These Many Truths I
“I believe in God the father almighty, the maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ His son who was born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified , dead and buried, and descended into hell and on the third day He rose again, and ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the father almighty. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins and in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. Amen” — The Apostles Creed.
I recited this creed many times throughout my stay in secondary school, every Sunday morning worshipping during the Protestant church service. It is a personal confession of the faith, which one must come to by personal reflection and personal internal agreement, and not just an anthem to be sung. Its roots are not clear but its cohesion and rootedness in truth has led it to survive hundreds of years of change, resistance, and disagreement because at its root, it is fundamentally true of the things a Christian believes. It is not that to be a Christian, you have to confess this or say this truth. It is that to believe these things is to be a Christian. This is my first truth: that to be a Christian is not a sequence of checklists, or a rule set that has to be met, it is not ordered by man, or requirements set forth by men in their foolishness. It is a coherent internal belief in these truths from which stem your actions and your choices. This is my first truth.
“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.”
Genesis 1:1-4 KJV
“And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.”
Genesis 1:14-19 KJV
These Bible verses above are drawn from the book of Genesis. By long-standing tradition, Moses is also credited as the author of Genesis, the account of the creation of the earth. When Moses pleaded to see God, God told him, “I will hide you in the cleft of the rock, and I will cause my presence to pass over you. I will not show you my face, for no man can see my face and live, but I will show you my back.”
I personally like to believe that God’s face is the future and his back is the past, and that it was there that Moses came into the knowledge of the creation of the earth. This is how I like to think Genesis came to be. This is a truth of mine that undermines any claim that the creation story was metaphoric, or an hyperbole of sorts or just stories told by man. But moreso, it reconciles some many errors I have seen in the 21st century church.
The creation tells us that God created the earth as it is. Many unfaithful scholars of the Bible would argue that the other planets were not accounted for hence the Bible cannot be trusted. But this is false for Genesis accounts for this when God creates “stars” and “lights” in the firmament. The sun itself is a star and governs both night and day. I’d like for you to take note of the use of the word “govern” or “rule”. God created things to govern the earth. And then when Jesus comes he admonishes us to respect these earthly governments. I hold as truth that giving to Caesar what belongs to Caesar also means respecting natural laws and sciences. For we cannot in one breadth say that God created the heavens and earth and everything within and in the other, continuously cling to Him to forsake the things He Himself created because they are not at the time working in our favour.
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These are my second and third truths. That God created everything. Both that which man deems good and that which he deems bad. And that these things Gods created are to be regarded and respected as authorities of God Himself.
Standing on these already existing truths, we see that these natural things by virtue of being creations and machinations of God himself cannot be called unholy nor should it be condemned when people attempt to understand the world through the lens through which they are for the way they are is the way God created them to be and it would be wrong to believe in Him but not believe in the things He Himself created. It follows that these things can be prevailed upon to guide the affairs of men. For even as the sun (a creation of God) tells us when it’s day to work and when it’s night to rest, and God allowed even himself to be governed by this when he was creating the earth, other creations of God can guide other affairs of men.
This is my fourth truth: that the things on earth can be relied upon to guide our affairs as men for they were instituted and composed by God.
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.”
Genesis 1:26-28 KJV
God created man in his own image and after his own likeness, to replenish the earth and to multiply. And throughout this time the likeness of God shows him creating things and shaping them. It would be unlike God if we chose not to create. For while we are also called to procreate by the seeds in our loins, we are also called to create by the power in our veins and the wisdom in our heads, and to tend to the garden of earth even as was his mandate to Adam later on.
This is my fifth truth: that the garden of earth has to be tended to, and God wants us to do that by creating as well in his image.
“And it came to pass, that he went through the corn fields on the sabbath day; and his disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of corn. And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the sabbath day that which is not lawful? And he said unto them, Have ye never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungred, he, and they that were with him? How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and did eat the shewbread, which is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them which were with him? And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath.”
Mark 2:23–28 KJV
“Lord also of the sabbath” I think this is one of my favourite piece of scripture. From the story of David as illustration to the situation on the ground, it really blends uniquely what I will call my sixth truth. I’d like to come to this through a story I seldom tell about when I earnestly pleaded with God about the issue of speaking in tongues. At the time, I was deeply inebriated with the issue of people saying that to be full of the spirit was to be able to speak in tongues when most of them were just saying gibberish. I felt offended and angry because this felt like mockery of my God to me. And then God made it clear to me, after a long period of contemplation that it was He who they worshipped and I do not concern myself with what they do, for He has and always will be a God who sees the heart instead of the action. Where men might see people speaking gibberish, God sees a heart intent on getting closer to Him and that rested my case. This is my sixth truth: It is God who defines what honors Him for we serve God and God alone. God is the worshipped, and in every situation He should remain the worshipped not our idol rules. Not our doctrine, not our interpretations. God should be the worshipped. And God’s worship sees a man’s heart, it sees a man wholly, so God admits His worshippers by His own standards and seeking to set those for God poisons our hearts against our fellow worshippers. And if people seek to mock God or to make jest, or to worship for onlooking eyes, it is God who knows best how to deal with them. He alone should hold that judgement — not us.
“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having an high priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”
Hebrews 10:19-25 KJV
