Week 38—Monday Romans 9:1-2
Week 38—MONDAY
DOES THE TRUTH ALWAYS MAKE US FREE?
We saw yesterday the wonderful clarity of this verse: “If you dwell within the revelation I have brought, you are indeed my disciples; you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31-32, NEB). The “revelation” Jesus “brought” is the Word made flesh. Then if I “dwell within” that “revelation,” then that Word must become flesh in me. I do not verbally accept his teaching—a creed to be believed—I vitally accept him as my Savior and my Lord, the Life of my life, the Being of my being, my very all. This means not mind-surrender—the acceptance of Truth—but self-surrender—the acceptance of the Truth by life identification with that Truth. Then, and not till then, are you “my disciples.” Then “you are indeed my disciples”—note the “indeed”; otherwise you are his disciples in intellect, in outer allegiance, but not “indeed.”
Now note the last portion: “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” We take this sentence, detach it from “the revelation I have brought,” and make it stand as the charter of intellectual freedom. It is over the gates of Johns Hopkins University. But it is completely detached from “the Word become flesh”—“the revelation I have brought.” And detached from the Truth incarnate, it does not necessarily make us free. Free intellectualism is free to get tangled in its own verbalisms, free to be mixed-up and muddled with no key to this business of living. For instance, a medical doctor said, “I’ve never seen a Freudian psychiatrist who wasn’t a problem dealing with problems.”
A Ph.D. said in disdain, “Do you mean to say that I, a Ph.D., will have to bend the knee and say I’m a sinner?” He didn’t have to, but if he didn’t he was left high and dry and empty! Another Ph.D. came to me and said without preliminaries, “I want to be saved.” Refreshing. In five minutes he was up from his knees, humble and happy—and full.
O Lord Christ, when we are detached from you, the Vine, we become dead branches, trying to live apart from Life. Forgive us this folly. For when this happens, our wisdom is foolishness. We know and we don’t know. Help us to know you. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: All my truths must be related to the Truth or they cease to be truths.