Good morning:
Did you check your email first thing this morning, Facebook, the newsfeed you subscribe to? What happens thousands of miles away is instantly broadcast everywhere. What the president or Congress or the CDC says becomes common knowledge online within minutes. Our problem is not a lack of information, but the question of whom to trust. “Fake news” has become a familiar term. Accusations of foreign meddling call into question news reports we read. The best-intentioned message may be inadvertently misleading.
No one has come up with a foolproof method of determining the truth of all that we hear. Some insist the best approach is to be skeptical about everything. Don’t believe something just because a politician, newscaster, or even a friend says it’s so. But that leads to another conundrum: If we are to trust no one, how do we verify what is true? How can we judge? How do we know our own conclusions are right? It’s a hopelessly tangled mess impossible to unravel.
Yet when it comes to what matters most, not just for our life on earth, but for our eternal future, we don’t have to wonder what’s fact and what are dangerous lies. We don’t have to depend upon our own reason and investigation. We have the eternal truth of God’s Word. “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away,” Jesus assures us. Paul writes, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).
When someone argues that there is no absolute moral truth and no accountability, we know the facts: “Each of us will give an account of himself to God” (Rom. 14:12). When a friend says they believe that God will take “good” people to heaven, no matter what religion they follow, we can show them what Jesus says: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn. 14:6). And when the news all seems to be bad and we begin to wonder whether there’s light at the end of the tunnel, we have the Lord’s sure word pointing us to Jesus’ victory on the cross and His promise that nothing can separate us from His love and the glory to come.
Whom can we trust today? No matter how confusing and unreliable the news we hear in the world, the message from above, the good news of a Savior from sin who even now says, “Surely I am with you always to the very end of the age,” remains the truth we can count on today and forever.
In Jesus’ name,
Pastor
Tomorrow’s services are at 8:00 and 9:30 a.m. The Lord’s Supper will be celebrated. Here is the link for signing up:
The public school confirmation class meets after second service.
