Ideas Have Consequences
Everything that we see around us is the product of ideas, of ideologies, of worldviews. That's where everything starts. Worldviews are not all the same, and the differences matter a lot. How do you judge a tree? By its fruits. How do you judge a worldview? By its physical, tangible, observable fruit. The things it produces. Ideas that are noble and true produce beauty, abundance, and human flourishing. Poisonous ideas produce ugliness. They destroy and dehumanize. It really is that simple. Welcome to Ideas Have Consequences, the podcast of Disciple Nations Alliance, where we prepare followers of Christ to better understand the true ideas that lead to human flourishing while fighting against poisonous ideas that destroy nations. Join us, and prepare your minds for action!
Ideas Have Consequences
TRUTH (10 Words to Heal Our Broken World Series)
Truth is an internal, personal, and subjective sense of reality that exists only in the mind. It's a social construct created to advantage whatever group currently holds power. These are the predominant understandings of one of the most important words in our world. The majority of people around you think and act based on this understanding. Today, courts are being corrupted by those in power, and men are going to the Olympics, claiming to be women. It’s not as if we can just say two plus two equals five. Truth matters, and if we as Christians don't hold to God's clear, eternal, and essential definition of Truth, we're at the doorstep of chaos. Scott Allen and the team unpack this first word from Scott's new book, 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World: Restoring the True Meaning of Our Most Important Words, and learn how you can play a part in healing and restoring this broken world through the protection and proclamation of Truth.
- View the transcript, leave comments, and check out recommended resources on the Episode Landing Page!
- “Live Not by Lies” by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
- Find out more about the book by Scott David Allen, 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World: Restoring the True Meaning of Our Most Important Words at 10wordsbook.org.
On what basis is truth grounded? Is there a basis for the grounding of truth that goes beyond my mind and I just don't think you can. You can't live in a world where everyone gets to define their own truth. It just becomes at some point it becomes unlivable.
Speaker 1:Hi friends, this is Scott Allen, president of the Disciple Nations Alliance, and I want to welcome you to another episode of Ideas have Consequences, the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. As we prepare to launch my newest book, 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World restoring the true meaning of our most important words, we wanted to go through each one of these 10 foundational words that are highlighted in the book, discussing their true meaning as well as how they've been fundamentally redefined in our contemporary culture. Now you might be asking why do words matter? Well, it's because words and definitions shape the way we think and feel, and that, in turn, determines our choices and our actions, and that shapes the kind of culture that we live in, for better or for worse. And so if you want to work for a positive change in culture in society, it has to begin by restoring the true meaning of our most important words.
Speaker 2:Hi friends, thank you for joining us today here on. Ideas have Consequences. My name is Luke and I will be your host today, joined by my friend, boss and former babysitter, dwight Vogt Dwight. Thank you for joining, you're welcome. Former babysitter Dwight Vogt Dwight. Thank you for joining, you're welcome.
Speaker 2:And yeah, this is the mini-series on the podcast here where we are introducing you to the new book that my dad, scott Allen, just wrote. It's going to be out here in a couple months. It's coming out this fall. We are going to let you know about the actual release date very soon. We have almost we're just about to have that set Just one more time.
Speaker 2:The name of the book is 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World, restoring the Meaning of Our Most Important Words. And for those of you who are wondering, those 10 words are as follows truth, human sex, marriage, freedom, authority, justice, faith, beauty and love. So over the next few weeks here on the podcast, we're going to just be walking through these words one by one and, as today is the first podcast where we're covering a word, we're going to start at the beginning with the word truth. So we are going to do our best today to unpack this word. So we are going to do our best today to unpack this word In the book. Dad, you open every chapter by giving a brief definition of your best attempt at the true biblical definition of these words, and then you line that up with the hijacked and redefined definition that we often hear in our culture today. So just to start out today, dad, why don't you just read us those two definitions a couple times so that we can get those on the table?
Speaker 1:Sure, yeah, thanks, luke, you know it's fitting. I think that we start with the word truth out of these 10 words, because it really is the foundation of all of them. If there isn't such a thing as truth, then there is no such thing as a true definition of these words, which is what we're arguing for. There is a true definition. These words don't just mean whatever people want them to mean. There is a truthfulness to what it means to be human, there's a truthfulness to sexuality and to justice, and there's a truthfulness to truth as well. So we have to start there.
Speaker 1:Truth is the foundation of everything in some ways, and so here's the simple definition of truth, and it's kind of surprisingly simple, actually. It's truth is that which accords with, or that corresponds with, an objective reality, or objective reality. So, yeah, truth is that which accords with objective reality. It's synonymous with fact. You know, something that is factual is truthful. Now, today, that has been redefined, and the way that I described the redefined definition is this way A truth is an internal and a personal and a subjective sense of reality that exists only in the mind. Or you could expand that to the group, and you could say that truth is a social construct that's created to give advantage to a dominant group. So that's how I've redefined truth today and I do think that second one, that redefinition is the dominant understanding in our culture today.
Speaker 3:Wow, thanks, scott. Let's go back, though, and start with the true definition. You said that which comports with reality, that which accords with reality, fact. That's pretty clear, but could you unpack that a bit? What are the key aspects of that?
Speaker 1:Yeah for sure. Well, I think the key part of that definition is objective reality. Okay, so truth has to be anchored to, or linked to, something that's objectively real. Without a sense of a real objective reality, then truth doesn't make any sense. And let me explain that a little bit. So, yeah, so what do I mean by objective reality? I don't want to get philosophical here, because it's something that we deal with every day.
Speaker 1:I had this morning for breakfast eggs and toast. That, in a sense, is an objective reality, right? And so when I say I had eggs and toast for breakfast, I'm speaking truthfully, I'm speaking factually, I'm speaking of something that corresponds to an objective reality. So it's really that simple in some ways and I don't want to over philosophize it it really is that simple. So what is objective reality? You know, the eggs and toast I had for breakfast.
Speaker 1:It's really this world that exists around us. That's kind of, in some ways, the most basic fixed point of of objective reality. It's the chair that I'm sitting on, it's, uh, the fingers and hands and body and mind that I have, uh, it's uh, I mean, these are things that exist, whether I believe in them or not. If that makes sense, so, yeah. So you know that I would start with that, dwight that this world around us is a fixed point of objective reality, regardless of whether we believe in it.
Speaker 1:So, for example, again, you could say you know, I'm going to just fly off the roof because I don't believe in gravity, right, and I'm just going to. When I jump off the roof, I'm going to fly around, and you can believe that. That can be quote, unquote, your truth. But if you do that, right, because we live in a real world that functions according to real laws and is designed in a way that doesn't really care about what we believe, you're going to fall to the ground, right, you're going to break a leg. So and that points to the importance of truth you know that we need a knowledge of the real world in order to just function. We just can't function in this world without some basic knowledge of the way things are in reality.
Speaker 3:Let me stop there and I'm sure you want to push on this a little bit. No, that leads to the second question, really, and that is you know, how does that create culture? Why is that necessary to create a culture, and what kind of culture will it create? Or you might want to give the opposite already, but just focus on the, on the positive here uh well, um, for example, for example. I mean I can think of um. You know, you just said I I had eggs and toast for breakfast this morning so you said well, I mean, dwight, would you give me eggs and toast, bring it to my house tomorrow morning?
