THE CHURCH AND THE TRUTH
“But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth” (1 Tim 3:15).
Praise the Lord for the 13th anniversary of True Life Bible-Presbyterian Church. Every anniversary must be a thanksgiving. It is not a time for self-congratulations, self-praise, or self-glory, but a time to remember and reflect on how God has blessed us, kept us, and used us year by year for His holy purpose to the glory of His holy Name.
It is good that we remember and remind ourselves what the Church is all about. The Church is described in many ways in the Bible. It is called the Body of Christ, the Bride of Christ, the Temple of God, and the Pillar and Ground of the Truth. Now when Paul said that the Church is “the Pillar and Ground of the Truth”, what did he mean?
What Is the Church?
The word “Church” is a translation of the Greek ekklesia. This word in general means “an assembly”, but whenever it is used in the context of God’s people, it always means a sanctified and separated people, called out of darkness into God’s marvellous light (1 Pet 2:9). Christians have become aliens to this world of sin and Satan to become citizens of the kingdom of God. Ekklesia literally means “a called-out people” and thus has the idea of separation. (When I was in seminary, I was told that ekklesia does not mean separation. Let me say that the word ekklesia means precisely that when it is used in a special way to refer to the Church.) A Church is no Church if it does not practise the biblical doctrine of separation (2 Cor 6:14–7:1).
Now, the Church is not a building in the literal sense. The Church is not made of wood or stone, but flesh and blood. In fact, in the days of the Apostle Paul, up till the 4th century, there were no church buildings (with steeple and cross). The buildings called “churches” only came into existence after the 4th century when Christianity found favour with the emperor Constantine. The Church before Constantine was much hated by the world, and severely persecuted. In order to worship peacefully, Christians had to meet in the quietness and privacy of their homes, in secluded places, in the forest, in the desert or in caves. Hebrews 11:37, 38 tells us, “They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.”
The Church is “the house of God” and consists not of dead stones but of living stones of the living God. “Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” (1 Pet 2:5).
The Church is also a “holy priesthood” because it is a sanctified people of God. If the Church is going to be an effective witness for God, it must be filled with people who are not of this world—not carnal or devilish but spiritual and Christlike; a people who believe in the Truth and practise the Truth.
What Is the Truth?
Jesus said, “thy (God’s) word is truth” (John 17:17). The word “truth” here is preceded by the definite article. This indicates that Paul was not just talking about the quality of truth, but truth as the object of our faith. The object of our faith is The Truth itself, ie, The Word of God, The Whole Counsel of God, The Holy Scriptures, The 66 Books of the Bible.
The Truth is under tremendous assault today. People no longer know for sure what Truth is any more. Like Pilate, they are asking, “What is truth?” Pilate did not know, nor did he understand. He could not believe or see who Jesus truly was because he did not belong to the Truth and was outside the realm of Truth, and so could not appreciate the Truth that Jesus spoke. Jesus said, “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). The world today is like Pilate, they do not hear the voice of God and hence do not know the Truth of God. When the Truth is preached and taught, they do not believe or receive it, but rather attack it. It is attacked by not only those outside the Church, but also by those within the Church.
How is the Truth attacked today? It is attacked by Liberalism and Rationalism. For instance, the Truth is attacked by atheists and unbelievers who deny that the God of the Bible was the One who created the whole world and universe out of nothing, by the power of His Word, in six literal 24-hour days. The atheists substitute the doctrine of creation with their theory of evolution. What is really disturbing is that those who profess to be Christians are agreeing with this theory, calling it science or scientific. To them, science trumps faith—science is for the intelligent, faith is for the weak-minded. So, for Christianity to be intellectually respectable, they mix the Word with the World and advocate a theistic evolution, ie God created the world through evolution. They say Genesis 1–3 is myth, not history.
