To Tell the Truth

Is it Wrong to tell people About Jesus? I have recently discovered a Barna report which explains that some people find it to be morally wrong to evangelize.

First of all, let me say why I think this is the case.

Under the guise of postmodernism, people believe that truth is in the subject, rather than the object. Truth is relative, in other words. If your truth is different than my truth, then it would be a severe problem, nay, a moral trespass, to offer someone a different truth that would cause them to leave their own truth. It would be offensive, and morally wrong, if it were the case that truth is relative.

For instance, if it were true for me that Mormonism was the way I saw reality, then to change my reality to biblical Christianity would be disastrous.

It seems that harming one’s reality should be a reason for concern, but the problem is, what if the way someone views the world does not correspond to the truth?

If the truth is not in us (the subject) but is outside of us (the object), then truth is not what we make it. Truth just is what it is. The Scientific Method for instance, is a philosophical tool used to discover what is true of our physical world. With this in mind, then, the Scientific Method is used to discover the truth. This is the case for all truth. It is discovered, not made. We cannot make truth any more than we can make dirt. We can pile vegetable scraps in a bucket for months at a time, but we are not making dirt. We have made a discovery that doing this will result in dirt. There is a big difference.

We cannot make our own gender either. We are born a certain way, whether male or female (or hermaphrodite, which is a birth-defect), and we cannot change what we are. If we transition from one gender to the next, we have to take all kinds of medicine in order to maintain the unnatural direction that we desire to in gender-transition. The truth is, we are what we are born as. We do not decide the truth on our gender, but we discover it (at the moment of birth, if not before).

So the poison of postmodernism is that it tells people that they can believe what they want, not what is necessarily true. This is why I believe that there are people who believe it is wrong to evangelize or proselytize. In a nutshell, because people think that truth is relative and that one person leaving what they see as truth coming to another truth is wrong.

But there are several things wrong with this.

For instance, if I leave one truth for another, then when I arrive at the new truth, under the guise of postmodernism, wouldn’t I still be in the truth? If I am leaving one truth for another truth, if truth is subjective, then I am still in the truth. So then there is no harm done. I’ve simply switched my perspective. And shouldn’t it be celebrated? Since I have discovered a truth that is better than my old truth?

The other thing wrong with this is that truth is not subjective. If Joe lives in Texas and steps outside on a 120 degree day, and he says that it is hot out, then it is true for everyone, wherever they are in the world, that when Joe stepped outside onto his porch in Texas and said that it was hot out, that he felt hot. Even if Marv lived in Northern Alaska, and it was nighttime at the time Joe said that in Texas, it would still be true that it was hot in Texas. It is obviously not hot in Alaska at that time, which is also true for the Texan, but for the Alaskan, it is true that Joe felt hot, when Joe stepped outside onto the porch, even though the Alaskan is very cold and sipping hot tea.

The Time Stamp

This points to absolute truth. Some of the readers might remember a camera that you could buy in the 80’s and 90’s which would place a time and date stamp on the picture when the roll was developed. Many cameras even offer this feature today. If I took a picture of Joe, stepping out on his porch in Texas and the photograph had a time stamp, then I took the picture to Alaska, and showed it to Marv, 2 days later and Marv said, “No, it was cold on this date and time… I remember.” Which one would be right? The problem is, Marv is using this place and time for his own place and time, which would be wrong, because it would be incorrect. So for both Marv and Joe, no matter where they are in the world, if they have the photograph, they can look at it and both agree that Joe felt hot on such a day and time on his porch in Texas. It will be true for all eternity forward. This is absolute truth, which describes all truth.

Since all truth is absolute and is discovered, and because most religions, which are worldviews, argue that they are the one true (exclusive) truth, but because they disagree (contradict) with one another, then there can only be two options: Either only one is true or none of them are true. So then, if I am a Latter-day Saint, and Mormonism turns out to be wrong, because it opposes the other religions, then for someone who does know the truth to hold it back, especially if it concerns my future well-being, then it would be wrong for them to not tell me about the truth. In other words, it would be wrong for everyone to not tell the truth if they know the only Way.

Think of cancer. Everyone hates it. Our family members have died from it, some readers might be suffering through it, and nothing about it seems to be good. Therefore if someone knew the cure for cancer, it would be morally wrong for them to not tell us about it. The reason we know this is because if we are the one with cancer, we immediately want to be healed from it! It would be morally wrong to withhold such a cure. Why? Because no one wants to experience the physical pain and heartache that one goes through with cancer.

Therefore, if we as Christians know the truth about life, through Jesus, that He died for our moral failures (sin), that He paid the price for us so that we will not fall under God’s wrath, but also that we might have eternal life, then to hold this back would be more immoral than holding back a cure for cancer, because we know that we live forever.

There are only two places that we can enter into after death. Heaven or hell. Only one of these destinations can be earned.

The truth is, it seems to be wrong to hold back the knowledge of salvation if we knew it, and if it were true. This said, it is not that we have to earn anything in sharing the Good News of Jesus with people, but our knowledge of the Truth should compel us to want to do so.

Jesus is God, and He told us about what happens when we die. The reason we know that He is God is because we can look at His claims and read about what He did. He is unlike anyone else that walked the earth. Read His claims for yourself. Read the eye-witness accounts for yourself. How would you react if you saw the things that the apostles did?

Written by Nace Howell through the grace of the Lord Jesus

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Apologetics and Evidence

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