Speaker 3:and I think eggs and toast for breakfast this morning. So you say, well, I mean, dwight, would you give me eggs and toast, bring it to my house tomorrow morning? And I think eggs and toast, or pancakes and corn flakes. So I bring those to you and you say, well, no, no, that's so. You know, we differed on objective reality, we differed on truth and we had, obviously, we had a breakdown, we had a friction.
Speaker 3:And I'm thinking, you know, if you're logically talking about this with somebody who doesn't believe in objective truth, they have to finally agree with you that without objective truth, how can culture possibly function?
Speaker 1:socially, as you were talking about, in relationship with somebody else. If we all have our own little private worlds of my truth and your truth, and it's limited to what I believe in my mind and you have a different understanding in your mind, you can't function socially that way. You can't. Nothing, everything breaks down. So, again, this is not complicated, complicated or it's something that we deal with every day, so that, yeah, the social ramifications are are immense.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, I mean, one of the things that I told my kids, luke and and the other kids is when they were growing up, is and this was like the most basic rule in the house you have to, you know, tell me the truth. And why was that so important? Because if they lied all the time, then I couldn't trust them. Trust, right, is the glue that holds relationships together. You can't have a relationship with somebody that you don't trust and you know, to have a relationship built on trust you have to be truthful. So the social consequences are immense right.
Speaker 1:And that's why we all, like you, have to speak truthfully. Tell me the truth. What's the truth? Yeah, thanks. Before we go on, though, dwight, I want to. You know, I talk about how truth has to be tethered to objective reality, and I said that that is this real world that we all live in that exists, regardless of whether you know what we believe about it or not. Gravity exists, whether you believe in it or not, you know. But I want to go beyond that, because, biblically, you have to, you know, and not just biblically, but, right, it begs the question, and this does get philosophical, but it's so important.
Speaker 1:Well, where did the world come from? Right, you know? What is that grounded in? Did it just emerge? Did it just happen as some kind of accident? Did it just appear out of nowhere? Right, you know, and these are really, really important questions, it turns out, and the answer is no. It doesn't just spring out of nothingness.
Speaker 1:Every effect must have a sufficient cause. Effect must have a sufficient cause. And the world that we see around us, its design and purposefulness and beauty and intricacy and all of its laws, right, the way that we see this world around us, it points to something beyond it. It points to a designer, right, it points to God. And that's the point that the Apostle Paul made in Romans, chapter 1, and he said this. He said since the creation of the world, god's invisible qualities, his eternal power, his divine nature have been clearly seen and they are understood from what he's made. So this world that truth is grounded in isn't just some accident, it's a creation and it points to a creator in a way that, if we're honest, is clearly seen. And if you deny that, if you just say all of this intricacy and design and intelligent kind of information, all that exists, the beauty, it just kind of sprung into being, you know well that's Paul says, that's you're suppressing the truth. You know that's a suppression, a willful suppression of the truth.
Speaker 1:So it's no surprise that the Bible begins with these words in the beginning God, god, he's the ultimate ground of truth. God created the heavens and the earth. Ground of truth. God created the heavens and the earth and the biblical God. He's not just like any God that's out there. He's not some impersonal cosmic force, he's not, you know, a product of human imagination, he's not a fairy tale. He's not like the pagan gods that are unpredictable or deceitful or capricious. The God of the Bible is a God who is utterly truthful. In fact, god himself says in his revealed word to us that it's impossible for him to lie, which I think is really powerful. God cannot lie. It's beyond his ability, because he's utterly truthful. He can't be bribed, he can't be manipulated, he doesn't change, he's the same yesterday, today and forever.
Speaker 1:So I think Jordan Peterson recently has been saying this, that the very concept of truth has to be grounded in an understanding of God right, in an understanding of God right. Apart from that, it really does, you know. It becomes untethered and it becomes relative. And this is why I think, when Jesus came into the world God in human flesh, you know he said I am the truth, right, I'm God, I am the way, the truth and the life. He said for this purpose this is from John 18, 37, for this purpose I always like that for this purpose I was born. Oh, I'm tuned in now. Why were you born, jesus? What was the purpose that you were born?
Speaker 1:Listen to what he says. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I came into the world. And then he goes on and he says Wow, it's so powerful. So, ultimately, truth has to be grounded in an objective reality this world. But this world didn't spring out of nothing. It was created by God and God has a certain character and God revealed himself in Christ. And when Christ came he said I'm the truth. If you're on the side of truth, you listen to my voice, because I always speak the truth. So this is so important, I think. I mean, at one level, truth is very simple it's the egg and the toast I had for breakfast. At another level, it's got to be grounded in the person of Jesus Christ. So that's a lot, but let's go on and we'll go from there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love your definition, dad Simple, it's easy to remember that which accords with or corresponds with objective reality. As I read that, I'm wondering. So is truth, then, just a synonym for fact or reality? Can you just swap them around, or is there something more intrinsic about truth or more?
Speaker 1:No, I think, Luke, they really are. I think they can be closely tied. I mean, some people that are PhDs in philosophy would probably argue with me on that, but I think for average everyday people like myself, yeah, we're really talking about the same thing. When we speak of truth, we're speaking of something that's factual, that's real, that's objectively real.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but at the same time, truth is a person, it's Jesus right?
Speaker 1:Well, again, this is the grounding of truth. Right? For there to be an objective reality, it has to be grounded. Think about this, luke. Let's just assume Darwin was right. Right, there is no God, everything sprung into being by accident. There's no God out there. There's no angels, there's no demons, there's no spiritual reality. It's just matter in motion and you're part of that matter. If that's your starting point, if that's your basic understanding of reality, then there can be no truth. Right, because I mean truth just makes no sense in that worldview.
Speaker 3:Well, it's constantly evolving. Yeah, it just changes Because the world is evolving, right, it's not tethered to anything, it's not grounded in anything.
Speaker 1:It's almost a nonsensical concept, right? And yet that's where we're at today, because that Darwin's view is the accepted view, it's the taught view in schools, and so what people have done with truth is they haven't stopped talking about truth, but they've relativized, they've said it's just what I believe. Right, it's what I believe, it's what you believe. So all that to say, luke, it has to be grounded, and it has to be grounded even in something that goes beyond the physical world, the chair that I'm sitting in. It has to be grounded in something deeper, and that is the Bible makes that very clear. That's God, the one who created everything, and that's Jesus Christ, ultimately God in human flesh.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I think of it as it's grounded in a person, but it's grounded in the author, it's grounded in the truth generator.
Speaker 1:That's correct.
Speaker 3:What actually created this? Well, it was the person who knew truth and created truth, and we see it, it's now around us. Absolutely, we see it, it's now around us Absolutely.
Speaker 1:The word author is really helpful here, Dwight, too, because when we think of an author who writes a book, he has a meaning that he gives to that book. He's got a message that he's trying to convey. That's the truth of that book, if you will. But once truth is relativized, then what the author intended to say doesn't matter. I can give whatever meaning I want to that text. Right, and that's the kind of the postmodern deconstruction, if you will, that we're into today. It doesn't matter what, let's say, the authors of the Constitution intended when they wrote that document. I can give whatever meaning I want to that document. But if there really is an author, then that matters, right, that matters.
