Truth in Data?

In the seventh “woe” that Jesus pronounced on the Pharisees, he told them he was sending them prophets, teachers, and sages, of whom the key characteristic was that they should speak the truth. 

We are speaking of the truth as the revered product of information, data, and knowledge. We seem to possess, deeply in our souls, an attraction to truth. We simply want to be right. We want the truth. We’re averse to lies. Even when it’s bad, we want the truth. 

But how do we know what is true? How do we know if we’re right, if what we hold in our belief and what we rely on for our information is the truth? We are especially attracted to the truth when it comes to religious things; most particularly, to the truth about God. But that truth, I propose for our discussion today, is not to be found in data. 

Truth based on data, information, and knowledge are ever changing and continually expanding. In 1900, knowledge was estimated to be doubling every 100 years. In 1945, it was said to double every 25 years. Today, it doubles every 13 months. Think about that. Every time your birthday rolls around the knowledge of the world has doubled. And we’re quickly on our way—with the help of the Internet of Things—to a doubling every 12 hours. 

How can truth be found in such a sea of information? How can knowledge be vetted? Who can determine if our data are accurate? Who is the keeper of the truth—who is the truth referee? 

In science, truth is always undergoing change, and is self-correcting. Questions are asked, hypotheses are proposed, data are gathered and analyzed. If the data don’t add up, then new theories are proposed, new insights are established, new truths are discovered. 

But in religion, and in things about God, we are still heavily influenced by the scientific method. We seek data-based truth that will enable us to draw valid, reliable, and reproducible conclusions. We especially value data that we can see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. Could it be that the truth about God is primarily accessible through a sixth sense—one not necessarily independent of sensory data but cognizant of its limitations? 

Religions try to establish data points and then, through logic and reasoning and argument, to get others to see those same data points and to draw from them the same conclusion. Their data points, of course, are drawn from Scripture—for Christians, the Bible. Yet the Bible is not written as a book of scientific and systematic thought. There is no data set that embodies truthfulness in the Bible.

Many see the Bible as the literal word of God. I see it as a dynamic book about the drama of life. In my work as a surgeon, I deal with that drama on a daily basis, and I find that the Bible addresses much of what I see. More than just a window on the divine, it is an intimately human book, full of love and tenderness, compassion, concern, hope, and all the good things of life, as well as the bad things too: Hatred, violence, revenge, corruption. 

It is a book of stark realism, showing us as we are—at our best and at our worst. It catalogues the afflictions as well as the greatness of humankind. It reveals our certainties and our doubts, our aspiration and our vileness. This degree of realism explains, at least to me, many of the Bible’s apparent contradictions, which disturb and perplex some of us even to the point of destabilizing our faith. 

The Bible seems to me to mirror the human heart, itself a mass of contradictions that prevent us from ever grasping but a portion of the truth—which we then expand, embroider, extrapolate from, or otherwise find ways to subvert. We do this at our peril, because God’s ways are not our ways and his thoughts are not our thoughts. 

The difference between us and God is not small—it is in measurably big. As Isaiah 55 says, it’s the difference between the heavens and the earth. In other words, it’s light years different. So one ought not to look to the Bible expecting to find logic. One should look to it for life, and like life itself, the Bible offers far more questions than it does answers.

In the Bible, God does not exempt us from life’s drama. Rather, he promises to live it alongside us. The Bible evades nothing; it enters realistically into life as it is. It expresses all of our feelings, aspirations, fears, contradictions, and intuitions. On every page, we see the crisis of human suffering. It provides a deep analysis of the human condition. 

But it is precisely in seeking knowledge from the Bible that I think we run astray. Jesus himself noted our tendency to rely on scriptural knowledge rather than on the living truth that he embodied:

 You examine the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is those very Scriptures that testify about Me; and yet you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life. (John 5:39-40) 

If we study the Bible for knowledge, for data, for information, rather than for the mission and the message of Jesus, then we find that the truth will be quite elusive. It is to be found in a person rather than in knowledge and data and ideas. The Word of God is the truth: 

 Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. (John 17:17)

And who is the word? Jesus is the living word: 

 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him not even one thing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of mankind. And the Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not grasp it. (John 1:1-5)

Are we then misguided in mixing up scientific knowledge about nature with scriptural truth about God and things of the Spirit? Is it necessary to have constantly to be updating scriptural truths in light of new scientific knowledge and the expansion of knowledge I mentioned earlier? Could it be that the Word of God is not meant to be simply understood as the words of the Bible but rather a mirror on the life of Christ? That the truth is simply the message and the mission of Jesus? Does the essential canon of truth consist, then, of the Beatitudes, the Sermon on the Mount, and a very few other simple precepts that form the core of Jesus’ teaching and the message by which he lived? 

