“I have no greater joy than this, to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” — 3 John 4 With this post, we make our first turn to truth as a moral issue. We will not begin with…
Truth Decay: The Old Testament on truth
“All the paths of the Lord are faithfulness and truth to those who comply with his covenant and his testimonies.” – Psalm 25:10 (NASB) In my last post, I reviewed philosophical theories of truth. I concluded that for most everyday purposes the correspondence…
Truth Decay: What is truth?
“What is truth?” — Pontius Pilate (John 18:38) Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in a famous essay called “What Is Meant by ‘Telling the Truth’” claimed that truth telling is “expressing reality in words.” Bonhoeffer’s shorthand definition reflects the commonsense, most familiar understanding…
Truth Decay: Truth as an issue in Christian ethics
“Let your yes be yes and your no be no. Anything more than comes from the evil one.” — Matthew 5:37 Six years ago, I took to the pages of Associated Baptist Press (now Baptist News Global), to puzzle over…
The church has a role to play in implementing COVID vaccine
With a vaccine for COVID-19 presumably coming sooner than later, the question of who will and who won’t choose to get the vaccine is looming large. And along with that are questions about the role of the church on matters…
Being ‘pro-life’ means telling the truth about COVID-19
One of my neighbors put a new sign in the yard today that reads: “Vote Pro-Life.” I want to knock on the door and ask one question: “Do you mean you’re going to vote against abortion, or do you mean…
The true story of two immigrants seeking asylum in the U.S. and the pastor who’s helping them
Michael Wangai (not his real name) has been in U.S. immigration “detention” since August 2019. The only crime he has committed is seeking political asylum in the United States with a certainty that if he returns to his home country…
Who is Jesus Christ for us today?
Deep and terrible divisions wrack American society. Sober observers are concerned that the sporadic protests and counterprotests, the riots and gun-toting militias we have spotted this summer could give way to intensified nationwide civil strife this late fall if the…
Is a political realignment coming?
This awful year has offered few glimpses of hope. But one of them has been dawning since May. That is the possibility that Donald Trump and his decadent version of the Republican Party may go down to a substantial national…