Speaker 1:What did he intend?
Speaker 3:And there is an author to everything, and that's God.
Speaker 1:Go ahead, dwight, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, no, I'm just talking over you repeating what you're saying yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, yeah, um, but yeah, so there is an author, but you, what's cool about truth is you don't have to know the author to know truth. You know, uh, we, you don't have to be a Christian to know truth. Correct, um, you can still observe it, which is really cool. And uh, that's, uh, what do they call that natural law?
Speaker 3:or scott. Why is it yeah?
Speaker 1:we all. We all relate to the same real world, right, you know? Yeah, um this, you know it exists, regardless of what we believe about it and whether you're a christian or not, we relate to the same world, right?
Speaker 3:you know so that said scott, why would you say it's helpful to know the author if you want to be a truth?
Speaker 1:seeker.
Speaker 3:Putting you on the spot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, this is really important. Modernism was based on the idea that truth is grounded in the physical world, right? This world, biological, chemical, material reality, right, but that's not enough. Okay, here's why, you know, if that's, all that exists is just, you know, is just biological, chemical, material reality, then again, how can anyone claim to know anything truthfully, right? It all becomes just a morass of subjectivism, you know. You know it has to be grounded in something greater, and I'm not explaining this. Well, maybe you can cut this part out, luke.
Speaker 2:I heard a guy who was not a Christian actually do a great job of explaining this, of why it matters, at the end of the day, to know the author, and he was looking at the way scientists look at science and he was saying you guys are doing it all wrong.
Speaker 2:So he was talking about how this is in the creationist argument, of how there is a creator that made the world and because there's order in the world, it means there was an orderly creator at the beginning of it, of it at all intelligent design. So this guy is not a Christian and he observes. He says what you guys essentially are doing, scientists, when you are looking at the world and trying to use science, but you're not acknowledging that there was a creator is? It's like looking at the English language for the first time, like a paragraph in a book, and scientists say, okay, so we have these markings on here. They're black ink and they have some kind of order to them and there's spaces between them and there's I see these dots at the end of each sentence and each sentence starts with a capital letter. So they're finding order in this paragraph.
Speaker 2:They're finding order, they're finding meaning, they maybe even start figuring out what the words mean and they're like, wow, this is interesting, so that's science, but no one's asking. Okay, but who actually wrote this in the first place? Why is? There even ink on the paper.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right and, at the end of the day, all science, all facts, all truth leads back to an origin. And if you ask questions and you seek the answers, you will continue on this road of this truth-seeking road. And at the end of that road there's a person.
Speaker 2:And if you're a very honest person. God's given us the mind, because we're made in his image, to actually go down that road and eventually we will have to make a decision for ourselves. Do we want to submit to the author at the beginning, at the origin of this road, or do we want to reject him? And good scientists will ultimately end up asking that question and they can answer it honestly, or they can choose to turn away from God in their own pride.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so well said, Luke. I think you really nailed it right there.
Speaker 3:I can think of one more argument as well, and that would be I was reading in Psalms this morning and basically God says I don't remember the exact words, but basically, if you seek me and you seek truth, I will help you find it.
Speaker 3:And we see through a glass dimly. Now, the fact is, all of us, I mean, if you love life, you love truth, because truth will lead to life. And and I'm thinking of even a person who's you know, you, you're trying to fix a formula one race car and you've never seen one before and you're trying to figure it out. I mean, the best thing you can do is go find the builder of that car, the engine builder, and say how does this thing work? What does it do, what's wrong with it here? And that person then will help you and God actually offers his wisdom to us as the author of the universe and the creator of the universe. So there's a pragmatic reason to want to know the author of truth.
Speaker 1:Well said, Dwight Well said yeah, you guys are bringing to my mind, you know, the kind of how does science actually work, if you're honest, you know, and you have to have certain presuppositions in place even for science to work, which is the study of the material world. Right, now, you have to believe that there's an order, you know kind of a repeatable order or certain laws, right? Then the question is, where did they come from? Right? Why would we expect order and laws in a random, chaotic universe of just matter and motion? We wouldn't expect that. So it points to a designer. But then, even more fundamentally, how could we understand it? Right? Why should we be expected to understand anything if our brains are just matter in motion? Right? Why should I trust what you say is true about anything you know? So you have to have this understanding that somehow we are set apart from God's creation and we can observe it and understand it and communicate with one another about it.
Speaker 1:And the only worldview that has those kind of groundings is the biblical worldview, you know. It says, yeah, there's an order and a design to this created world because there's an author and designed to this created world. Because there's an author, God created it in an orderly and a designed way, and he created us in a unique way as image bearers of God, to be able to kind of reason and think critically and carefully. He created us to be truth seekers, so that we can know truth. Yeah, so you can't even have science or a study of the physical world apart from God. So I think what you guys are saying is really spot on. Truth has to be grounded. It has to be grounded in the real world and even beyond that, where it came from, so well said.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's such an emboldening concept, it's such an exciting concept, such a freeing concept to know that as Christians, we are followers of the truth, which means that asking questions that should be our favorite pastime uh, seeking for answers, looking for people to uh really press us on our beliefs. That's great, because we know that, ultimately, if you ask the right, if you ask questions and you truly seek out the truth, you're eventually going to end up at God. So we should not be afraid of science, we should not be afraid of data, we should not be afraid of what psychologists are figuring out if they're honest psychologists because ultimately, all of that is going to be pointing back to God. So we should be, you know, the most accepting people on the planet of questions and challenges.
Speaker 2:We've said this quote a thousand times on the podcast, but I'm going to say it again this is JI and right reasoning cannot endanger sound faith. When confronted by those who take exception to Christianity, we must outthink them. So if you stand on truth, you know you essentially can't be moved. Yeah, no, you're right.
Speaker 1:As Christians, as followers of Jesus, we should love the truth. Again. The truth, ultimately, is a person, it's Jesus Christ. We love the truth, we seek the truth, we want to know the truth and we want to speak truthfully. It brings to. I think this is another important thing to say as we're talking about truth is that when we're talking about God in the spiritual realm, about truth, is that when we're talking about God in the spiritual realm, we have to bring up the fact that there, you know, there is an antithesis to the truth. Right there, god has an enemy, an opponent, satan. Right, this powerful fallen angel. That God is more powerful, okay, but there is a conflict between God and Satan at the very foundation of all things and all of history. And Satan, this fallen angel, is described as the father of lies. So if God only speaks the truth, satan, his opponent, constantly lies, and I think that's really important, that the great divide in the world in reality is this divide between God and Satan, and that's a divide between truth and lies.
Speaker 1:Let me just read to you what Jesus said about Satan. I think it's really powerful. Jesus said in John 10, 10, satan was a murderer from the beginning and he doesn't stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. So you've got truth and you've got lies and deception. And behind those, you've got truth and you've got lies and deception. And behind those you've got personal spiritual beings. Actually, you've got jesus, the, the father of truth, and you've got satan, the author of lies. And those have consequences in the real world.
Speaker 1:The truth builds, it builds flourishing relationships based on trust and it builds healthy cultures. We'll get into this in a little bit. Lies always destroy, and that's always Satan's—that's his goal, that's his purpose. It's destructive. He wants to tear down and destroy. Jesus said his purpose is to steal, kill and destroy, and he does that through lies and deceptions. So, yeah, you definitely want to be, as a Christian, on the side of the truth. Okay, if you want to build a healthy, flourishing life, family, marriage you name it Try truth.
