Day 13 - Issue 25
Proverbs 4:5 NLT
'Get wisdom; develop good judgment. Don’t forget my words or turn away from them.'
Growing up is a challenge. When young, who else was there to trust but my parents? Yet, as I grew older I discovered that their behaviours were inconsistent, they were flawed, and theirs was not the only advice on offer. As my personality developed, I increasingly explored alternative sources of ‘truth’ in making my mind up. I was conscious on occasion of suppressing my instinct, my conscience, to follow my new-found source of wisdom.
There are so many sources of ‘truth’ on offer today. Any public figure caught in a troubling situation offers calm and apparently clear words of explanation. Given the way we source truth today, we little believe such explanations and make fun of what appear no more than the emperor’s new clothes. And yet we find ourselves dancing to the same tune as we seek to rationalise and explain away misdemeanours of our own making. While sourcing truth offers few challenges, finding truth requires far greater effort.
Having settled on following Jesus at university, over the years I discovered there were many varieties of Jesus on offer. I was taught to batten down the hatches and defend my version of the truth. It created something of a siege mentality and I was encouraged to retreat deep within the church of my choosing to repel all assaults upon my ‘truth’. Well-intentioned, such advice was short-sighted and wrong. While my mind was being trained in defence techniques, my heart was left to wither. I learned what I was to believe, but failed to encounter the One whose truth I was so stoutly defending. My faith began to take root in fear of getting it wrong, quite some distance from relaxing into the arms of the One who loved me infinitely.
“Faith comes by hearing” (Romans 10:17, NKJV) and I needed to attend to the words spoken by God. And by attend, I mean live by the good news that God is for me and present in every circumstance of my life.
QUESTION: How do you determine the truth that informs and directs your steps?
PRAYER: Lord God, I know that living by your words will lead me to wisdom. Give me the courage to do so.
