Torch, Spring 1998

Go up and down the streets ofJerusalem, look around and consider, search through her squares. Ifyou can find but one person who deals honestly and seeks the truth, I will forgive this city. (Jeremiah 5:1 NIV) So justice is driven back, and righteousness stands at a distance; truth has stumbled in the streets, honesty cannot enter. Truth is nowhere to be found, and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey. (Isaiah 59:14-15 NIV) 6 Torch hether you think he 's guilty or innocent, if you have been following the media coverage of President Clinton 's alleged immorality, you've probably begun to think that the actual truth of the matter is never going to be made public. There are so many perspectives being offered, so many interpretations of the "facts ," and so many unanswered questions that it seems impossible to sort it all out. If you take those feelings of confusion and hopelessness and apply them to all attempts to know anything, you have the essence of the contemporary understanding of truth. According to many today, "the Truth," as traditionally conceived, will never be made public. We must content ourselves with a state of truthlessness, they say. The realm of truth is a constant flux of differing opinions, competing perspectives, and shifting interpretations. In this domain, any person claiming to "know the truth," especially a "timeless" truth, is either naive, dogmatic, or perhaps even dangerous. We Christians maintain belief in a God who claims for Himself the title of Truth (e.g. , John 14:6) and who requires