What is Truth? Do You Even Care?

When Pilate asked Christ "What is truth?" he didn't really want an answer. Do you?

There was a time in my life when truth was not central to my thoughts. Sure I gave lip service but I was just pretending that I knew the truth. But I really didn't. When the lights were out, my so called religious practice was just a superficial version of the truth. O, I lived what I had been taught was the gospel, but really did not comprehend how much truth I really possessed and had access to. I was still at that stage where family and job were the greatest focus of my time and energies. 

'Lip Service' is such an apt term to describe my devotion to Christ. I was able to mingle it with scriptures and pretend I knew the truth, but again I didn't. I was one of those who was ever learning, but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. It's simple really. I could not know truth if I was not even searching for it. And I would not search for it if I had little or no desire to search. There is nothing worse than to pretend we know the truth when we have no desire to know it.

I was of those described by the Lord "who have professed to know my name and have not known me," or "who swear by the name of the Lord, and make mention of the God of Israel, yet they swear not in truth nor in righteousness." That was me. 

I didn't give ear to His words. I did not hearken to His voice. I did not hear His voice in His words. I didn't pay attention to my Father in Heaven when He commanded me to Hear the words of His Son! In fact I hardly focused on His words. They remained in the scriptures which I would read occasionally, but never connected His words to the truth. My pursuit of earthly things was the very thing that clouded my knowledge of heavenly things. And yet I considered myself blessed.

It now intrigues me, after years spent obtaining His words and knowing the truth, how differently believers in God respond to the same truth. I can see myself in most of them. While some reject it, others assume that salvation is theirs, although their idea of the truth is mistaken or incomplete. I can relate, however, because I was one of those who 'claimed' to know, but had no idea what I did not know! The best boost for me came at General Conference when a speaker would speak about fathers because I thought I was a good one, and that was sufficient, wasn't it? Or another would speak about attending meetings and the temple. And another about repenting of committing grievous sins, none of which I had committed. Or another about how much Christ loves me. I was home free. Or so I thought. Or better yet, I wanted to think. I had become very good at deceiving myself, and even better at decieving others. I was a member of the "true church," which had the right organization with twelve apostles, the priesthood, and the temple ordinances. And we had the Book of Mormon. I was of the House of Israel and was one of those righteous spirits held back to come forth in this last dispensation. 

Keep in mind that during this time I had served a mission, taught, been an elders quorum president, a counselor in two bishoprics and a bishop. Don't be fooled by the office. No one, all of a sudden, by virtue of a calling, local or general, knows the truth. One must put in the work to acquire and then come to know, the truth. And it requires a lot of both. But it begins with an overwhelming desire to know the truth. A desire I did not yet have.

I have come to believe that each of us should have our own Road to Damascus experience, where we are stopped on our journey through life, and with the clarity of an angel, told to hearken unto the words of God. To stop what we are doing and hear His voice! Or at least have an experience that causes us to quit conversing among ourselves and look to the source of His words, and hear Him say to us, "This is my beloved son. Hear ye him." 

Following several life changing experiences, I began to unlearn my limited view-point of a fixed set of beliefs, and my mind was opened to all the possibilities the word of god could contain. It was then that scriptural insights came so fast I had to completely reevaluate what I had learned before. My limited view-point was quickly changing and becoming unlimited.

My own Road to Damascus experience came in 1984 when I was released as a Bishop, where I did hear His voice in His words telling me: "Behold, I am God; give heed to my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore give heed unto my word." He also told me to "Wait a little longer, until you shall have my word, my rock, my church, and my gospel, that you may know of a surety my doctrine. Seek not to declare my word, but first seek to obtain my word, and then shall your tongue be loosed; then, if you desire, you shall have my Spirit and my word, yea, the power of god unto the convincing of men" (D&C 11:16,21).

It was because of this experience that I began to really focus on His words, actually on the word word! And His words led me to His definition of truth, which by the way, is the word of the Lord (D&C 84:45). It also led me to ask if truth is being taught today in the Church? I confess that it was only after concentrating on the scriptures that I discovered that only a watered-down version of His word is being taught in the Church. Having obtained His words, I could clearly tell the difference.

I also saw that it wasn't so much that people read the same word of God differently, but that many were not reading at all, or not searching--the scripture itself--at least not in a manner that allowed them to fit every piece of it into one cohesive picture of the truth. Instead people were reading materials the church published for study. Often these were selective--preserving some threads of truth while excluding others--so that the total picture was so incomplete it becomes a distortion of the truth, a transfiguration of His words. I also discovered that the more truth I discovered, the more my knowledge of the truth kept growing exponentially.

That was unsettling at first because what I started to learn turned many of my former beliefs upside down. But I was not tempted to call off my quest for truth. I recognized the danger of a self-sufficiency acted out in the lives of people who practice a religion that lacks substance, which substance is the truth of the word of God. But the irony is, Joseph's religion does not lack the substance, but it's people do.

Another problem is that the truth is not easily discovered. I had to exert myself to find it. I discovered that presuming to know something prevented me from knowing more, that lesser truths become a trap. Also believing something is not the same as knowing it. We may believe whatever we want, whether it is true or false. But we can't know something unless it is true! The truth is also light because it has the capacity to guide us and enlighten us, until we know for ourselves whether something is true or not. That light also shines upon ourselves and with it, we can see and experience our nothingness and His goodness.

