reported by the press
are not the truth, but something less.
Of all the things that come at you,
how can you tell which ones are true?
Things can be fake, if digital, so study the original:
Whether mature or just a youth, get to know the solid truth–
Know Jesus. Get to know His word, and out of everything you’ve heard,
Of everything that you can see, know this: The truth will set you free.

To buy my latest book, Real People, Real Christmas: Thirty-one Days Discovering the Hidden Treasures of the Christmas Story, go here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1729034918/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
For Slaying Giants: Thirty Days with David, go here: https://www.amazon.com/Slaying-Giants-Thirty-Devotions-Ordinary/dp/172568327X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1535814431&sr=8-1&keywords=Slaying+Giants%3A+Thirty+Days+With+David
To buy my book, Beggar’s Bread, go here: https://www.amazon.com/Beggars-Bread-Devotions-Ordinary-Guy/dp/1535457392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473336800&sr=8-1&keywords=Beggar%27s+Bread