Possess the Truth
Dear friends and benefactors,
A perceptive child can often spot insincerity or indifference. In Sunday school, when the teacher recounted the story of Jesus’suffferings and death, a child remarked,"The story is not true."
Taken aback, the teacher asked, "What makes you say that?"
"If it were true," the boy replied quietly, "you could not tell it without weeping."
Sorrily, some Christian writers, authors of religious hymns, and preachers are boring; others are very good but burn out quickly; and some become soul-less—perhaps it is because they spend too much of their souls on their work without taking due precautions to refill them daily.
William Cowper wrote the renowned hymn:
"There is a fountain, filled with blood,
Drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains.
The dying thief rejoiced to see
That fountain in his day,
And there may I, though vile as he,
Wash all my sins away."
One feels there is life in this song. Cowper poured into it the blood of his own heart. In his old age, he suffered several bouts of insanity; he who had written that "the precious blood shall never lose its power" doubted during his depressions that his own sins were washed away by Christ’s sacrifice.
It is necessary that we allow ourselves to be cleansed and purified.
To be in error is dreadful thing, but it is even worse to embrace truth for the wrong reasons: because it is convenient, because it is pleasant, because it is profitable, because it is socially acceptable. God wants us to love the truth. It is the water of life He offers us. Don’t adulterate it with pollutants.
Love truth for its own sake, and it will come to you.
But is there no hurry to find the truth?
St. Augustine says, "You would never have sought the truth if you had not already found it." "The truth induces men to seek the truth," said St. Makarios the Great. And Blaise Pascal wrote, "We could not seek God unless in some real sense we already possessed Him." The fact that you seek truth, that you ask for it, shows you have a love for it. Love for truth is an essential part of truth itself. If you seek it earnestly, you can afford to sit down quietly, like Mary Magdalene.
Which is more real to you, your problem or your-self? You existed before you posed the question to yourself about finding truth. How many hours a day do you seek it even now? You are much bigger and more important than your search for truth.
Don’t throw away the whole of your life for this particular, though valuable, preoccupation—this search for truth. Live your life. When you work, work. When you eat, eat. When you sleep, sleep. When you amuse yourself, amuse yourself. Truth and life are good companions. They are friends, not enemies. You don’t have to exclude the one in order to have the other. Jesus said,"I am the Way." What does this "Way" consist of? He explained Himself immediately: "the Truth and the Life."
Take it easy, take one step at a time, and you will reach the truth. Meanwhile, be yourself.
Truth is the supreme goal, except that truth alone can be nowhere, just as one cannot find either iron or gold alone in the earth; they exist only in combination with other elements.
Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life". if one wishes to know truth, he must know life too. If he wishes to fulfill the demands of truth, he must be attentive to the demands of life as well.
St. Paul taught us to beware of vain philosophy.
Long ago there lived a king who had a very valuable stallion. He appointed a watchman to do nothing else but guard the magnificent animal during the night. To satisfy his concerns, the king arose at night and went to the guard.
"What are you doing?" he asked.
"Well, your majesty, I was just reflecting on why a circle is round and a square rectangular."
The king exclaimed, "I am happy to have in my service a real philosopher. Just continue."
Later in the night, the king went again and asked the watchman, "What were you doing now?"
"I was trying to find out what happens to the hole in a bagel after it is eaten. I did not eat the hole, but notwithstanding it has disappeared."
the king was very pleased to have a soldier with such interesting thoughts. He came a third time and asked the watchman, "What now? What are you thinking?"
"Now I have a really serious problem. There was a stallion in the stable. It is no longer there. Where could it be?"
For the sake of philosophy, he had lost the stallion of truth.
Seek the truth, but be careful not to destroy your life and the lives of other men for the sake of philosophizing about truth. Without men, where will the truth settle and of what good will it be?
The story is told that Pol Pot, the Communist dictator of Cambodia, declared, "I have a truth that will make people happy."
He was asked, "What if your people do not accept your formula of truth?"
He replied, "I will kill al those who oppose the truth. Truth is for me above all things." Out of a population of five million, he killed two million of his own people.
This is the attitude of the inquisitors of all convictions. This is the philosophy of those who tyrannize their families, forcing them to accept what they consider as truth.
God says, "You shall therefore keep My statutes and My judgments, which if a man does, he shall live by them..."
Truth is given that you and others might live by it, not die by it.
Be careful. Be forewarned.
Richard Wurmbrand
A perceptive child can often spot insincerity or indifference. In Sunday school, when the teacher recounted the story of Jesus’suffferings and death, a child remarked,"The story is not true."
Taken aback, the teacher asked, "What makes you say that?"