This learning process is built into our very existence, as it teaches us an important thing about ourselves: for each of us, life is a personal journey in which we can advance at whatever pace we want toward a more intelligent condition than we started from. "Advance' being the operative word, for if we are not advancing we are going backward. And if we become more intelligent, then we become more useful to the Lord, influential, and powerful in the service of the very truth that makes us so. 

When Jesus said "The truth will make you free," He tells us that the more truth that is in us, the more we become our own agents. By living the truth--by living the laws of God* that are grounded in truth--we become increasingly independent. The opposite is also true: the more we live a lie, the more we are bound by lies and become less free, captured even-- by the chains of hell. Because God is the source of truth, He is also the source of freedom--not the freedom to do what we want, but to live the truth, which makes us free.

For most of us, our spiritual side has barely been tapped. We have not asked the right questions but have simply assumed that things are so. We have not lived the truth we could have lived, and so we are still less than what we can be.

I recognized this in myself and others, and desired to share the truth with others at every opportunity I could find. It was the purpose of this blog to share the truth with others, and as an aid to help them come to the knowledge of the truth. I also had been called to say nothing but repentance unto this generation and could not ignore His leading me to the truth. I could do the same and lead others to the truth--to Him! Every post in this blog is about His truth, and reflects my journey in learning and knowing His words. 

I cannot help but share what I know. And I understand your resistance to what I have written because I was once where you are. I share with you my journey to repentance as the Lord defines it, and my discovery of the standard by which I can compare everything--His truth. I share with you my coming to know of a surety His doctrine and His gospel, not a watered-down version of it. I share with you how I came to discover His righteousness and to rely wholly upon His merits. 

I have come to know personally what the prophet Malachi taught: that the “righteous” people in God’s Day of Judgment are not those who profess a particular creed or repeat religious slogans but are those who “serve God,” while the “wicked” are those who “don’t serve him” (Malachi 3:18). Associated with this is the Lord's definition of the righteous and the wicked.

I share with you how we can avoid His justice, and how we can be found guiltless and spotless at the judgment when we stand before Him to be judged. I share with you the Book of Mormon and how important it is to you, your children and grandchildren. You are living in the last days, and the Book of Mormon was given to us to help us avoid the endtime judgments and destruction. It describes the Lord's Great and Marvelous Work, and how that work will divide us. I share with you Nephi's and Christ's prophecies concerning us who are identified with the Gentiles.

I share with you Isaiah's remarkable endtime prophecy concerning America and the world, the destruction of those who are not repenting and the deliverance of those who are. I share with you how the Book of Mormon is the link between us and the prophecy of Isaiah, and how the Lord commanded us to search the words of Isaiah, for, as He said, "great are the words of Isaiah," and that all Isaiah said "has been and shall be." The mystery Isaiah conceals and reveals is the knowledge of God.

As Isaiah teaches it, *the higher law is nothing but an expression of God’s love in its purest form, demonstrating God’s design, and desire, to lift us up. At the center of Isaiah’s prophecy, for all who have “eyes to see and ears to hear,” we discover God’s eternal plan to exalt his children.

I share with you the discovery of how we become like him, and how we are sanctified by the truth. I share with you His words as I have come to know them as the truth. I share with you my sorrow for those who do not desire to know His truth, my worries for them, my suffering for them. I share with you my testimony of Jesus, the Spirit of Prophecy, and that I can clearly see that which is to come. I share with you all that He has revealed to me, as another witness of Him in all places and at all times. And because what I share is truth, His words which have now become my words, will live on long after I am gone.

I share with you His gifts of the Spirit given to me. I know that we only do good through the gifts and power of God. I share with you how and why we are identified with the Gentiles, and that the Lord's endtime judgments come about because of the failure to repent of those of us who have entered into the Lord's covenant, and will be as the salt that has lost its savor, good for nothing but to be hewn down and cast into the fire. There will be those few who do repent and become nursing fathers and mothers in helping to gather the house of Israel. 

I share with you a series of posts on repentance and how repentance is linked to everything in the scriptures, and why only those who are repenting will be numbered among the house of Israel when the Lord gathers them as they are protected from the endtime judgments. 

I share with you the obstacles to hearing and receiving the truth.

I share with you that many personalities from millennia past were beloved of God and were privileged to see and know more about God and angels than many of us can comprehend. That is not because we are inferior, but because we consider ourselves superior, although we have little to show for ourselves in comparison. In reality, if we allow these men of God to speak to us, there is a lot we can learn.

I can speak with the tongue of angels, and recognize immediately those who were like me, who pretended to know the language, but did who not. I know the difference between the Church and His gospel. 

I plead with you to seek the truth. I pray that you will. Why? Because I desire for you all that the Lord desires for you. Remember that you are saved no faster than you gain knowledge of the truth.

Although I am sharing these insights with you, I will understand if you treat them as fiction. Compared to today’s well-worn pulpit narrative, some of these views may seem radical indeed. But I have found them easy to support with hard scriptural evidence. I have not written anything that I have not been able to show you.

I invite you to put them to the test, to see if they are not enlightening, empowering, and freeing to your spirit for that flight to heaven which God has invited every one of us to make.

Keep in mind that Christ had told Pilate what truth is before he even asked when he said to him: "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice" (John 18:37). How grateful I am that I now hear His voice, and can bear witness of the truth!