First some thoughts on where I'm headed with this blog. As the title suggests, I am going to speak the truth, but I hope I can do so lovingly. And this is the truth that I believe is the absolute truth so far as one can know truth. And this is the truth I claim: that Jesus Christ became flesh, was obedient to the cross, died for the sins of mankind, and was raised again to bring the hope of salvation for all who would trust in him. Orthodox Christianity you could say, but I'm not religious or narrow-minded like you might think. At some point maybe I will put a statement of faith on here just so you know all that I believe, but for now I think you know enough for me to begin.
So with this truth, I hope to offer insights on things in this world that often get misinterpreted, twisted around, and all that. Certainly there is plenty of discussion topics available in the world around us, especially here in the USA. We've lost our entire moral foundation and are now adrift in the sea of relativism and secularism and just about every other -ism that you can imagine. I hope to present the truth even if it hurts a little. Just like when you get a shot from the doctor to prevent illness though, sometimes a bit of truth that hurts a little is better than what could happen.
Our culture has abandoned truth, as I mentioned, in hopes that everyone can love, love, love one another (thanks to the Beatles maybe?). And if I stand up in a crowd and tell them I'm a Christian, they will assume that I am a bigot, gay-hater, bible-toting, ignorant believer and I hope to dispell all of those rumors here. Let me instead be an ambassador for Christ in this generation, that is my prayer. But with all the culture's talk of love, it seems like nobody is around to try to present and defend truth anymore. The balance must be struck, because sometimes the most loving thing you can do for someone is to speak the truth to them. If someone were about to step off the curb into a speeding automobile would you say "well, I just want to love them, I shouldn't tell them what to do or how to behave"? No, you would say and do anything to keep those you love from danger. Well the truth that I'm talking about works like that. Where the sticking points are found might be where we may disagree about whether someone is really in danger because the threats may not be as imminent as a speeding automobile, but I hope you can at least see my heart behind what I say here.
Also just a point here about absolute truth, since our culture has this whole "your truth", "my truth", "their truth" mentality. I believe in absolute truth, that there is one underlying story that ties things together, and that forms my worldview. When standing before a judge in a criminal trial, the attorneys try to present the truth to the judge using evidence, testimonies, etc. But in every trial, just as in life itself, there is only one truth that actually happened contrary to what may be presented by the two sides. Different people will have different angles on what happened, but there can only be one truth that actually occurred. And where conflicts occur then one of those truth claims must be false. To explain from the perspective of a trial, if I said that at 3:00PM on a particular day I was at home watching TV but someone else claims to have seen me at the scene of a crime at 3:00PM on the same day then one of us is lying. This is of course, assuming that I don't have an identical twin (which I do not) nor the ability to be in two places at the same time (that would be cool, but alas I do not). So I will do my best to defend truth here, and not just some brain-washed religious talk but what I've actually seen and heard with my own eyes and the reports of others that I trust. And this includes the Bible, which I believe is the primary resource of truth, but now I've gone ahead and offended some of you with this truth. But I hope, as I mentioned earlier that you can see that I'm only trying to say the truth in love and one of the most loving things I can imagine is to point out the absolute incredible nature of the Bible as it stands alone as the foundation of truth. You may not believe me now, but I hope and pray someday you will.
And so there we have it, let's begin the journey. Come along on the ride with this blog if you want to join in the adventure! So hand on my Bible, I promise to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God!
-Alex
