In this message by guest speaker Roger Glidewell, we will explore what the problems are with standing for truth.. Especially in our “post-Christian” culture of 21st-centry America.
Life group discussion questions are below!
If you are the discussion leader, be sure to have everyone in your group open to this page on their mobile device. Take turns reading questions, verses. Be sure everyone has the chance to contribute to the discussion.
Before we begin our sermon discussion, has everyone invited someone to our “Everyday Heroes” service on Sunday, September 11? This will be a GREAT way for us to leverage an important day for the sake of the gospel in our community.
As a group, will you commit to praying for this event together?
Have you ever had a time when you just hated to have to tell the truth?
On Sunday, Roger talked about the value of the TRUTH in our lives. But, he started out making the case that the truth can be offensive. He used a pretty good illustration with a “feather” to show why the exclusivity of truth can be offensive. What does that mean?
The other offensive quality of truth is that truth is absolute. That means truth is unchanged by opinion. Or by multiple opinions. So, how has this quality of truth led to the perspective that Christians are “narrow minded?”
For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.
Romans 1:20
Can you see how spinning the truth can be a great tool in the hands of our enemy, Satan?
In being truth-tellers, though, we are called to “speak the truth in love,” but this hasn’t always come easy for us, has it? All too often, rather than love, doesn’t the church instead judge and even condemn?
“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.”
Jesus, Matthew 7:3-5
What is the result when this happens?
When do we get to the point when we are “good enough” to honestly begin pointing out the specks in others’ eyes?
When we point out the speck without first removing our log, we are called “hypocrite” by Jesus. It is hypocrisy when we put the truth BETWEEN ourselves and our neighbor. In this case, truth itself can become a wall. A truth wall. It separates us from them, and has the potential to keep them OUT all together.
Truth isn’t about facts. What? Here is what Jesus says:
Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
John 14:6
For the believer, it isn’t about having truthful facts. It isn’t about preaching or even holding up truth… it is about living the truth. It is “no longer I, but Christ lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) How can we tell the difference in our own lives between “holding up the truth,” like a hypocrite, and actually living the truth, and sharing that life with others?