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The Scholarship of Truth
Text: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Proverbs 1:7)
The Purpose of Education
The Dean of the school where I teach was once a student of
mine. To this day, he testifies when he was in my class, he would stain
his notes with his tears because he wanted to know more of the Lord. The
purpose of education is to bring students to a greater knowledge of God.
Education and the Home
Most Christian parents lose their children to the world. The
primary reason for this is because when they sent their children to
public schools, they placed them in an environment to be taught
anti-Christian philosophy. They allowed their children to “walk in the
counsel of the ungodly, to stand in the way of sinners, and to sit in
the seat of the scornful” (Psalm 1:1). What is a child to think?
Certainly such teaching must be right. “My Daddy and Mama would not sent
me here if it was not right!”
I am amazed when bewildered parents come to me, and wonder
why their children have gone the way of the world. The reason is simple:
they have been nursed at the teat of rebellion by public school
educators.
Someone will ask, “Didn’t you attend a public school?” Yes, I
did. I went in a day when public schools still had a form of godliness.
The schools I attended in New England as a boy read the Bible and had
prayer. That was in a day when public schools exercised discipline, and
taught respect for authority.
Someone else will ask “Didn’t Moses go to the schools in Egypt?”
Yes, he did; but neither Amram nor Jochebed, put him there. God put him
there because this was not the norm for the people of God. It is
shameful when Christians run to the heathen and beg them to educate
their children. The American education system in our generation is
pronouncedly anti-God; and it is on account of the worldliness of
Christian parents that when it comes to the education of their children,
they choose carnally.
I am amazed when Christians say they cannot afford to send
their children to a Christian school. Of course they can’t! They have to
live for their house, and their boat, and their car. Many years ago, my
wife and I made a vow to the Lord that if we had to eat bread and drink
water, our children would never go to a public school. People do what
they really want to do.
“Can a person learn Truth from a teacher who does not fear
God?” David says, “O how love I thy law! It is my meditation all the
day. Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies:
for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my
teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditations. I understand more than
the ancients, because I keep thy precepts” (Psalm 119:97-100). “The fear
of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and
instruction.”
Certification and Continuing Education
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge.” What shame
covers the face of Christians when Christian schools labor to find
teachers who are certified by the state, but who have no conviction
about Christian education! I know a quality young man who as a teenager
would sit at a table of soldiers several years his senior, and would
tell them about the Lord Jesus. When he graduated from high school, he
decided to go to a local state college. When he graduated, he was hired
by a local Christian school to teach history. I caught up with him at a
local restaurant, and asked him, “R., what is your philosophy of
history?” He looked at me in bewilderment, and said, “You know, I don’t
know.”
Well, no wonder he had formed no philosophy of history:
he was not taught History is His-story, that it is the account of God
working in the affairs of men; that “he doeth according to his will in
the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth” (Daniel
4:35); that “the king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the river
of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will” (Proverbs 21:1).
But, Christian schools not only seek teachers who are
state certified: they also encourage their teachers to keep up their
state certification by subjecting themselves to what is called
“Continuing Education.” The purpose, of which, is the continuing
brainwashing by atheistic educators. I say we should be amazed. I cannot
fathom that! No wonder it is said, “judgement must begin at the house of
God” (I Peter 4:17).
The God of Truth
Moses tells us, God
is “the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgement: a God
of Truth and without iniquity, just and right is he” (Deuteronomy 32:4).
Jesus Christ, Son of God, is the incarnation of Truth. “In him is no
darkness at all” (I John 1:5). He justifies his people and makes them
“children that will not lie” (Isaiah 63:8), a people who are not in the
habit of lying, who are not known to be liars.
God is the God of Truth. He is God “that cannot lie” (Titus 1:2).
All who love God love Truth. As we know God, we know Truth. And, all who
spurn Truth, hate the God of Truth. Truth is not God, but God is the God
of Truth.
The beloved disciple tells us “The law was given by Moses,
but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ” (John 1:17). Someone will ask,
“Was there no Truth before the incarnation of Jesus Christ?” Yes, but
Truth only as it was embodied in Christ. The manifestation of Grace and
Truth came by Jesus Christ. He is the Consummation, the Personification
of Truth.