In our effort to establish the correct data set—the truth, for religious understanding—are we missing the real, scriptural, simple truth—the truth found in the person, not in data, or as Connie J might say, truth which is found in a relationship, not in a body of knowledge? In the garden of Eden, we see two trees: The tree of life, which we might call the tree of relationship or the tree of reliance on the sustaining power of God; and the tree of knowledge—the tree of datasets and information, which we know cannot be complete unless we have a perfect set of data. Paul recognized this when he wrote:

 Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away with; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away with. For we know in part and prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away with. (1 Corinthians 13:8-10) 

 Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory;… (1 Corinthians 2:6-8) 

Truth can never be found in a dataset. You cannot discover a capital T truth from knowledge—not without perfect data and with complete knowledge. Capital T truth can only be found in a person, in a relationship. It is a truth, then, in the paraphrased words of an old country song, that we’re “looking for truth in all the wrong places, looking for truth in too many faces.” 

The late Bertrand Russell, a British philosopher and self-proclaimed atheist, wrote much about truth. I was surprised to find in his work the idea that real truth can only be found in acquaintances. Ideas and beliefs, he says, may be right or wrong. In other words, they might be truthful or they might be in error. But: 

 ”Whatever we are acquainted with must be something; we may draw wrong inferences from our acquaintance, but the acquaintance itself cannot be deceptive.” (Original here.) 

In other words, we may hold errors about what our acquaintances’ behavior and motives might be, but we cannot be in error about the truth of their existence. You might say that the truth rests in a person, not in an idea.

The truth about God has elements both of knowledge and of faith. If the truth about God is a timeless truth, it cannot be bound by culture or age. The elements of knowledge are manifest in everything that has been created. Therefore, what we know of the timeless truth about God must be increasing, in line with growing scientific observation and understanding of nature and how the world works. The psalmist says: 

 The heavens tell of the glory of God;
And their expanse declares the work of His hands.

   Day to day pours forth speech,
And night to night reveals knowledge.

   There is no speech, nor are there words;
Their voice is not heard.

   Their line has gone out into all the earth,
And their words to the end of the world.
In them He has placed a tent for the sun, (Psalms 19:1-4)

That is not to suggest that the truth about God is trivial, that it merely is a matter of time before we discover it with increased datasets. Mortality limits our ability to apprehend something which, being divine and indestructible, is beyond the realm of our physical experience and beyond the realm of observation and data and knowledge. It is not, however, beyond the realm of spiritual experience. 

Jesus said to the woman at the well: 

 “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:24)

Spiritual experience does not depend upon knowledge. It is not dependent upon data. But truth can be approached—maybe, perhaps, at least in part—through it. But if God wanted knowledge of him to be data driven alone, would he not have given us an unambiguous data set, good for all time for all people everywhere? 

How important is truth? Can you live without it? Can you live with uncertainty? Is wrong information easier to live with than uncertainty? Where would you go to find truth anyway? Would you rather make something up than admit that you don’t know? How much do you need to know about God to believe in him? And why do we so make God in our own image that we claim to know his ways? Is seeking the truth about God in the end a lost cause? Or is the seeking the most important part? 

How confident are you that you hold the truth? Can you embrace the concept that truth is to be found in a person or an acquaintance; not in data, beliefs, or ideas? How does God communicate with Wo/Mankind in this modern time? What does God want you to know about him? And finally, what does this concept of truth do to the doctrines you hold to be precious about your faith? 

David: You asked: Can truth be accessed through a sixth sense? To me, it’s the only way that truth can be accessed. Daoism would certainly support that. The opening words of the Dao De Jing are that “The way that can be traveled is not the eternal way; the name that can be named is not the eternal name.” In other words, you cannot walk the real path—you cannot be like Jesus. The things you hold to be true cannot be true, because they are the result of logical intellectual exercise. You can know the truth only through a sixth sense. 

