Truth With a Capital "T"

I do my best writing in my darkest places.

I think that’s because it’s in the dark that I go searching more urgently for the light. In other words, in the face of struggle is when I search for the truth. It suddenly becomes of the highest importance to decipher the truth from the lies.

It’s like I feel the Holy Spirit stirring in me when I’m giving in to my gluttony or struggling to have faith. Something like a battle cry begging me to choose God over the struggle. But I hear another voice too. It claims to be the truth, and sometimes the things it says are true things, but it twists them into something that doesn’t align with God’s truth. It may be an accurate description of my recent behavior, but it’s not true of my identity as a child of God.

Ironically, God’s Truth seems to be the opposite in most cases. It doesn’t describe what I see or what has exactly occurred. Rather it identifies something deeper about who I am because of who He is. Something solid. Something hopeful. It’s Truth with a capital “T.”

Are you still with me? Let’s talk it through with a biblical example and a current example.

“The Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.” - Genesis 12:1-2

“Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, ‘Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?’ … Then God said, ‘Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him…” - Genesis 17:17,19

*for the full story of Abraham and Sarah, check out Genesis chapters 12-23. It’s a story with lots of layers and twists and turns!

The story of Abraham is one of the oldest examples in the bible and there’s so much we can learn from it. For now, we’re going to hone in on this “Truth v. true” train of thought.

God promised Abraham this Truth about his identity: “I will make you the father of many nations.” Of course, that statement was and is True in ways far beyond Abraham’s comprehension. Today, we see the ways God has expanded His people to include Gentiles as well as Jews making Abraham a symbolic father of all God’s people. However, at the time God made that promise to Abraham, even the simple understanding of having lots of children and a big family was incomprehensible to him.

Abraham was seeing the “little-t truths”: He was old and his wife was barren, and past child-bearing age anyway. Leave it to us to get stuck on human problems like infertility and forget that our God is far greater! All Abraham could see was the facts of his circumstances, but God knew the depths of who He created Abraham to be and how He was going to make His miraculous promise a reality.

Even though what God said to Abraham was going to come True - that he would be a father of many nations - nothing in his life looked like that could possibly be true. It was still true that his wife was barren, and it was true that he was old. But it is also True that God made him a father of many nations. And isn’t it wonderful that this “Truth with a capital T” came only by the will and voice of the Almighty God!?

Yet, the enemy tries to distract us by telling us the things we see in front of us are all that can be true.

"So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." - 2 Corinthians 4:18

Now for my current, personal example:

One day I had my whole evening planned out - I was going to relax a little with a TV show, and then chisel away at my to do list. Before I knew it, 1 episode on Netflix turned into a wasted 3 hours before bed time.

Let’s look at the “little-t truths”:

I did not do the things I intended to do.

I sat on the couch and watched Netflix for 3 hours.

I had a whole list of chores/goals for the day that I ignored.

Now, what the enemy does with these things is use them as ammunition to try to pass these identities off as “big-T Truth”:

I am lazy

I am stupid

I will never accomplish anything

Let’s compare this with Abraham’s story...

Abraham’s “little-t truths”:

I am old

My wife is barren

I have no children

What God’s promise proclaimed as “big-T Truth”:

I am seen by God

I am a father

There is hope

I love when God takes the things I see as normal and flip them on their heads! I can look at the facts of my circumstances and believe the enemies’ lies that they define my identity...

OR

I can seek God’s Truth-with-a-capital-T despite the circumstances and choose to believe I am who God says I am.

I challenge you today to ask God what Truths He is calling out in you and to walk out boldly in that identity!

"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light." - 1 Peter 2:9