On the basis of “Science”, there are professing Christians who now claim that the Bible contains mistakes. And so, they deny that the Bible is divinely inspired, infallible and inerrant. They say the Bible is a good book but not God’s Word. They begin to interpret God’s Word just like any ordinary human literature, questioning its authorship, its history, chronology, geography, people, events, doctrines and teachings whenever it does not agree with “Science” so called, or observable facts or evidences. They think after this manner: “If the Bible does not agree with what I can discover and observe through my tests and experiments, the Bible must be wrong.” That was why Paul said, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; … Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools” (Rom 1:18, 21, 22).
Another attack has come from apostates and compromising Christians who deny the perfect preservation of the Bible. They say the Bible was only infallible and inerrant in the past, when it was first given, in the autographs, but after all these thousands of years, the Bible we have right now is no longer as infallible and inerrant as it used to be. They say that the manuscripts or copies we have today are all corrupted in one way or another, hundreds of thousands of scribal errors have crept in, no two manuscripts are alike. They insist that the Church cannot be dogmatic about what the Bible says in all its minutiae—words have been corrupted or lost. Anyone who is dogmatic about the Bible and makes the present perfection of Scriptures a dogma is castigated as a heretic.
Such a low view of Scripture has resulted in many today accepting all kinds of versions of the Bible regardless of whether these versions are faithful and accurate to the inspired and preserved original language Scriptures or not. Their thinking goes like this: “If the original writings have been corrupted and we cannot be totally sure of the inspired words, then it is only the general sense of what the Bible teaches that is important; the mistakes are insignificant and do not affect the general message or the doctrines. The doctrines are preserved, not the words.”
But this is not what Jesus said. Jesus said, “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled” (Matt 5:18), “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away” (Matt 24:35). Why was Jesus so concerned that His words, even to the last letter, should never disappear but would always exist? It is because “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God” (Matt 4:4). It is because “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim 3:16–17). We believe that all the inspired words of God, each one of them to the last letter and syllable, have been preserved by God Himself just as He promised, “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever” (Ps 12:6, 7). God has made sure all His words are kept pure so that we might have all of His doctrines. Words first, then doctrines.
In these days of great scepticism and questioning of the Scriptures even by those who profess to be members of the Church, how can we tell the true Church from the false? The answer is simple and straightforward: The Church that is faithful and true is the Church that is the Pillar and Ground of the Truth. The word stulos (pillar) is used four times in the Bible (Gal 2:9, 1 Tim 3:15, Rev 3:12, 10:1). It literally means “a supportive column”. It speaks of firm or strong support. The word hedraioma (ground) is used only here in the New Testament, and it means “basis”, or “foundation”. It has the idea of strength, steadfastness, safety, fixedness, and certainty. A strong pillar is not enough, the ground or foundation on which the pillar stands must also be equally strong and unmovable. In other words, the Church cannot be flexible and fickle, unsure or uncertain concerning the Truth. It is not enough for the Christian just to know the gospel and nothing else; he must also know deeply all the words of God and doctrines of the Faith (Matt 28:18–20, Acts 20:27).
The Church is thus supposed to be an unwavering upholder of the Truth. When the Truth comes under the weight of enemy attack, the Church is supposed to bear the Truth up so that it will not fall or fail. In the first four centuries, the Early Church upheld and defended the Truth of the perfect deity and perfect humanity of Christ in one Person when it came under attack by the Docetists, Ebionites, Arians, Apollinarians, Nestorians, Eutychians and other heretics. In the 16th century, the Reformation Church defended the Truth of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone against the Roman Catholic doctrine of salvation by human works and church traditions. In the 20th century, the Biblical fundamentalists defended and upheld the truth of the verbal and plenary inspiration of the Scriptures against the destructive views of Liberalism, Rationalism and Neo-Evangelicalism. In the 21st century, when the doctrine of the verbal and plenary preservation of the Scriptures is under attack, we find faithful believers from various churches and denominations all over the world defending and upholding this good doctrine against Postmodernism, Neo-Deism, and Neo-Fundamentalism.
May the Bible-believing and Bible-defending Church today fulfil its divine call to be “the pillar and ground of the truth” in the midst of rampant apostasy and treachery in these last days just before the Lord comes back. “For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth” (2 Cor 13:8). JK