C-J: We know that sensory deprivation—where information is no longer coming and going through the brain—does creepy things. It is destructive. Our brain seems to need new information to stay healthy, otherwise it atrophies, it plays tricks on us. Soldiers who are kept in dark boxes with no one to talk to—all they have are their inner thoughts—after a while become lost in the darkness. I find it interesting that the way God the Creator made us is that we need constant input, we need to be constantly assimilating and sorting and giving value to information, space, and time. 

Bryan: Is truth the journey or the destination? To me, truth is the journey. As Don has noted, information changes and the information we use to discern truth changes. Even in heaven, where we were created perfectly, we are human beings—being there does not make us Gods. So in my mind truth is a journey, because we will never understand God fully, because we will never be God. We will continue to learn, continue to strive for truth and knowledge, but we will never get to the end point. Truth is not a destination.

Donald: The idea of truth introduced me 30 or 40 years ago is different from the idea of truth we are discussing today, which seems to revolve around our relationship with God. The challenge I have with this is the idea of organized religion, because then doctrine becomes another layer of this conversation. 

We refer to the beginnings of Adventism as a movement, a group of people coming out of other churches to form a new understanding of what a faith-based group of believers would be. It evolved over a number of years and the data points kept changing, as we know with the Great Disappointment. Should we try to remain as a religious group of people, not seeking our truth in relationship to God but as a group of believers, or should we always be seekers and not strive to become believers? 

Seekers and believers are different attributes of, or ways of thinking about, a congregation. Seekers seem to me to want to look at the data and keep moving forward; believers want to settle down and focus on the 27 Beliefs. 

I’ve had the good fortune (or not!) to attend a number of general conferences when they were in session, listening to the church leadership spending days discussing whether there should be an “a” or a “the” in some developing doctrine—little words, to which they would devote hours and hours and hours. Should we try to remain as a movement and not try to become fixed, not put the truth in a box and say: “This is it!”?

The Bible is a good group of stories that give us insight as to how God and man work together. But what do we do with Daniel and Revelation? Because that’s where we use data points to give us our timeline.

C-J: On the inception of the concept of having a new belief, a new Revelation, Jesus addressed the difference between belief and seeking knowledge. Paul addressed that issue too. For about 300 years after Christ’s death, this was the discussion: “How do we do this?” Because this new audience extended beyond the Jews to the Greeks, which was the predominant culture around the area of the known world, and to Rome, which was predominant politically. Both of them were pagan, worshiping whole pantheons of gods and deities, and had different cultures. 

I think it’s insightful to pose, as Donald just did, the question of what do we do with that? Are we to seek? And where do we leave it with faith belief? I just accept it as truth. I think it’s a weaving of the tapestry as we mature. I think we are mandated to live here, to commune with one another—especially those who are not in agreement—as witnesses. But our belief, I believe, is the gift of faith by the Holy Spirit. I don’t have enough questions and I couldn’t find enough answers to do that—that’s the job of the Holy Spirit. 

When we see something, we ask: What am I looking at? It may be a new bug, a new bird, a new acquaintance. Questioning is healthy, but when it comes to faith I believe it is the job of the Holy Spirit to reveal truth with a capital T. It’s transactive, it’s transitional, it’s constantly evolving, and it’s transcendent, requiring an open heart and an open mind and a willingness to be malleable in our environment.

Pastor Giddi: I agree. Jesus said, however, that when he—the Spirit of Truth (the  Holy Spirit)—has come, he will guide us into all truths. We must all consider this text because these are the words of Jesus Christ. So I believe that the Holy Spirit is what reveals. Scripture says: “He will guide you into all truth.” And Jesus says: “I am the truth.” The Holy Spirit guides us to Jesus, in whom we can find the truth, because Jesus is the truth.

David: Did the prodigal son, the Good Samaritan, or the robber alongside Jesus on the cross (who was saved) seek the truth in their lives? Did any of them find it? They appear not to have been ardent seekers of truth and to me they illustrate that for purposes of seeking the truth religion is not necessary. It has other beneficial aspects, but in terms of the search for truth, religion is perhaps not the way to go. The prodigal, the Samaritan, and the robber on the cross never went  the way of religion, yet they found the truth.

