Truth-Seekers (Jeremiah 29:13)

Introduction

Good evening. It’s good to see everyone out tonight. I’m thankful for the elders to give me an opportunity to speak. I think this is the first time I’ve ever brought a lesson here at Decker Prairie, so it’s a good opportunity. I’m thankful for that. We actually have a lot of young capable men here, and well, older capable men, middle-aged capable men. So when the elders, if they do come to you and ask you to do this, you’ve never maybe done this before, you know, I’d admonish you to try it. It’s definitely a noble venture and a worthwhile venture to prepare lessons like this. and I’ve got a lot of it. Okay. There’s the plug for the elders. tonight we’re going to be talking about being truth seekers.

We’re going to be talking about truth in general quite a bit. And I know the idea of truth that at first it seems like a very extremely broad topic, so obviously I’m going to narrow this down. But truth is something that it always seems important to everyone in today’s society. You know, we all want truth. We’ve always wanted truth. Ever since the beginning of time, everybody always wants truth. But we need to be diligently seeking it in order to obtain it. And essentially, the definition of truth is not hotly or contested. It’s not debated over. it’s essentially whatever is in accord with fact or reality. and everyone agrees with that. However, I was looking up some definitions of truth. and there are now in some of the definitions, a I guess a secondary definition that says in modern times, truth can now be defined as truth to self or authenticity.

Which I cannot disagree with more, and I don’t think I need to go in detail as to how perhaps erroneous that thinking is, but the very fact that was actually listed as a definition of truth from a source is alarming. So tonight we’re going to be talking about truth and how we can be truth seekers, how we as Christians need to work on ourselves to obtain this goal. Okay. So essentially to narrow our search for truth. There are many types of truth. We have mathematical truths. If you’re a nerd, you might know some of those. We have scientific truths. Of course, these truths are only hampered by our I guess our physical nature, and we can only know so much from our physical world.

How much do we even trust our senses? We have historical truths, a lot of these are tied in with the Bible. So we have very valid historical truths. Philosophical truths, which these are again debated over. Maybe we have journalistic truths because we know what the media puts out is usually as things that are often portrayed, right? Well maybe not.

We won’t even consider that. But what we’re going to be talking about tonight and focusing on is the biblical truth or God’s truth, which I would confess is the most important of all these truths.

Okay. So moving on from there, then, how do how do we obtain this truth? Because, well, you know, in preparing this lesson, we know that man is fallible. we can all be fallible. So can we actually obtain this perfect truth? I’m going to start off in John 17. Jesus is actually praying. Turn over there real quick. Well, this is quite lengthy prayer, and I won’t read all of it, but in John chapter 17, verse 17, Jesus says, Sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth. So we know that the word of God is truth. We’re going to start with that, accepting that, or I will, from the basis of this sermon. So, how do we obtain it then? Well, how do we obtain his word?

Can we even do that? I would answer, yes, we can do that. So, what ways do we see in the Bible? What are the methods that we need to do that? I have a few verses. This might not be an exhaustive list, but just to get us started, Proverbs 8 17 says, I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me. So, diligently seeking God, we need to first have that. God and his truth and his word. Second, John 8 31 says, Jesus said, if you abide in my word, you are my disciples, and you will know the truth. goes on to say the truth will set you free. We’ll get into that a little bit more. But if you abide in my word, he says, You’re my disciples, and you will know the truth.

So being diligent, constantly abiding in his word. And then finally, Jeremiah 29, 13 says, you will seek me. This is actually Jeremiah speaking on behalf of the Lord. Well, this is the Old Testament, I think this very much applies today. it’s that he says, You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. So I’m gonna argue if we follow these three methods, we’re diligent, constantly abiding his word, and seeking with all of our heart, that we can, we’re capable of obtaining truth, even though we may be fallible human beings. Okay. This brings us to the next question I have, if it’s sometimes brought up. Non-believers in truth. I think we all, how do we harmonize this? Can nonbelievers know truth?

Well, perhaps yes or no, depending on your definition of truth, they might know some truth. to start off with Pilate, when he was questioning Jesus at the end of their conversation, they were talking about things, and Jesus was talking about his kingdom, not being of this world. Pilate at the end of that conversation posed the question to Jesus, well, what is truth? depending on your interpretation, we don’t have much dialogue after that, but I think what can be gathered from this is that for non believers, it is much harder to obtain this truth. Well, they don’t have this truth. That’s the truth of God’s truth. ultimately, to boil it down, I think non believers can obtain many truths from the earlier disciplines we listed earlier.