Speaker 1:Society nation you've got to. The truth is the basic building block. It is the most fundamental building block and if you veer away from that, you're playing right into the hands of Satan and he is going to use lies and deception to destroy you and everything that you love.
Speaker 2:Yep, it's always good to keep in mind the opposites. Truth will lead to reality, reality leads to order, yep, and the opposite of order is chaos.
Speaker 2:So you're going to have a chaotic society if you reject truth. Speaking of chaotic societies, this word truth has been redefined and at the beginning of this conversation, dad, you, you read that redefinition to us. I think. So far for our listeners. They're probably sitting there and they're most of our listeners are Christians and they're like yeah, I agree with you guys. So far, 31 minutes in, you know, thumbs up, great job. Uh, but this word has been redefined.
Speaker 1:Uh and I think, uh, it's.
Speaker 2:it's such a destructive redefinition and I don't think a lot of Christians understand how dangerous this redefinition is when played out. So why don't we just flesh that out real quick? Why don't you read the redefinition, dad, and we can unpack why we really really need to reject this definition and hold strongly to that true definition?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so when people speak of truth today, when people speak of truth today, what they mean by that is something that is truth is internal, personal and a subjective thing, a subjective sense of reality that exists only in your mind.
Speaker 1:Or, as I said earlier, it can be a social construction that a powerful group has created that it uses to give them advantage over weaker groups, so it becomes something—it's reduced to power and we can talk about that in a second. So the key thing to understand about redefined truth is that it starts with the presupposition that there is no God. We live in a secular society today, largely secular. We've been taught, you know, that God doesn't exist, that we're evolved, you know all there is is matter in motion. So, given those starting points, truth has been redefined to something that isn't linked to any objective reality. There's a denial of objective reality. You know, now reality is just strictly individual and personal. It's something that exists within you. So today, people speak of my truth and your truth right, and that's very common, and even Christians fall into this, you know, when they say things like well, what I believe, right, what I believe is that Jesus is my own personal Savior, and that's essentially like saying my truth is that Jesus is.
Speaker 1:It's the same thing as saying my truth, I know this may not be your truth, and so they're falling into this idea that truth is just relative. This is my belief, and so that's the way truth is understood in our society today. I think it's just really important we could talk about the implications of that or the consequences of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, before this podcast, I just Googled, you know, famous movie quotes about truth because I wanted to get kind of that contemporary feel for what people are thinking about this word and a quote popped up from a movie. That I have no idea what this movie is, so I am not endorsing this movie. That I have no idea what this movie is, so I'm not endorsing this movie whatsoever. It might be a terrible movie, um, but it's uh. It's called I tanya the movie, uh, margaret robbie plays the main character and in it she says this quote, which is very crass, so I'll try to clean it up there's no such thing as truth. It's all bull. Everyone has their own truth, uh, and life just does whatever the f it wants, so it's all random truth is random.
Speaker 2:There's no truth because there's no god yeah, uh and uh, your own truth is all that matters, you know. Follow your heart, uh, be your truest version of yourself. These are all stickers we see on the back of people's cars today. Uh, and it's a very comfortable stance until you think about it for 10 minutes, but it is. It's an easy stance, just like saying, well, I believe this. I remember, dad, one time you called me out on that and I was talking about the Bible and I said, well, I believe this, but you know I'm okay if other people don't.
Speaker 2:And what I essentially was saying the Bible is just another opinion, it's just another truth out there and there's no such thing as one foundational truth.
Speaker 2:It's all options, and what a squishy view for someone to have. And you caught me on that, and it was a good heat check for me, because there is some things in life that are just. You don't have to cover them up with that nice label of, oh, it's just mine, it's no. No, this is reality, um, and it's okay to be, uh, you know, very clear and firm on that, um, and yet christians don't like to do that because it sounds dogmatic.
Speaker 2:Uh, and just saying my truth is so much more comfortable and I think that's why that is such a popular concept today is people I don't think people truly believe it because, you know, just believing my truth, uh, really doesn't work. When it comes to something like, uh, getting your getting your paycheck at the end of the month, you don't want your boss to say, well, my truth is you don't get paid this month. You know people don't really believe that, but it's so comfortable to say in any kind of discussion where there might be disagreement is you say, oh, that's your truth. You know my truth is a little different, but you know we'll go our separate ways. We're all cool, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's right, we it's, it's, it's unlivable, as you were saying, luke, in the real world we still have to rely on people's word. The truthfulness of people's words, eye on people's word. The truthfulness of people's words, you know, in everyday life, in just simple ways. You were talking about paychecks and, yeah, I mean, this idea that truth is relative doesn't really work when we're talking about something that personal and meaningful to you, like what you get in your paycheck each month. Right, you know, we have to have some kind of external agreement about that that goes beyond what I think or you think, and that we've got kind of written down, so to speak. You know, and that's just one example. But, yeah, no, today we, even though that's people. So we live in this weird place where people still have to live according to some basic level of truth, but philosophically they've become unmoored from the concept of kind of objective truth. And you said, this idea of being true to yourself, you know, yourself is the only grounding of truth. You know, what do I believe? And so, being true to yourself, then, today has become this supreme value.
Speaker 1:And this, by the way, this isn't new, you know, and I remember in 1987, when I was just out of college I read a book, famous book, by a University of Chicago professor named Alan Bloom, called the Closing of the American Mind, and that famous book some of our older listeners might be familiar with that book. He started it with this sentence he said there's one thing that a professor can be absolutely certain of Almost every student entering the university believes, or says that he believes, that truth is relative. In other words, there is no such thing as objective reality that grounds truth. Truth is relative to what you believe, what I believe. That was 1987, three decades ago. And so today, where are those students of Alan Bloom's from the University of Chicago that all he said? They all subscribe to that belief. They are now leading our universities and government and business and everywhere else. So this has become established in our culture, really sadly.
Speaker 3:I think the word belief is. I've been thinking while you guys are talking and I'm thinking well, what is belief and what is truth? And I think the difference is we do say I believe, and Jesus said what's the work? What is the work we're called to do? It's to believe in him, and so we have this word belief. But the difference is I believe this is true, I believe that thing is true, I believe Jesus is true and I will pursue that as truth. So I'm like you say, scott, I'm pursuing objective truth with my belief and right now I believe that's true.
Speaker 1:We'll get into what you're talking about, Dwight. When we talk about the word faith, faith and belief, when we lose the idea of objective truth, then we can believe.
Speaker 3:Belief means nothing.
Speaker 1:It just means I have an opinion. Well, it means that I'm free now to be whatever I want to be, and you see this, particularly in the whole area of transgenderism, right, like this has really become a social reality. We've denied the objective reality, the biological reality of male and female.
Speaker 1:And we've empowered people to say you can be whatever you want to be. And then here's the thing you have to affirm that right, you have to support that. That's what's understood today. So whatever you claim to be yourself has to be supported by other people around you. Go ahead.
Speaker 3:But the point is there's a disconnection between what I believe and what is true.