Pastor Giddi: Where can we find the truth? I’m a pastor, so I tend to think within the Biblical realm. You can find the truth in the Word of God. Holy men of God wrote this holy Word as they were moved by the Holy Spirit, and you find the truth, surely, in the Word of God. They wrote it as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is truth. Jesus compares truth with light, and error with darkness. Jesus also says he is the light of the world—the truth and the light. Therefore, as we begin our quest for truth, perhaps our destination is to be found in Jesus Christ.

C-J: One of the beauties about the Bible is that it takes into account the spectrum of intellectual maturity. You can read it to a child, and explain very basic terms about relationship and extending kindness to others and doing no harm. We can have a discussion collectively here with a more mature audience able to sort through that information. But both the child and us here, who are more mature and have walked many, many years with God, understand the bottom line comes back to believing. It’s not what church you are a member of, it’s not the rituals; it is the written word of God that is enlightened. And that’s only through the Holy Spirit. 

We know the basics, but God says: “Climb the mountain, don’t stay in the valley.” For us, it’s simple, it’s pretty obvious. But when I was younger, I struggled a lot. There comes a point where (speaking for myself) you think: I just can’t do this on my own. I’m not capable of always making the right decisions or understanding how to make the right decision because I don’t have all that information. But God knows the beginning and the end the intention and the purpose of every day of our life. And when I leave it in God’s hands, things turn out better, and I’m able to move forward because God is always trying to build on faith, on just trust, on just this transactional relationship we have in this dimension with others in our environment. It is God’s domain, not ours. We didn’t create it.

Reinhard: The Bible tells us to love God and love our neighbor. Jesus said: 

“’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’ and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” (Luke 10:27)

The Gospels of Mark and Luke include the word mind, but that of Matthew does not. God allows us to seek the truth using our mind, our God-given intellect, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to find what we need to know and what we have to do as Christians, as followers of God. I think that’s the key. I think the End Time is open for discussion, to know what are the important things about it. 

We touched on the End Time in a previous discussion. Knowing the prophecy is not going to save us but I think it’s important for us to understand. We may think our church has the inside track. Certainly, my former church had almost no discussion, no explanation, of Revelation. I think it is important for us to know the drama of the End Time, the end of the controversy between evil and good, and the Second Coming, which Jesus said would be soon and of which the Apostle Paul said people would only sleep and wake up to it.

When I was at Loma Linda back when, a professor said the Second Coming had occurred but was not taking place yet! It will be a global event. It is important for believers to keep things in perspective. Knowledge of the prophecies is important even though that alone is not going to save anyone, any more than any of the ritual things we do as believers. It is an accessory to help our faith, to be prepared, to be ready. It is not magic. We need to know what we are facing in our future. I think that’s also important for our discussion about the truth that God wants us to know

Jeff: With regard to Bertrand Russell’s notion about acquaintances being a manifestation of truth: Far be it for us to listen to an atheist, but I think, in our pursuit of the idea of capital T truth, we have not defined it, which gives us an out—we can say we don’t know and it’s not our business to find out. But there is something universal and intuitive about the concept of acquaintances and relationships and interactions with other humans or even interactions with nature as capital T truth. I’m wondering if maybe that’s a pathway that transcends the idea of love, of which God is the embodiment and which is a manifestation of God.

Dewan: Scripture says:

 Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in faithfulness and truth;…” (Exodus 34:6)

Because of his perfect nature and will, truth is a fundamental moral and personal quality of God.

Don: Donald and Reinhard have mentioned the End Time prophetic paradigm. We look at the so-called signs of the End—an earthquake, meteor fragments falling from heaven, an eclipse of the sun—but we always assign them from a Western or North American perspective. What do the signs of the end have to do with our friends in Jakarta or the Indians in Andhra Pradesh or the Africans in Malawi? This is the data I’m referring to, that seems to me to be so much cherished and yet so potentially misguided. As Jeff says, maybe truth ought to be much more cautiously embraced in a dataset fashion. Is anyone here willing to stake their truth in the North American/Eurocentric paradigm?

