truth

Trust.

This month's "value" at the local primary school. The first of the new school year.

This is where it starts.

Yes, I was in at the school again today. The first assembly the P1 children have had.

The Head was speaking about trust. Who you trust and what trust is and involves.

And, of course, truth came into the equation. The school motto is "Honest and True". So that got an airing as well.

Trust and truth. The two have been before me much of today in one way and another.

"Trust in the Lord forever," declares the prophet of old (Isaiah 26.4). And that's the heart of all that we seek to do. Urging the people to do just that and simply trust in the Lord.

But the prophet's exhortation doesn't stand alone.

"Trust in the Lord for ever, for the Lord, the Lord is the Rock eternal."

Trust is rooted in truth. The truth about the Lord. Who he is and what he's like. He is 'the Rock eternal'.

But it doesn't even end there.

"Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord is the Rock eternal. He humbles those who dwell on high, he lays the lofty city low; he levels it to the ground and casts it down to the dust."

Trust, yes. But the trust is rooted in truth, the truth about God. And that truth is then expounded. So that we understand exactly what is meant when it's said that the Lord is the Rock.

I'm newly back from a whole long evening addressing this question of truth with a person here.

Can we ever be all that certain about the truth of God? When you come to that 'truth', the person suggested, is it not all rather subjective?

You come from a certain background, you bring your own perspective, you have your own way of thinking, and you've had your own experience. Surely that colours the way you read the Scriptures? So that your 'take' on the 'truth' is going to be different from mine.

Can we ever be all that certain about the truth of God? That was the line the person was trying to air. And I think it's a question a lot of people have.

And it's very basic stuff. If 'truth' is such an elusive thing, how can we cultivate trust?

Well, yes. We are all different. Background, personality, experience, and so on.

But no more so than the writers of Scripture itself. They were all different, too. You only need to read what they wrote to see that for yourself.

But that didn't mean the truth they revealed was somehow highly 'subjective'.

The truth is not 'subjective'. And the exposition of that truth is also not subjective.

I'm bound to be myself in teaching Scripture: and as a result the way I teach the Scriptures will be coloured by my own distinctive teaching style, and helped, I hope, by what have been my own unique experiences.

But that doesn't make the exposition of Scripture a thing that is basically subjective. I can't simply make the Scriptures say just anything. I must let the Scriptures interpret themselves.

So I can't simply take the statement that "the Lord is the Rock eternal", for instance, and make it mean what I want. I have to let the Scripture interpret itself.

And so I have to take on board the immediate exposition of that statement that the Scriptures give. I have to take on board the many other references that there are to this great theme throughout the whole of Scripture. The 'rock' that Moses struck from which the water came. The statement that "that rock was Christ". And a whole load more.

I have to do a lot of work, in other words. I'm not a free agent, quite free to expound as I will. I am 'licensed' to preach. I am bound to expound what the Scriptures themselves have set out.

I am called and ordained and obliged under God to discern by the grace of his Spirit exactly what Scripture declares. And woe betide me if I seek or presume to do anything other than that.

'Truth' is not what I choose it to be. 'Truth' is not a chameleon-like thing which can change according to context. 'Truth' is not an elusive thing, dependent on the hearer.

'Truth' has been revealed. Made known. Made clear.

I expound that truth as such, on its own terms.

And I do so that others may learn to trust in the Lord. Forever.

On the basis of that truth which he's revealed about himself.