Since the Fall, man has been plagued by the guilt and shame
of sin. He has never been able to find any remedy or peace for the
restlessness in his heart except in Christ. Only one of the world’s 799
religions makes any claim to be able to answer the problem of sin. All
others offer a salvation by works, because they have no real concept of
sin.
In our day, men have turned to shock therapy, but man’s problems
re-occur. Others have been seduced by psychology, or by New Age
mysticism which teaches salvation by dismissing one’s guilt, and by not
owning up to the shame. But closing our eyes to a real problem does not
make it go away. The reason none of these can satisfy the soul of man is
because they are without Truth. “This is the condemnation, light is come
into the world, and men (love) darkness rather than light, because their
deeds (are) evil” (John 3:19). Note the verse well: “This is the
condemnation.”
The Dispenser of Truth
God is the God of Truth. Truth does not only reside in God, but as
He is the Creator of it, so He is the Dispenser of it. What greater
mercy can God give to a man, a woman, or to a nation than the knowledge
of Truth! Truth is more valuable than “thousands of gold and silver”
(Psalm 119:72). It is more pleasant than “honey and the honeycomb”
(Psalm 19:10). It is God, not the intellect, which causes men to
understand Truth. “The world by wisdom (know) not God” (I Corinthians
1:21).
It is God’s right to give men Truth, or to withhold it from them.
If He so chooses, He has the right to leave men to their own confusion,
What a mercy, then, is Truth!
Truth generates the meaning of things. It gives expression to
things. It warms, as it gives clarity, and broadens our understanding.
But, God is the Dispenser of Truth. Anything we can know of God, He must
teach us. Anything we would know, we must come before Him. He is our
Teacher. “Blessed art Thou. O LORD: teach me thy statutes” (Psalm
119:12).
When Men Reject Truth
The prophet Zechariah records, “And the word of the LORD came
unto Zechariah, saying, ‘Thus speaketh the LORD of Hosts, saying,
execute true judgement, and show mercy and compassion every man to his
brother: and oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger,
nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in
your heart.’ But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder,
and stopped their ears, that they should not hear. Yea, thy made their
hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words
which the LORD of Hosts hath sent in His Spirit by the former prophets:
therefore, came a great wrath from the LORD of Hosts” (Zechariah
7:8-12).
Men have refused to hearken. “They are like the deaf adder
that stoppeth her ear; which will not hearken to the voice of charmers
charming never so wisely” (Psalm 58:4,5). David, whom the Holy Ghost
records as being a man after God’s own heart (Acts 13:12), continues his
prayer saying, “Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth: (vs. 6).
Let me pose a few more questions. First, “Can you give me one
reason God should give men the privilege of having Truth?” “Is God
obligated to do so?” “Do men deserve to have Truth?” Men who have had
Truth in the past have not labored to keep it. We are told the Lord is
longsuffering, yet there are many people in the world who yet do not
have the Word of God in their own language.
But, “What happens when people reject Truth?” God is neither
obligated, nor required to give men Truth; so, what happens when people
turn up their nose at it? The Bible says, “Therefore, came a great wrath
from the LORD of Hosts.”
“How does God manifest his wrath upon people?” “Does He always
bring armies, pestilence, or disease?” One of the greatest judgments God
can bring upon a man, a woman, or a nation is to remove from them a
knowledge of the Truth. God declares of apostate Israel, “My people ask
counsel at their stocks, and their staff declareth unto them: for the
spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err, and they have gone a
whoring from their God” (Hosea 4:12). Like Israel of old, Americans are
turning to the ways of the heathen. God does not say the cause of
judgment is because they sought counsel at their stocks, and because
“their staff declareth unto them:” the reason for their judgement is
because “the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err.”
Sin makes people stupid. The Truth the people of Israel
once enjoyed, they no longer enjoyed. They traded it for the pottage of
sin. The prophet Isaiah prayed, “O LORD, why hast thou made us to err
from the ways and hardened our heart from they fear?” (Isaiah 63:17) Sin
makes people stupid. This is not meant in a derogatory sense, but in a
judgmental sense. Sin causes people to lose their ability to reason.