C-J: I like the question because it hones in on the limitation of data. My understanding of the End Times from talking to theologians is that it is a time of political chaos. Horses of color coming out of the sky might just be imagery to help illustrate the chaos and the fallout that impacts the entire planet, humanity and all that lives on it—everything from the simplest life form to the most sophisticated. 

That makes a lot of sense to me, because I agree with you that you can really trip and fall hard if you base your faith on a precise time that Christ will return. It’s something we don’t know, we don’t need to know what it looks like, when, time… any of that. It really comes down to a dimension that we are unaware of. And it is intuitive. 

But when we get hung up on literal truth, I agree that it’s a dangerous thing. It’s not inclusive, and I see God as being very inclusive and caring about all of creation, not just where we live, but the universe itself. Political chaos in the fallout, I can wrap my head around fairly easily.

Anonymous: I don’t know much about the prophecies and the relationship to the truth—to Jesus, except that these prophecies came from Jesus, whom we call the truth, so they have to be important, just as he is important as a person. He is the truth. 

Donald: Some dear friends and I, who do not always share the same political positions, recently started discussing our understanding and perspectives on vaccinations. It’s amazing that something like this has caused such a rift amongst people—between wise people and people that aren’t very learned, between church people and non-church people. 

Fauci changes his position based on data that’s coming in. But I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve watched that. Normally, if I have a scientific question I ask a scientist, whose answer I take as fact, although in another six months, the scientist might give me a different answer. It’s clear that people have a difficult time with data changing. It changes about our spirituality, based upon our life circumstance, our understanding, our reading, and our relationships, so it’s probably wise for us to remain flexible. 

I think, in general, some of us will be less comfortable with this than others. But generally speaking, I can handle a little bit of tolerance, I don’t have to have everything just exact. But I have very, very close friends whom I highly respect and appreciate, and this conversation would go nowhere with them. I respect them, but sometimes I have to tell myself “Don’t go there,” because I know that it would cause a great deal of anxiety in the relationship. 

So I’m grateful for this grup and for the discussions that we have every Sabbath morning. But I also recognize that we’ve self-selected. 

Bryan: Again, I think it’s a journey—such a loaded word. There’s so much that surrounds it. If truth is the absence of falsehood, how do you discern what is true and what is false? At some point, you have to step out and choose a reference point. You have, by faith, to step out and choose a reference point that allows you to filter what you believe is true and what is false. It could be the Bible, it could be CNN, it could be a variety of things. But at some point, you have to filter what you believe is true and false through that reference point. 

So the journey changes. The reference points may change. The data changes. Everything changes. But if you’re a true seeker, hopefully, then even your reference point may change at some point. But truth has so much wrapped up in it that it’s really difficult (as is clear from our discussion so far) to really grasp the difference between truth and falsehood. And so the reference point, I think, is what’s important.

Donald: That’s great terminology. In one actual and one potential discussion this week with my discussion group, if I said “This is my reference point for what I’m saying,” I think they would have said that’s fine. But if I called it truth, it would have been very disruptive to our relationship to suggest that it was not a reference point but, rather, the absolute truth.

Robin: The prophet Daniel. John the Revelator in his prophetic visions could not, it seems (we’re not told) see the entire Earth at once, as can an omnipotent God. So they were seeing, perhaps (this is my guess), scenes from different regions of the earth. In World War 2, in America we could not see what was going on in Europe. We could see film news reels but we couldn’t see what was going on over there. Our vision is not that great. So it doesn’t bother me that all of the Earth doesn’t see the same thing at the same time. In fact, the only time, we’re told—specifically told, that’s going to happen is when Christ returns. How that’s going to happen, I don’t know, except that it has to be a miracle. 

So I’ve never lost any sleep over not seeing the prophetic happenings that are not going to happen in North America. But I really like Bryan’s comments about what or who is your reference point. 

Donald: Kiran and Srilakshmi’s reference point will have changed, now that they have a new baby, a new life. I think that’s good. But with regard to people who are very fixed upon knowing the absolute, should we just work around them? Or should we admire that they have it all put together. What’s our relationship with people who suggest that they know the absolute?

Don: Tell them they’re wrong and they need to get a life 😉 

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