However, the error that they will continually have, no matter how much they are diligent in seeking truth, is that they’re not attributing the source of truth to God. And I think that’s something we’re gonna see, and I’m gonna point it out. As an example, I’m going to be talking a little bit about Socrates. Because he was a philosopher. He lived around 400 BC. So this is 400 years before Christ. And arguably, many considered him one of the wisest men of all time. He said some very wise things. A little background, he actually was put on trial. We have some records of this. He was put on trial and gave a defense. His crimes were, he was accused of corrupting the youth and blessing the gods of the time in Athens there.

Spoiler alert, he was put to death because of his crimes. But we’re going to.

I actually want to use him in some of his quotes because in reading through his apology, his defense, he said some things that are very much in accordance with kind of the things I believe. So we’re going to use these and kind of juxtapose these with biblical ideas and see how Socrates came to these conclusions and you know how right he actually was and what he was lacking.

But essentially, I think if you lack attributing the source of truth to God, then that is where his major fault will lie. Okay. So then how do we train ourselves to seek truth? And that’s what the thrust of the lesson will be about for the next two hours. But this is what we’re going to talk about. How do we actually train ourselves to seek truth? I think seeking truth is like many of the disciplines of the Bible, whether you know patience, being joyful, all these things are maybe not naturally things that we do as humans. I don’t know if humans arguably sometimes maybe we want to be misled. We want to do whatever’s easier. We’re lazy. We’re selfish, we’re lazy. And so seeking truth can sometimes be a discipline.

1. Engage Ideas

It’s continually buffeting our body, thinking about these things and working on these activities. So it’s something that we have to strive to do. So how do we actually do that? And I just have a some of some of the points I have tonight we’ll talk about. And then the lesson will be yours. Move through my pages here. Okay. So number one, engage ideas. Now, Socrates said, I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think. Now, I don’t know if this is so much a biblical idea, but I do see some truth in this statement.

I think it kind of compares to what Paul said. I kind of juxtaposed this here. Paul, when he was meeting with the Corinthians, perhaps for the first time, put in these ideas, these godly ideas of the people. He put ideas forward. And then Apollosis says water and perhaps came along and further expounded on these ideas and you know helped people come to the source of truth. But Paul attributes again to God. God gave the increase. Now, Socrates didn’t have this God. Well, they had many gods, but they were not the true gods. But again, we need to continually engage ideas. So how do we do that? Well, obviously, the first way and the best way is through Bible study. 2 Timothy 2 15, we all know says, study to show yourself approved unto God.

So some of the best, arguably, the Bible is truth. And going to the word daily, yes, daily and studying it, is going to put biblical ideas in our head. So this is, first of all, the first way we need to put ideas into our head as to biblical, what’s biblical, what’s not biblical. If you will, turn over to 2 Timothy chapter 4, verses 1 through 6. We’ll just read through this. Or 1 through 5, perhaps. 2 Timothy chapter 4, it says, I charge you in the presence of God and of Jesus Christ, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word, be ready in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching.

For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions. And will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober minded, endure suffering, do the work of evangelists, fulfill your ministry. We know here that people are going to depart from the word. They’re going to depart from truth and follow these myths, as the Apostle Paul tells us. But we continually need to be buffeting our body with doctrines from the Bible. It’s the only way we can engage ideas, come to believe these ideas fully, and then be prepared to present these ideas to other people.

So it’s interesting. The first way is obviously through Bible study. But also, the second way we need to engage ideas after Bible study, once we’ve buffed it ourselves, is through conversation. And this could be, you know, obviously with family and friends. We always need to be talking about spiritual things with our family and friends, talking about these ideas. Another way is also through co-workers of people who are maybe not so fortunate. And this is the one I kind of wanted to talk about. Now, we need to engage ideas in our search for truth because I’m not saying that everybody you talk to is going to have truthful things to say. But the reason we need to engage ideas with everyone, and you know, perhaps even non-believers, is that we get it sets a pattern, it sets a habit for how we’re going to conduct ourselves in our lives.