When they refuse to repent of their sins, and stop their ears from
hearing His warnings, God delivers them over to commit even more sin.
God says, “And I will bring distress upon men, and they
shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the LORD:
and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the
dung” (Zephaniah 1:17). Note the verse: “They shall walk as blind men.”
This is a simile. Sinners are going to walk as if they are blind men.
They are blind in a spiritual sense, not in a physical sense. The reason
they walk like blind men is because sin causes people to lose their
bearings; they lose their spiritual equilibrium. Sin causes people to
act stupid. They wander into things like the blind, because they have
sinned. This is part of their judgment.
Americans have pushed Truth aside. Now, God is taking Truth
from them. Men and women have shown their contempt for Truth, so many
are no longer able to recognize it. Things they once understood, they no
longer understand; yet, in their spiritual drunkenness, they think they
are “progressive.” They think they have matured! “Professing themselves
to be wise, they (become) fools” (Romans 1:22).
Truth is no longer important to people. Most Christians are far
quicker to attend a church that has programs for their children, and
fashionable facilities without regard as to what is taught. Truth is not
of paramount importance to this generation. Christ will assess the
lukewarmness of the Church in this generation together with the martyrs
of past centuries who were willing to die for Truth. But Truth is no
longer considered to be of much importance. This is the reason American
society is plummeting to depths not seen since men first stepped upon
these shores. We are returning to barbarism.
When men spurn Truth, God will take it from them. Can
you blame Him? People have rationalized, and argued with Truth. Truth
which people have understood, they have come to despise; so, they have
dispensed with it. Not content to “pull away the shoulder,” they have
“stopped their ears.” As with Israel of old, God has given people eyes
which cannot see, and ears which cannot hear (Deuteronomy 29:4). This
generation is no longer able to discern Truth because they have judged
themselves unworthy of Truth. And, as they continue to suppress Truth,
they lose the ability to be able to make up their minds as to what Truth
is.
When men resist Truth, they fight against the Author of
Truth. Men may argue over the doctrine of Separation, or the doctrines
of Grace, but when they resist Truth, they do it at the peril of their
own souls. Perhaps, you know people who once seemingly espoused some
measure of Truth, who today, have been left to embrace humanism,
socialism, or Arminianism, etc.
With the decay of men’s understanding comes the decay
of virtue. “They walk as blind men…” so, they sin more, and lose more of
their understanding. They sin more, and lose still more of their
understanding. When people forsake their duty toward God, as revealed in
the First Table of the Law, it is not long until they turn form their
duty toward man, as revealed in the Second Table of the Law. Every time
a person turns from what he knows to be right, he must first climb over
the barrier of Conscience. Conscience is that light that lights every
man who comes into the world. (John 1:9).
Men know what is right and what is wrong; and by
despising the Truth of God, they despise the God of Truth. By breaking
the law of God, they reveal their spite toward God and man.
At last, the heart of the sinner hardens, and his will
becomes stubborn, and his damnation becomes certain. Once again,
consider the words of the prophets: “I will bring distress upon men, in
order that, they shall walk like blind men because they have sinned
against the LORD.” “My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their
staff declareth unto them: for the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them
to err.” (Zephaniah 1:17; Hosea 4:12).
As people move away from God, God delivers them up to
commit sin; and, as a judgment upon this sin, He delivers them over to
commit more sin. And, with each rebellion, men lose more of their grasp
of Truth.
Prayer
Lord, we know that these are very serious issues. Help us to “buy the
Truth,” but to sell it never. May it be precious unto us, knowing that
with Truth comes light and life: the blessings which thou are able to
give. Help us to be faithful to what Thou hast taught us. Help us to
rehearse in our minds the things which we have heard, that we may know
how we may be more able to apply your Truth to our lives. Lord keep us
as the “apple of thine eye” from this perverse generation that has grown
hostile to Thy Gospel. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.
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