“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).
We accept reality to be the physical world around us. Reality is that which we know through our five senses: touch, taste, smelling, hearing, and seeing. Webster says truth is “the quality of being in accordance with experience, facts, or reality; conformity with fact,” also “a particular belief or teaching regarded by the speaker as the true one.” This adds the dimension of a spiritual reality.
“There be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ” (Galatians 1:7)
The latest piece of presumed “superior scholarship” defaming God, His Christ, and the Bible, is a movie released last summer called the Da Vinci Code. The book version has been on the New York Times best-seller list since its release in 2003. The reception of such heresy in our society is revealing—it is also a best-seller in 150 other countries. The book defames Jesus’ character and says Mary Magdalene bore children to Him. It says Jesus never intended to be God and accuses the disciples of cover-up plots to make Jesus look divine. The Bible is accused of having “glaring historical discrepancies and fabrications.” The book is fiction but conveys an aura of factuality. A statement in the beginning of the book says, “Fact: All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.”
“God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).
“Behold now behemoth, . . . he eateth grass as an ox. . . . He moveth his tail like a cedar:. . . he is the chief of the ways of God:. . . the willows of the brook compass him about. . . . He drinketh up a river” (Job 40:15-24).
“He hath made every thing beautiful in his time” (Ecclesiastes 3:11).
The complexity and order in nature from the billions of bits of precise DNA information on our genomes(Psalm 139:16) to the life cycle dependency of organisms in our ecosystem (Psalm104:14) are proof of God. But beyond that, that we find beauty in creation reveals a personality of emotion, pleasure, and goodwill (Revelation 4:11; 1 Timothy6:17). God’s predominate trait is love. “God is love” (1 John 4:16). This is not a selfish love of self-gratification but is revealed in seeking the welfare and delight of mankind. It reveals itself in nature, in beauty, designs, and miraculous innovations that could not self-organize from random chaos (Ecclesiastes3:11).
“In that day the lord with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan that piercing serpent, . . . that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.” (Isaiah. 27:1)
By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed about seven days” (Hebrews 11:30).
“All these [armies] were joined together in the vale of Siddim, which is the salt sea. And the vale of Siddim was full of slimepits” (Genesis 14:3, 10).
“The waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered… All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land died” (Genesis 7:19, 22).
The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: But those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever (Deuteronomy 29:29).
From the beginning, God has restricted the amount of knowledge that it is good for man to know. Yet rebellious men have followed Satan’s invitation to acquire spirit powers, “intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind” (Colossians 2:18). The desire to “be as gods” (Genesis 3:5) has allured man to delve into mystical occult “wisdom” while corrupting himself in the knowledge God has given him (Jude 10). Eve, then Adam, fell for Satan’s deception, ate the forbidden fruit, and were put out of the garden. “Lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever” in his sinful state (Genesis 3:22).
Jesus acknowledged man’s godlike capacity (John 10:34, Psalms 82:6). Animal life has amazing instinct powers, and there it stops. But is there a boundary that man will reach? Only God can control that boundary!
God needs to limit human knowledge of the natural and spiritual realms because of the grief and destruction that selfish man can bring outside of God’s will. Satan is the ultimate expression of having superior knowledge (“the anointed cherub” — Ezekiel 28:14, 15) and rejecting God’s control.
For those who accept God’s revelation, they will eventually know it all, “Then shall I know, even as also I am known,” through the omniscient or all-knowing God (1 Corinthians 13:12).
The new enlightenment in Western Europe in the 19th century brought more scientific advances than in any previous millennium. Scientists as Sir Frances Reddi refuted superstitions such as meat generating maggots and flies (spontaneous generation). He established the law of biogenesis (that only life produces life). Many fixed laws God had established in nature were discovered and used in new ways. The everyday conveniences we enjoy in home, business, health, and travel are the result. These developments in technology are in harmony and obedience to God’s dominion mandate given at creation. “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 1:28) Scientists in reformation Europe such as Boyle, Pasteur, and the like also gave credit to God from whom all truth and knowledge originate.