Speaker 1:Right. It's just a denial. It's a denial of truth at all. Right is really what it is.
Speaker 3:Basically, you say there's no longer an objective truth. Whatever I believe is true, so I am God.
Speaker 1:I'm God, exactly, and I make truth and I make—so.
Speaker 3:I believe in what I make you know.
Speaker 1:Anyway, it gets really confusing. Hey, there's an appeal, there isn't there. I mean, that's pretty powerful. I get to be God, I get to define reality, right. I get to be God, I get to define reality, right.
Speaker 3:That'd be scary.
Speaker 1:So you can kind of almost see and, by the way, you can hear a voice behind that and that voice is the voice of. Satan. I refuse to bow my knee to God. I'm going to define reality. And if you follow in the footsteps of Satan, that's what you say. I refuse to bow the knee to God. I define reality. I define who I am, what is real, what is true. And I'm going to then take the next step and I'm going to force you right to affirm my own belief about it.
Speaker 3:And we can trace that back to Genesis 3, where Satan said you will be like God.
Speaker 1:You will be like God, Exactly Right at the beginning of the Bible, Dwight, so good, you brought that up. I mean, we see lies and deception, right. I mean that's the first thing that causes Adam and Eve to go astray in the Garden of Eden, essentially is a deception. Satan calls God's word into question, you know, regarding the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And God said you know, do not eat of that, You'll surely die. And Satan comes in and to the garden in the form of the serpent and said did God really say? Did he really say? I don't think he said Right. So he starts kind of twisting God's words and then he puts that, he dangles that out there in front of them. You know, if you right, if you eat from that tree, you will be like God, right, you will be the definer of reality, of course. And all of this is meant and intended to enslave them, to destroy them, and that's, you know, that's the story of human history. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just want to read that false definition one more time An internal, personal and subjective sense of reality, what exists only in the mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:A social construct created to advantage the dominant group um yeah, I can, I can break.
Speaker 1:I can think of so many examples.
Speaker 2:Oh, go ahead, yeah, so many examples of people that that that believe this and it's it is hard. I've had conversations I'm sure a lot of people listening have had conversations where they talk to someone who who really does believe that it's an internal and personal subjective sense of reality.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, uh and uh, if they, if they really have built their worldview around. Uh, truth is just a personal idea of you know whatever's right for you. It's hard to have any functional, rational, reasonable, productive conversation with someone like that. Have you guys experienced that? I mean, I'm thinking of examples you know left and right right now. In fact, we could play devil's advocate here and I could represent someone who believes that as best as I can.
Speaker 1:Dad and we could have a little back and forth. Yeah, go, can dad? And uh, we can go back and forth. All right, Devil's advocate.
Speaker 2:Here we go Um, okay, uh. So you read your definition of truth that is is anchored in reality, and I say okay, um. Well, why do you, why do you get to define truth? You know, for everyone else who gave you that right, uh, what you're saying is just your truth, uh, your truth. And you know that's very dogmatic of you to assume you can say what's true for everyone else. That's unloving, you know, that's uncaring. I could even say that's bigoted. I want to treat people well. In my truth, I allow people to follow their dreams. I just want people to be the truest version of themselves and ultimately that's probably going to lead people to happiness. You know, and isn't that the purpose of life?
Speaker 2:to be happy and to follow truth to wherever you think happiness is.
Speaker 1:What do?
Speaker 2:you have to say about that.
Speaker 1:Well, I think again I would come back to the simple kind of thing that we started with. So are you saying then, luke, that we can't have any kind of agreed-upon facts about anything? Is that the kind of world that you think we should live in, where I say I had eggs and toast for breakfast, but Dwight says no, that's not eggs and toast, that's actually waffles. And we can never agree on that because we get to define truth ourselves. So are you saying that there is no kind of shared understanding of facts and reality in this world that we live in, and what does that mean for how we function together? What does it mean about your paycheck, for example?
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, but who gets to define what an egg is? You know, for you it could be an egg, For me it could be a cornflake. At some point in history, someone just threw the label on that thing. So they're essentially the ones that got to define truth, and maybe I don't agree with that person because that's just their truth.
Speaker 3:We can disagree on the word, but eventually, if we're going to communicate about that egg, we have to come up with a common word. So we can change the word egg and we can call it a cornflake, but you and I had better agree that that's a cornflake.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but then wouldn't that just be a social construct that we all agree upon as humans?
Speaker 1:Well, yes, you know, I mean we can say it's just something that we agree upon together. But again, this gets back to that earlier discussion about the grounding of truth, right, you know, and we would have to push down that philosophical road of on what basis is truth grounded? Is there a basis for the grounding of truth? That goes beyond my mind and I just don't think you can. You can't live in a world where everyone gets to define their own truth. It just becomes at some point, it becomes unlivable, you know. I mean we're seeing right now an example of this, just one example, in the destruction of women's sports, because a lot of men are saying my reality is, I'm a woman and I'm now going to enroll in women's sports, and they're destroying all the records right, and wrecking all the. You know they're essentially destroying the sport. You know, whatever the sport is women's sport, you know, and so that's just one example of how.
Speaker 1:If you, luke, there was a I thought this was a really terrific example that I saw several years ago. You guys saw this as well. It was a YouTube video and it got millions of views. It was created by the state of Washington Family Research Institute and the interviewer in this video goes on to the University of Washington in Seattle you know the campus there and he starts asking some questions to the students. And you know, to me this is just so perfectly captured the mindset that is prevalent in the culture today, especially amongst that age group of students anyone 30 and under.
Speaker 1:So he goes up to one of the students and he says hey, if I told you so, this interviewer, he's probably in his 30s, he's a white male guy. So he says to this student if I told you I was a woman, what would your response be? And the student says well, good for you. Yeah, I don't have a problem with it, you know. Another student says so fine, if you want to be a woman, good for you.
Speaker 1:Then he goes on and he says to another student if I told you that I was Chinese, how would you respond? And that was a little harder for the student you could tell, right, you know, than the woman one, because he's clearly Caucasian guy, european ancestry, you know he's like, but the student's still like. Well, I might be a little surprised if you told me you were Chinese, but I would say good for you. And then he goes up to yet a third student and he said something that was even harder. He says hey, if I told you that I was six foot five inches tall, this guy's probably five eight, right, what would you say? And the student struggled even more with that one but at the end of the day felt kind of compelled to say well, I would say that if you're not hindering anyone in society, if you're not causing any problems, if that's your truth, then I would say that's an okay thing.
Speaker 1:You can be 6'5", then I would say that's an okay thing you can be six foot five, um, and then the interviewer says but but would would you tell me I'm wrong? And the student answers oh, I don't feel like it's my place to say that someone is wrong or to draw any kind of lines or boundaries. That's kind of what you're getting at, luke. There too, you know like it's not my place to draw lines or boundaries around. But okay, what's the problem? This is the way. Now these students have thoroughly absorbed this understanding of truth, this redefinition of truth. It's something subjective, it's created in your mind. So if you're a five foot eight inch Caucasian male, then if it's your reality to be a six foot four inch Chinese woman, you know good for you. I can't say anything about that, you can't. Oh, I mean, that is delusional, though. Let's just be honest. It's delusional. We cannot live in a world of delusion, okay yeah that's.
Speaker 1:That's the bottom line right.
