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The Triune God Makes Truth

          Frustration is spreading more rapidly than the millions of gallons of oil spewing out of BP’s sunken drilling platform. With cleanup failures continuing, people are wondering, “Why is BP calling the shots?” Obviously BP doesn’t want the spill to cause any more harm and they’re trying hard to contain the damage, but just as obvious is a company’s desire to contain damage to its own image and profitability. That means BP will be tempted to manufacture its own truth, trying to convince itself and others that the worst oil spill disaster in U.S. history isn’t really that bad. For instance, BP’s early report that the leaking rig was gushing 1,000 barrels of oil a day was found to be only a fraction of the true volume.

            This desire for image control is a conflict of interest that we see not only in corporate giants like BP but in our own lives. The truth can be scary. So we manufacture our own truth, or at least manipulate the real truth just a little bit so it feels better to us or sounds better to others. “It’s not that bad,” we say. We can also make our own truth from a source that tells us what we want to hear; like going online to some obscure blog that contradicts our doctor’s unreasonable demands to lower our cholesterol. Making our own truth can be fatal. Worse than that, making our own truth gets God’s unpleasant attention in a hurry.

            Now, maybe I’m an oversensitive pastor overprotecting God’s image but when someone says, “God told me to,” I translate what comes after that statement (for example, “take a third job” or “divorce my wife”) as manufactured truth. Here’s the real truth: she takes a third job to fund irresponsible spending, or he wants a divorce because of selfish lust and immaturity. God gave us the second commandment to make it very clear he will not put up with anyone who drags his name through the mud to endorse our dirty sins.

            In a warning to us all, the Bible condemns people who sinfully make their own truth “to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear” (2 Timothy 4:3). When it comes to the truth, we confess today that we’ve scratched our itching ears, fed our lustful appetites, and made truth for ourselves – as care free as making a plate of food for ourselves at a potluck that gives us exactly what we want. And it turns out to be poison. 

          In John 16 knows that his disciples don’t want to face what they need to hear: it is time for Jesus to save the world by dying and rising. He’ll need to leave them for a while. Showing compassion for their hurts and confusion, Jesus holds off on the TMI and tells his friends, “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear.” Jesus has truth he wants us to know, truth that will help us, and he’ll give it to us when we are ready for it. For now, what he does share with his disciples and us is enough to occupy our minds with this real truth on Trinity Sunday: The Triune God Makes Truth.                                                    

The Father makes truth exist

            True or False: Zebras have stripes. True or False: The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. True or False: God loves you. All true, because God the Father makes truth exist. He created zebras and gives orders to the sun, and his eternal love for you begins in his own heart. These are some of the many truths that are true because God the Father created the world and adopted us as his children. While we observe these truths as true, we’re not responsible for them to be true. So when Jesus says, “All that belongs to the Father,” he is pointing us to the many, many truths that are true, have been true, and will always be true because they belong to the Father. He is responsible for their reality. They exist not because of certain circumstances or when we feel good about them or only on Sundays. They exist all the time because God the Father is God. And here is the grand finale truth for sinners who have, to our shame, made our own truth instead of accepting God’s. Jesus once prayed to his Father about us, “They are yours (John 14:9). We are God the Father’s. We belong to him as his most glorious truth of all.

The Son makes truth work

            If we think of God the Father’s truth that exists like a map, then Jesus the Son is the chauffeur who gets us where we need to go with expertise and care. “All that belongs to the Father is mine,” Jesus promises confused travelers needing divine direction now and forever. Jesus the Son makes truth work. He take what the Father gives him and uses it to save us with his works of redemption – his living and dying, his rising and ascending, his clothing with righteousness and coming at the Last Day. For your Savior God truth is not dusty dogma sitting on a library shelf waiting for a seminary student to use it in a research paper. The Father makes truth real, and Jesus the Son makes truth work for you wherever you are.

            In the last few months I’ve watched, prayed for, and helped my mom care for my dad, whose Parkinson’s disease is starting to rob his functioning. I’ve discovered the value of medical records, particularly the medical chart of a patient under the care of multiple doctors. Proper coordination of medical treatment relies somewhat on the personal experience of the patient and family, but even more so relies on the professional data recorded in the chart. When doctors can access these truths, knowing they are real and not wondering if they are a person’s own perception, they can take those truths and make them work for the health of the patient. This is what King David meant when he expressed his faith to God, “All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be” (Psalm 139:16). God’s chart for you and David is filled with truths from eternity that make God’s love work for you throughout your life.

The Holy Spirit makes truth known

            Better than a medical chart, which most of us can open up and it looks like a foreign language, when God opens up his file of truths to us he also opens our minds and hearts to know and believe those truths. Jesus promised, “When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.” This promise held magnificent weight for the disciples of Jesus who would become his witnesses and some of them even writers of Holy Scripture. It also applies to us, because the Spirit comes to us too, in the words of Scripture, in our baptism, and in the Lord’s Supper. He comes to counsel us, guide us, and teach us. Furthermore, notice that even God the Holy Spirit doesn’t speak on his own, but speaks “only what he hears” from the Father and the Son. If the Holy Spirit listens to the Father and the Son, certainly we do well not to make our own truth but instead listen to the Father and the Son too. The Holy Spirit makes known the truth that the Father makes exist and the Son makes work.

            So why is BP still calling the shots cleaning up its own mess? Because nobody else, including the government, has resources for cleaning up an oil spill 5,000 feet underwater. But BP does. The government can monitor, and the media can report, and other experts can assist, but BP owns this problem and needs to own the solution. To be honest, that doesn’t make me feel any better. It’s like saying I am a sinner with guilt gushing out of my ungodly thoughts, decisions, and behaviors and I am responsible with my own resources for stopping the problem. Sometimes we can feel that way, especially when God doesn’t give us what we want. But there’s something better than what we want, or even what we can do. It is the truth that belongs to our Savior God, who makes it exist, makes it work, and makes it known.

            You don’t need to make your own truth. God’s truth is perfect for you. Turn to it. Trust it. Amen.

Preached at Grace Lutheran Church, Milwaukee, WI (www.gracedowntown.org) on May 30, 2010

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Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church | 1209 North Broadway Milwaukee, WI 53202 | (414) 271-3006

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