"If it were true," the boy replied quietly, "you could not tell it without weeping."
Sorrily, some Christian writers, authors of religious hymns, and preachers are boring; others are very good but burn out quickly; and some become soul-less—perhaps it is because they spend too much of their souls on their work without taking due precautions to refill them daily.
William Cowper wrote the renowned hymn:
"There is a fountain, filled with blood,
Drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains.
The dying thief rejoiced to see
That fountain in his day,
And there may I, though vile as he,
Wash all my sins away."
One feels there is life in this song. Cowper poured into it the blood of his own heart. In his old age, he suffered several bouts of insanity; he who had written that "the precious blood shall never lose its power" doubted during his depressions that his own sins were washed away by Christ’s sacrifice.
It is necessary that we allow ourselves to be cleansed and purified.
To be in error is dreadful thing, but it is even worse to embrace truth for the wrong reasons: because it is convenient, because it is pleasant, because it is profitable, because it is socially acceptable. God wants us to love the truth. It is the water of life He offers us. Don’t adulterate it with pollutants.
Love truth for its own sake, and it will come to you.
But is there no hurry to find the truth?
St. Augustine says, "You would never have sought the truth if you had not already found it." "The truth induces men to seek the truth," said St. Makarios the Great. And Blaise Pascal wrote, "We could not seek God unless in some real sense we already possessed Him." The fact that you seek truth, that you ask for it, shows you have a love for it. Love for truth is an essential part of truth itself. If you seek it earnestly, you can afford to sit down quietly, like Mary Magdalene.
Which is more real to you, your problem or your-self? You existed before you posed the question to yourself about finding truth. How many hours a day do you seek it even now? You are much bigger and more important than your search for truth.
Don’t throw away the whole of your life for this particular, though valuable, preoccupation—this search for truth. Live your life. When you work, work. When you eat, eat. When you sleep, sleep. When you amuse yourself, amuse yourself. Truth and life are good companions. They are friends, not enemies. You don’t have to exclude the one in order to have the other. Jesus said,"I am the Way." What does this "Way" consist of? He explained Himself immediately: "the Truth and the Life."
Take it easy, take one step at a time, and you will reach the truth. Meanwhile, be yourself.
Truth is the supreme goal, except that truth alone can be nowhere, just as one cannot find either iron or gold alone in the earth; they exist only in combination with other elements.
Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life". if one wishes to know truth, he must know life too. If he wishes to fulfill the demands of truth, he must be attentive to the demands of life as well.
St. Paul taught us to beware of vain philosophy.
Long ago there lived a king who had a very valuable stallion. He appointed a watchman to do nothing else but guard the magnificent animal during the night. To satisfy his concerns, the king arose at night and went to the guard.
"What are you doing?" he asked.
"Well, your majesty, I was just reflecting on why a circle is round and a square rectangular."
The king exclaimed, "I am happy to have in my service a real philosopher. Just continue."
Later in the night, the king went again and asked the watchman, "What were you doing now?"
"I was trying to find out what happens to the hole in a bagel after it is eaten. I did not eat the hole, but notwithstanding it has disappeared."
the king was very pleased to have a soldier with such interesting thoughts. He came a third time and asked the watchman, "What now? What are you thinking?"
"Now I have a really serious problem. There was a stallion in the stable. It is no longer there. Where could it be?"
For the sake of philosophy, he had lost the stallion of truth.
Seek the truth, but be careful not to destroy your life and the lives of other men for the sake of philosophizing about truth. Without men, where will the truth settle and of what good will it be?
The story is told that Pol Pot, the Communist dictator of Cambodia, declared, "I have a truth that will make people happy."
He was asked, "What if your people do not accept your formula of truth?"
He replied, "I will kill al those who oppose the truth. Truth is for me above all things." Out of a population of five million, he killed two million of his own people.
This is the attitude of the inquisitors of all convictions. This is the philosophy of those who tyrannize their families, forcing them to accept what they consider as truth.
God says, "You shall therefore keep My statutes and My judgments, which if a man does, he shall live by them..."
Truth is given that you and others might live by it, not die by it.
Be careful. Be forewarned.
Richard Wurmbrand
Labels: Richard Wurmbrand
Posted by Dominique Péladeau for the Rev. Radu Roscanu | 4:01 AM
1 Comments:
Pastor Wurmbrand was right to caution us about pursuing truth. However, wasn't he a bit inaccurate/inarticulate when he wrote here against dying for the truth? (He was a brave martyr for Christ.) The problem is NOT a willingness to die for the truth. The error comes by accepting the wrong assumptions as facts and then following them to the end.
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