So the opportunity came up one day where the issue actually came up, and I had the opportunity to engage or to deflect that conversation. Now, a lot of times we assume that it’s going to go terrible, and that we really don’t want to do it because it’s going to be uncomfortable for us. Well, in this instance, it actually was. It was not great. It did not go well at all. However, don’t let that discourage you. Because we need, we need to accept these ideas to accept this habit, I guess you should say, to continually engage ideas. We need to do it with non-believers, we need to do it with believers. We need to do it with doctrinal issues, non-doctrinal issues, non-biblical issues, even. But we just need to keep our minds moving and continually taking new ideas and holding up to the standard that we hold to be true.

2. Don't Be Afraid of Being Wrong

And I’m not saying, I’m not saying that you people are wrong and you need to listen to other people, but I’m saying develop this pattern as to how we’re going to find truth and then weigh everything against that and accept it or reject it. Okay. So another way that we can train ourselves to seek truth is don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid of being wrong. Now, as humans, that’s way easier said than done. I’m probably the worst in here about, I might be the worst about not wanting to be wrong ever. Maybe not. We could argue about that later. But I don’t like being wrong. It’s not comfortable. And why don’t we like being wrong? I think it was a pride issue, a fear issue.

I think perhaps why do people continue on an air of sometimes comfort, sometimes not wanting to leave what they’re comfortable with. There’s many reasons, but ultimately we don’t like being wrong. to quote Socrates, he said, the only thing I know is I know nothing. Which, for someone who is a non believer, I think this shows a good amount of humility. In the Bible, we can see, let’s actually turn over to 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verses 18 through 21, and we’ll read that.

Okay. 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verses 18, starting verse 18, it says, let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in his age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, he catches the wise in their craftiness. And again, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, but they are futile, that they are futile. So let no one boast in men. This summarizes a lot of things I want to say all the time, that men are fallible. Men cannot be trusted. The ideas of men are oftentimes not something we want, well, I shouldn’t say oftentimes. The ideas of men are something we never want to lean on unless they’re in accordance with God’s word.

But it is interesting that a non believer can come to this conclusion because it is a truth. Man is fallible. But only the Lord is capable of having this ultimate truth. So, don’t be afraid of being wrong. Some examples of this we see in the Bible. I just wanted to point out something, because at some point we’re all going to be wrong about something. It’s never easy to come to that conclusion. Especially after you get married.

But yeah. So one example I think we can see about, and what we’re going to show here is that we’re not in, we’re in good company, actually. Solomon, and I didn’t have a specific verse about this, but he recanted many things in this physical world. I think, you know, if we go to Ecclesiastes, then the conclusion of everything he had was this fear God and keep his commandments. Because he perhaps lived a luxurious life. He had many luxuries available to him. He perhaps indulged in these things.

He admitted to this wrongdoing, and you know, he was a wise man because of it. Paul, obviously, in Acts 9, he thought he was doing what was right. He was shown a more perfect way, and I think he had he had a very good attitude about it. We also see Apollos in Acts 18. I think I guess we don’t know exactly the attitude of Apollos. I always kind of wish I knew more about these stories, or I was there. Whenever Aqua and April Priscilla took him aside, he was preaching the baptism of John in Acts 18, and they explained more perfectly the way of Jesus and the truth.

And then finally, we see Peter. If you remember in Galatians, Peter was you know engaging with the Gentile Christians, but when the Jewish Christians would come around, he would lead them, so Paul had to rebuke him to his face. Now, we don’t know how Peter took that either. I would really like to know kind of how these guys took it. Of course, Peter was a character that maybe was more what’s the word I’m looking for? Vivacious sometimes, so he might not have been the best at taking corrective constructive criticism. But ultimately, I do believe he, you know, found the truth.

So I get I guess also one of my points from this is that you know we’re all going to be wrong. And I know that in these some of these instances, these are kind of big issues. But what we need to work on too in our lives is the very tiny things. We need to start with the really small things in our life, I’m being wrong. When your wife tells you that a word is pronounced one way, it’s a really small thing. and you’ve been saying it wrong all your whole life. Well, do you just keep on with it? we need to start adopting good strategies for dealing with how we’re wrong from a small level and then start working our way up. Because eventually we’re gonna, I don’t think anybody in here has the whole Bible 100% figured out.

We all vary in our beliefs. But at some point we’re probably going to come upon someone who’s going to teach us something. Teach us something in the way of truth more rightly. I want to think it’s not going to be me, but it’s probably going to be me. in several ways. But we need to start developing this mindset, this mentality. How are we going to deal with this? it’s like anything else. You need to be thinking about it and buffeting your body and your mind. because when truth is presented to me someday in a way that I haven’t seen it, I would hope that I accept that, and that I go forward with the truth.