Speaker 2:doesn't he go on to say what if you know I was a female woman who's six foot something and eight years old? You know? Oh yeah, eight years old. He kind of keeps asking harder and harder questions because, because you know he's pushing against.
Speaker 1:You know, right, the, the male, female one, we've already kind of crossed that line. You can be whatever you want to be. You know you can. You can create your own identity and we have to affirm that. Right, that's a big one in the society. But ethnicity, that's a harder one, right? Can I say I'm black if I have white skin? That's a little.
Speaker 1:Can I say that I'm, you know, eight foot tall when I'm three foot tall or four foot tall, right, you know those are harder ones, but it's good that he pushed on those, because if truth really is as it's been redefined, just something that's completely relative and in the mind, then of course you can say any of those things, right yeah?
Speaker 2:And you have to be affirmed in that. That's just actually happened recently on a um, a girl's high school swim team and some dude who is probably in his 50s or 60s said I identify as a 15 year old girl. Just a total creep you know yeah right and he actually joined the swim team and, like was in their pictures and in their locker rooms, races there's real consequences for this kind of mass delusion.
Speaker 1:So this is what I would say to to your friend luke like we have to, at the end of the day, live in the same real world and have some basic agreed upon facts that go beyond what you believe and I believe yeah or things are really going to break down like real consequences, rape of young women or whatever it is. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I find, with these things, when you use kind of simple things like breakfast cereal or whatever, your truth, my truth gets really philosophical and confusing. But I think with people having these discussions. Don't be afraid to just use very extreme examples, because extreme examples oftentimes are just the clearest examples, right, and that's where it gets very uncomfortable, because black and white is a lot clearer in the extremes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, here's where I think it really gets clear too, luke. There's really only two simple choices at the end of the day Either God defines truth or we define it. Okay, it's really that simple. But when I say we meaning human beings, people define truth, that doesn't really work in the real world. I don't get to create my own little reality and then force you to affirm my reality, right, right, I can. Every when I try to do that, what you see is that everything gets reduced to power.
Speaker 1:You know, we're all trying to force each other into affirming our own understanding of reality, so everything gets reduced to power. So, at the end of the day, truth, then, isn't what you or I believe it's, whatever the most powerful person says it is. So those are the two choices. Either truth is what God ultimately says it is.
Speaker 1:It's grounded in his reality or if you don't like that, it's going to be grounded in whoever the person is that's able to amass the most power. Those are the options and you know, this is something that George Orwell saw super clearly and I think it's so relevant, you know, for the day that we're living in, because as we go down this post-truth world, that's what we're seeing in the world around us. We're just seeing people amassing power and then forcing other people, through censorship and all sorts of techniques, to affirm their preferred narratives or their view of reality. There's a, if you don't mind, there's a line in George Orwell's famous book 1984, that just captures this so clearly. I came across it as I was writing my book and I was really stunned. Came across it as I was writing my book and I was really stunned Because he wrote this, I think, shortly after.
Speaker 2:World War II and just the insight that he had, even at that time was really stunning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the book 1984.
Speaker 2:He wrote in 1948, I'm sorry, he wrote in 1948, exactly.
Speaker 1:So the book kind of climaxes with this kind of inquisition that happens between the protagonist of the book, a guy named Winston Smith, who is somebody who's a truth seeker, and his torturer. This person named O'Brien. And O'Brien represents the group in power, or the party Okay, in the book it's called the Party and so O'Brien says to Winston during this inquisition he says this only the disciplined mind can see reality. Winston, you have to believe that reality. Excuse me, you believe that reality is something objective, external, existing in its own right. You also believe the nature of reality is self-evident. When you delude yourself into thinking that you see something, you assume that everyone else seems the same thing as you. But I tell you, winston, that reality is not external. Reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else, and not in the individual mind this is the point that I'm making now, which can make mistakes and in any case soon perishes but only in the mind of the party, which is collective and immortal. Whatever the party holds to be true is truth. It is impossible to see reality except when looking through the eyes of the party. That is a fact that you have got to relearn, winston. I just think that is so powerful and clear. He just nails it with that right. Clear, he just nails it with that right.
Speaker 1:You say reality is external, that we all can agree on it, that it's grounded in ultimate reality. No, it's not. It's subjective, it's grounded only in the mind, but not in the individual mind, only in the mind of the party. Right, this is where it goes. Right, the powerful are going to define reality. Those are the two choices either God does or the powerful, the party, if you will. Right.
Speaker 1:So, what kind of world do you want to live in? I guess is my final question on that Go ahead.
Speaker 3:That's inevitable. That's inevitable. It's inevitable and I think that's one of the things we should be aware of today that this move towards highly individualistic perception of reality and truth ultimately cannot. It leads to dissolution and disintegration.
Speaker 1:It leads to tyranny.
Speaker 3:And so you look at the suicide rates of today among young people and you look at the overdose levels of young people and people in general, and I think it's because there's this fragmentation that's taking place in our postmodern culture, where people nobody can agree with anybody on anything and so nobody connects to one another on anything, and there's just this isolation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they don't know who they are Exactly Everything is just lies. It's lies and deception. We live in this world of deception now because there's no grounding for truth anymore.
Speaker 3:But Orwell looked down the road and said where this leads is that you can't. Society will disintegrate.
Speaker 1:It'll disintegrate, and so the solution is for power to step in. It'll disintegrate into chaos, right?
Speaker 3:if we all define our own truth and finally, the party steps in and says no, we will define reality for you, I will impose the order right, and then everybody goes.
Speaker 1:I'll take it.
Speaker 3:Truth is my truth, not your truth, right? And at that point you're so upset with life as it is that you go I'll take that, I'll take that order, even if it's a lie. Yeah, and that's the danger that we'll take an order that's a lie. And then you have where solzhenitsyn ended up writing true live, not by lies when he left not by lies and so we had exactly solzhenitsyn brings.
Speaker 1:You know, we live this way, we, not me personally yeah we as a human race live this in the 20th century. I mean, communism, essentially, was what Orwell was writing about. They rejected God, they amassed power. We define reality and we're going to force you, all of you, to affirm our reality. And we saw where that led to the gulags and literally millions of deaths. We saw it in Russia, we see it in China and Cambodia, and you name it. I mean, that's where it goes, exactly right, dwight.
Speaker 2:So those are the choices right.
Speaker 1:Either God defines reality or you end up in something very much like that, and that's where I hate to say it. Ideas have consequences. That's where we are going. Okay. So then the question as well is there anything we can do about it? Maybe we can Luke, we can move to some of that space there now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just one last thought before we move on In using examples of this. It is really true that those are the only two options. Either you acknowledge that God exists and that he is the way, the truth and the life and the foundation of truth, or if you don't and you reject truth, then the only way that you can have any formal order is through power, holding that all together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, either God or people, and the most powerful people exactly.
Speaker 2:And you see that throughout all histories, look at every civilization that's existed.
Speaker 1:Look at every civilization that's existed.
Speaker 2:You either devolve into authoritarian dictatorships or tribalistic power wars, all of which are based on power, and whoever has the most power can control everyone else. 1984 is literally written for today's North Korea. Today in North Korea, they tell everyone in that entire country that there is no other countries in the world. There's just a bunch of savage people. You don't want to go out there. We're the only ones that are enlightened. They've rewritten history books. They've rewritten geography. It's pure power that's holding any semblance of formation in that country together.
