When Shall We Learn the Truth?
It is ever well to question, at least, any society or organization which sets up a human organization as authority, and the creed of that organization as the truth. This is well illustrated in the following quotation from a Roman Catholic priest, in stating the object of a Catholic organization: “The object of the Catholic Truth Society is to set forth the teachings and history of the Catholic Church from the Catholic standpoint. As we may be reasonably supposed to know best what our teachings mean, it is only right that those who wish to examine our teachings should learn them from us.” Our purpose in quoting the above is to point out the wrong principle involved in the last statement. For it is a fact that those in error do not best know what their teachings mean. The old-school physicians, who bled till they sapped all the vitality of a fever patient, did not “know best” what their teachings and practise meant. There is no one so deceived in his own case as the self-satisfied sinner. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?”—as much as to say, No one. The text continues, “I the Lord search the heart.” Jer. 17:9, 10. To whom then shall we go? Shall we go to the Buddhist to learn what the teachings of Buddhism mean? Shall we go to the Spiritualist to learn what the teachings of Spiritualism mean? Shall we go to the anarchist to learn what the result of his teachings will be? Shall we take lessons of the light-fingered cult or the road agents to learn the justification of their acts? Or shall we go to the law of the eternal God, and the word of His truth, and the life of His Son? Roman Catholic theory may be learned by the study of Roman Catholic theology. But the truth must be found, if found at all as a saving truth, in God and His word. If the Roman Catholic have the truth, that word and his life will reveal it. He will bear witness in teaching and life to the truth of that word. This we will know if we learn it in the word. If he do not have the truth, why need we study a false theory? The artist who would paint a perfect picture does not fill his heart and soul with imperfect models, but with the perfect. The truth, the whole truth, is found in God’s word. Accept nothing which is contrary to that. The only true way to discern error is to know the truth. “My sheep hear My Voice,” says Jesus, “and I know them, and they follow Me.” John 10:27. “A stranger will they not follow; . . . for they know not the voice of strangers.” Verse 5. The sheep do not spend their time endeavoring to learn the voice of every stranger or any stranger. It is enough for them that they know the One Voice; all others are discerned as strangers because they know the One. The only sure way to discern truth is, not to know a theory or a system or a church, but to know God, and Jesus Christ whom He has sent. If the princes of this world had known God “they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” 1 Cor. 2:8. And Jesus declares that those who persecute His followers do so “because they have not known the Father, nor Me.” John 16: 1-3. Knowing God, knowing His Voice, which uttered His holy and immutable law, knowing and having (for we know it not unless we have it) the life of Jesus Christ, we will in God’s wisdom and by His power be preserved from damning and delusive error. “Thy word,” says the psalmist, “have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee.”