Have confidence in source of information
Learn the truth from the Word of God and not allow understanding of God’s truth to be determined by sources which may be misguided or actually intent on leading one astray
Well it’s that time of year again, the time that just about every preteen and teenager alike has been waiting for... graduation day!
Whether graduating from the final year of high school or moving from one grade to another, the joy of “no more studies” is a huge sense of relief and freedom.
I can still remember my graduation day from high school and how I foolishly believed that it would be the last time I would have to crack open another book and learn something. I soon realized that every day I am learning things. Thankfully, since that day I have learned a lot of valuable lessons from the people in my life as well from a variety of other sources.
But, as happens in life, from time to time over the years I have been told some things which I later found out were actually not true. To be honest, I, too, have been guilty of sharing a few things I thought at the time to be true but then found out later were not. I did not mean to intentionally mislead, I just should have checked the facts closer first.
With the vast amounts of information available to us today and the influence of today’s social media, there is a great potential of being misled. The things being presented for our youth seem to be more about how it is OK to tell untruths or be selfish and disrespectful of others. Sadly, these falsehoods are also being presented as acceptable by the sources we would expect and assume are sources of integrity and justice.
The things our youth are being taught is that lifestyle and preference is of greater truth and value than Scripture, that the Scriptural things are too outdated in our modern world. And sadly, a number of people, even believers are accepting these untruths, largely because they have lost interest in verifying the facts.
In the book of Acts, we are told that those who believed in Jesus (including the Apostle Paul) went from place to place teaching the Word of God. I am impressed with what the author said about a group of people Paul taught. He wrote in Chapter 17 verse 11 that “the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true”.
Did you catch that? The Bereans actually took the time to check and ensure that the things they were being taught by Paul were indeed true. They did not simply allow society, the media, government agenda or political correctness to mislead them from what was the truth. They did not let someone else format their beliefs, instead they “examined the Scriptures” themselves so that they would know for sure what was truth.
As believers in Jesus Christ, I hope we never get to the place where we think we have learned enough about the Word of God. I hope we continue to see the importance of learning the truth from the Word of God and not in allowing our understanding of God’s truth to be determined by sources which may be misguided or actually intent on leading us astray.
Isaiah wrote “Learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow”. (Isaiah 1:17) Relevant words for us today. As believers in Jesus Christ, we need to know what the Scriptures say about the things of life, faith and justice.
We need to be able to discern between what is from God and what is simply man’s assumptions or perceived wisdom.
Only then can we know the truth and be able to teach the true Word of God with confidence and correctness. Without error.
It is in everyone’s best interest that we be a nation of people who are daily reading and learning from the Word of God…. Dare I say we need to make reading the Word great again.