Speaker 2:Or you have democracies, and the only reason that the US has worked for this long is because at its founding it said we hold these truths to be self-evident, sacred that all men are created, equal and endowed by their creator. There is a God endowed by their creator with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If you don't acknowledge the creator at the beginning of a democracy, it's going to fall apart, and that's why, as the US has tried to spread democracy around the world, cultures that don't actually acknowledge that we're endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights. The democracies don't work there and they eventually just devolve back to tyranny and authoritarian dictatorships. So that's just a good example of how, when these are lived out, it really just does devolve one way or the other. It can only yeah, it can only go one way or the other yeah, we'll get into that.
Speaker 1:When we talk about the word freedom, you know, even more luke, that these things that we I mean they're basic building blocks for, for, for democratic societies, for, for just basic human relationships. I think it's good to go and just even at this point, you know, say what is truth important? For what do we rely on it for? You know we take these things for granted, but we ought not to. We ought to come back to it. You know I already talked about how we rely on truth and truthfulness for basic human relationships. I can't have a relationship with you, dwight, if you lie to me all the time. I can't trust you. And I can't have a relationship with you, dwight, if you lie to me all the time, I can't trust you. And if I can't trust you, I can't have a relationship with you. And so you know, once truthfulness breaks down, relationships break down, people become isolated and lonely. As you said, you know, it's this basic glue that holds everything together. As you said, you know, it's this basic glue that holds everything together. So truth is essential for healthy relationships. Just imagine a society where you know a family, a business, an organization, a marriage in which everyone lied all the time. Right, you know, you just couldn't trust anyone. Think how quickly things would fall apart.
Speaker 1:Right, truth is essential for justice. Right, we don't want to take this for granted. Right, because justice is essentially a search for the truth of what actually happened, and that's why witnesses in a crime have to, you know, they have to take a vow, essentially to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. So, help me, god. Right, there has to be some kind of sense of this is really important, this is sacred. You have to tell truth because there's going to be consequences guilt or innocence, prison time or not, depending on what you say. So, justice is dependent on truth.
Speaker 1:Science is dependent on truth. Right, you couldn't have science without an agreed-upon set of natural laws that we all agree. It's not just what I think or you think, it's what's actually existing out there. Right, education, universities can't exist without truth. Harvard, the founders of Harvard, the Puritan founders, the committed Christian Puritan founders of Harvard, when they established that university, founded it upon the motto veritas, which means truth. This is a place where we seek the truth. So, apart from truth, there can't be any university. And you know, I could go on and on, but suffice it to say that without that basic building block of truth, everything falls. You can't have a civilization. We just wouldn't have a civilization without it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I mean ideas have consequences and this false definition is very pervasive, at least where I live and in many places around the world. I think a lot of our audience could agree with that. I even look at surveys from George Barna that he's doing at the Cultural Research Center. And even amongst Christians, this idea that there is no objective truth is very pervasive disturbingly pervasive.
Speaker 1:And you can be a Christian and still believe in the subjectivity of truth, and a lot of Christians are right. I don't know. Well, you can be a Christian in the sense that you can have a relationship with Jesus, but still have been kind of you know have a lot of this— you can still spout the wrong definitions.
Speaker 2:yeah, Right, yeah.
Speaker 1:You can't have a fruitful christian life. Let's say, but yeah, no, you're right, it's probably arguable, but but, but, there's a lot of christians who are post-modern. In this sense, you're right, luke yeah, I think you could.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree with you. I think you can definitely be a christian at heart. But still accidentally and unthoughtfully just re-say the common definitions that the world uses on words like truth. Yeah, so yeah. We're at a point now where it seems like we're on a slippery slope. How can we, as Christians, recover this true definition? We need to. So, how do we do that? You know a lot of people think, oh, it's just me, it's just my life. What can I really do to change society, culture, nations? How do we do that?
Speaker 1:A couple things. I'd like to just focus on, two really simple things that I think we can do that are really practical. The first thing is it's simple but it's also hard we commit ourselves just individually to being truthful and to not lying and not deceiving and not shading the truth, just in our everyday lives. We're just going to make a commitment to being as truthful as we can be, and that alone is going to take us a long way towards healing our societies is if we just individually make that commitment. I struggle with this. It's, you know, the flesh part of you, especially in times when there's consequences for truthfulness and you want to lie and shade the truth. Right, you know it's still hard, you know I struggle with it, but at the end of the day we have to just say truth is that important that I will do my very best in God's strength to not lie, to not shade the truth, to be honest, completely honest and trustworthy with everyone.
Speaker 1:I was listening to Tucker Carlson, you know, and whatever you think about him, I was impressed by one thing he said. He was, you know, he's a journalist and he lived in this world of journalism and he saw how journalism in the United States this is another thing that can't exist without truth was just being taken over by lies and spin and narratives, and it didn't really matter what was true anymore, it just mattered what the powerful narrative was. And the journalists existed to trumpet that narrative right. And he was so sickened by that you know, you can't have journalism without truth that he eventually got fired and he kind of created his own journalistic enterprise and he said my foundation for this new enterprise is truth. I'm going to tell that, I'm going to tell you, my listeners, as best I can, the truth about things you know. And I understand we see through a glass darkly and we don't always see the truth completely, but to the best of my ability I'm going to tell you the truth. And then he went on and I thought this was powerful. He said and I'm going to commit, I've committed myself to be as truthful as I can and to not lie. You know it starts with that, that basic commitment. So I would put that out there. As you know, how do we turn this around? It starts with you, right, and your own commitment to truthfulness. But I would put another thing out there too, luke, and this is that we live because we live in a we already are in some ways in George Orwell's 1984, where you've got powerful people that are telling you something that's not true, but they're saying this is the truth.
Speaker 1:You have to affirm it, and you see this again especially in the transgender you know thing where you know if you say no, there is an objective reality to male and female, you can expect some real negative consequences for that. You can expect to be possibly fired from your job, to be fined in some places. There's different jurisdictions and civic locations that actually have fines for you not affirming someone's chosen gender identity. So what do you do? And I think here you have to make a commitment to speaking the truth about things, even if there's strong social pressure not to right and not be cowed. You know you have to. This is what.
Speaker 1:What's his name the former during the Cold War, the former prime minister of the Czech Republic, václav Havel, said he called it living in the truth. You have to make a commitment to whatever lies the regime, the powerful regime, is telling and are holding over you with all sorts of threats of jail and imprisonment and, whatever it is, fines. You have to find it within yourself to not go along because their lies, their powerful lies, only work to the degree that everyone is cowed into submission. And this is what Solzhenitsyn said, you know, when he said you know, the truth is so powerful One person telling the truth has the power to topple that whole regime of lies.
Speaker 1:So I think you know this is again we have to have the courage within ourselves and support each other to tell the truth about these things and say, no, I'm not. You know, in love I'm not going to, I'm not. I'm going to continue to say that there is. You know, male and female are realities. They're God-created realities, they're biological realities. I will not. And that's just one example, but it's an important one. Just one example, but it's an important one. So I think those are two things that we have to commit ourselves to doing in this time, just personally and socially. What are your thoughts, dwight and?