3. Develop a Yearning for Truth

And that’s my hope for all of you. So don’t be afraid of being wrong. Start to discipline yourself. You’re in good company with being wrong. Okay. So finally, how else are we supposed to train ourselves? Well, we need to develop a yearning for truth. Turn over, if you will, to John chapter 4. And so here we have in John chapter 4 is Jesus speaking with the woman of the well. So now, how do we develop this yearning for truth? What’s actually going to incentivize us to do that? How do we adopt this? And I’m just going to present the ways that I am most incentivized to develop this yearning for truth. In John chapter 4 and verse 24, Jesus is speaking to the woman of the well.

And after talking to her for a little bit, Jesus says, Sir, God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. Now I think sometimes we talk about worshiping in spirit, and I can remember some studies we’ve talked about with that. But I don’t know if I’ve thought about that. We have to worship in truth. If we are not worshiping in truth, our truth, our worship is useless. And if we’re not continually seeking truth, well, that’s going to be a problem.

We have to worship in truth.

So oh, I was going to get back to this quote about Socrates. But I’ll get right back to the worshiping in truth. But one of the quotes of Socrates, he said, Are you not ashamed that you give your attention to acquiring as much money as possible and give no attention to the perfection of your soul? Now I thought this was an extremely interesting quote from someone who is not a believer. Obviously, he lived 400 years before Christ, did not know about the God of the Israelites, my knowledge. But he says this thing that is very much in accordance.

Perhaps some of you have friends who, you know, they’re really good people. You know, they think good things. They really only want what’s best for people. They, you know, they do good things. They don’t drink, smoke, cuss. and why are they not good people? Well, they have great ideas. The answer to that is that again, they are not attributing the source of truth to God. That’s the heir, that’s the fallacy. in Mark 8 36, it says, For what is a prophet man to gain the whole world and lose his soul? so it’s a very similar quote to what Socrates said. however, Socrates was missing the mark because he had that inability to attribute this ultimate truth to God.

Okay, and as I was saying earlier, we must have truth to worship God righteously. Turn over, if you will, to John chapter 8, verse 32. This is something we read a little bit earlier. John 8 30, starting in 31, again it says, So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, if you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. So the truth will set you free. That sounds great, right? But what does that actually mean? Well, I think if we look at the context here, Jesus is talking about the Jews who have believed him, and perhaps they were still somewhat under the mindset of the old law. This truth is actually what is going to save us from sin and get rid of our sin.

Similar to this time, Jesus had this new idea, well, new idea coming forward that he was going to be the savior for us. He was going to have the ability to take away our sins. And he was saying that to the Jews here because that was very applicable to them in their formal way of thinking. But similar to us, this truth is what is going to set us free of our sins. So this is another incentive for me to want to continually search for this, to train my mind, to train myself to search for this truth.

Turn over, if you will, to Proverbs chapter 30 and verse 5.

So Proverbs 30 and verse 5 says, every word of God proves true. He is a shield to those who take refuge in him. Now, we remember from John 17 that God’s word is truth. And based on this, we know that every word of God proves true, and he’s going to be a shield to those who take refuge in him. If we put our trust in God, we’re going to have to admit that God is the source of all truth. I think, you know, I kind of struggled with this idea of, you know, how do non-believers have some truth? And the fact is they might they may find through a lot of diligence and studying, people can get the truth. But ultimately, the final linchpin, the final hurdle, is attributing the source of all truth to God.

That’s something that we’re going to have to do.

Conclusion

I wanted to talk about this tonight because it’s something that you know I continually try to work on. Going back to the not ever wanting to be wrong thing. No one wants to be wrong.

And so sometimes I think we get afraid of taking on new ideas, taking on new challenges. But the truth is, as Christians, that can’t be us. We have to continually engage ideas. We have to engage other people. We have to look at new things. We can’t be afraid of being wrong. We have to put ourselves out there. You know, even put our what we believe to be our reputation on the line if we’re afraid of something.

It’s just something that we have to train ourselves to do, to work on, and continue to buffet our bodies and our minds.

If you were here tonight and you haven’t ever credited God as being the ultimate source of truth, you haven’t considered that as an option.

Everybody’s tried to find. So if you’re here tonight and you need that truth, please come forward now as we stand and see.