Speaker 3:Luke on that. What other ideas do you have too? I should ask Two thoughts. One is just you said you know speaking the truth in love. We flip that out and say, oh yeah, we got to do it in love. Truth and love. We flip that out and say, oh yeah, we've got to do it in love. But really, if you love somebody, really really love them, you will want them to speak, you will want them to know the truth.
Speaker 1:You will want them to live in truth, because delusion and deception are so dangerous. Truth and love are two sides of the same coin. Exactly yeah.
Speaker 3:And I think of how many lives are being just really harmed these days because of lies and young people, especially Children, are taking it on the. They're getting hit hard because of lies.
Speaker 3:And if we love children, if we love families, we'll speak truth. The other thing is yeah, I think I mentioned Solzhenitsyn's Live, not by Lies. I looked at that again as I prepared for this podcast and I was just dumbstruck by his. Basically, he's doing what you're doing, scott. He's saying okay, I'm leaving the Soviet Union, I'm being sent to the US in exile because he's been released from the gulag. After all those, years.
Speaker 3:They're saying you have to leave, and he releases this Live, Not by Lies. It's a three-page paper and you should go Google it and find it and read it.
Speaker 1:It's just here's what you do.
Speaker 3:Don't go to a meeting where you know they're going to distort the truth. Just don't go, walk away.
Speaker 1:Walk away. Yeah, and he has all these points. Live in the truth, don't?
Speaker 3:do this if you want to live in a truthful society, and it's really practical.
Speaker 1:He is so worth listening to because he lived for years and paid the price of living in a society that was built on a foundation of lies and it was imposed upon people by the powerful forces of the communist regime, and he saw how it destroyed everything, and it just gave him this deep commitment to the truth. So, yeah, he's really, really important.
Speaker 3:He's a prophet and he really loved his country. I I mean, he still does.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he wanted it to flourish and thrive. And he saw the lies destroying it. So absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you love something, you'll tell the truth. That's such a good takeaway. Yeah, you mentioned Havel as well. Bacalhau.
Speaker 1:Havel.
Speaker 2:He said if you speak the truth, you will preserve your humanity.
Speaker 2:Yes, I love that the truth will set your humanity. I love that, um, the truth will set you free. We say that verse all the time, but if we truly believe that, then if we love someone, we would want them to live in freedom, we would want them to thrive in God's freedom. And to do that, you have to tell people the truth in the most loving way you can, as Jesus really did a great job of modeling for us but you have to tell them the truth, as Jesus really did a great job of modeling for us, but you have to tell them the truth. You know, we read these stories in the Bible about. Two of my favorite stories are Radshak, meshach and Abednego and Daniel in the lion's den. These are people that were faced with the choice do you want to live in the truth or do you want to follow the lie? And they chose heroically to live in the truth and that resulted in consequences.
Speaker 2:But we love those stories because those people embodied in a heroic way what living in truth looks like and we love that. And nowadays, you know, in our society, we also have been afforded that opportunity. Some of us will be afforded that sooner than later and we can, just like Radshak, meshach and Abednego, stand up when everyone's bowing down.
Speaker 1:Let's go back, luke, just for a second. I think it's so powerful what you said there about Vaclav Havel. He said that when you live in the truth what did he say?
Speaker 2:You gain you regain, you preserve your humanity.
Speaker 1:You preserve your humanity. Let's talk about that just for a second, because I think people need to really understand what he meant by that. So he tells this famous story of a life under the communist regime right in the Czech Republic and how. You know, if you ran a small business, you were forced to put up a sign in the window of your business that you know had a motto or slogan of the regime right that showed that you were compliant and would go along with the lies. And in this case the sign said workers of the world unite or something like that. Right, that you were safe, that you would go along with the lie, that you would tell the lie and that you would be left alone, no problem. But you were in doing that, you were propping up this lie, this false regime right that was destroying people, and you were just a cog in the wheel.
Speaker 1:Right, and at some point, that green grocer within himself, he makes a decision to take that sign down and Vaclav Havel says two things happened at that point. Number one he gives permission to other people to live in the truth. Right, to take the sign down. Right. There's a contagion to the truthfulness here, right, and the courage to do that. Yeah, courage is contagious, courage is contagious. He loses something by taking the sign down, meaning that the authorities are going to come in and they're going to confiscate his business. They may put him in prison. So he's going to lose something, he's going to pay a price for that. But then Pavel says he gains something greater. This is, I think, what we don't see. He gains his humanity. He lives in the truth. You know this idea that to be a human right, to be fully human, is to not be an animal, to be cowed by some other powerful force, but to commit yourself to the truth no matter what, and that's to be fully human.
Speaker 2:So I think, that's just so powerful what he said there and that's connected to Genesis 1, where it says why is that being fully human?
Speaker 1:Because we're made in the image of the truth of God, who is truth.
Speaker 3:So for us to be fully human is to be fully truthful, to be as close to Christ and to God as we can be, and that means yeah, truth, it's impossible to lie.
Speaker 1:That's yeah exactly, dwight exactly. We regain our to lie to. That's yeah, exactly, dwight exactly.
Speaker 1:We regain our to lie, to live in a lie, is to be subhuman. So yeah, anyways, A couple things there for people to kind of chew on. I don't think it's too late in our post-truth culture, but we do have to come back to God. You know, there does have to be a kind of a return to God in the church, in the society, for there to be a return to truth. Can we control that? No, but what we can control is what we can do right in our own lives, and so I want to encourage people in that way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, this is a hard one to wrap up. This has been a really fun discussion For our listeners, who are still with us thank you so much for joining us for this little bit long discussion today.
Speaker 2:But while we were having fun and I hope you were enjoying it as well in the future with these upcoming the rest of the nine words that we're going to be covering here, we'll try to keep it a little bit shorter for you guys, just for the sake of your time. To keep it a little bit shorter for you guys, just for the sake of your time. But, yeah, truth is a it's a big one, so I'm glad that that we went so in depth in this one. Yeah, so again, this is part one of a 10 part series we're going to be doing here on the show and, by the way, these are not going to be exactly and, by the way, these are not exactly going to be a consecutive series, as we're still going to be sprinkling in some of our regular ideas have consequences, styles, interviews into the lineup over the next few months. But in the meantime, what you can do is keep an eye or an ear out, as we're really excited to start bringing you some of the new content and announcements pertaining to the upcoming book launch.
Speaker 2:Again, the title of the book is 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World, and I love. This subtitle Restoring the true meaningsings of Our Most Important Words. Today we unpack truth. Next time we'll cover the critical word of human and then down the list from there onto sex, marriage, freedom, authority, justice, faith, beauty and love. So again, I hope you'll be able to join us for these upcoming episodes here in the series, and if you missed last week's introduction to the book episode, then make sure to. And love.
Speaker 2:So, again, I hope you'll be able to join us for these upcoming episodes here in the series, and if you missed last week's introduction to the book episode, then make sure to give that one a listen, and please consider sending these episodes to your people, as it will help us build momentum for the upcoming book launch. Thanks again for joining us today. Make sure to visit the episode page for more information about the book and our ministry here at the Disciple Nations Alliance, and I hope to catch you next week here on Ideas have Consequences the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance.