Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
What is truth? This is a question that many people have been wrestling with for years—all the way back to Jesus's time. People have been wrestling with the idea that everyone can have their own truth. Maybe this sounds familiar to today, where "my lived experience is my truth." That holds some weight. But there's a truth that's even greater than that, and Jesus exposes it in our Verse of the Day today.
It's John chapter 8, verse 32. This is what Jesus says: "'And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.'"
More Than a One-Liner
If you've grown up in church, you'll hear this as a one-liner: "You know the truth. The truth will set you free." Or "Who the Son sets free is free indeed." These are great one-liners. But do we really understand what Jesus is meaning when He says these things?
Jesus Confronts the Religious Jews
If we look at what was going on here, Jesus was actually talking to a group of religious Jews who allowed their standing—the way they perceived themselves and having all of their life together—to cloud their view of what God sent Jesus to earth to do.
Jesus is confronting them. He's talking to them about how we really are slaves to sin. Meaning, we, outside of the freedom that Jesus offers us, have no ability to do what is right.
Our Best Works Are Like Dirty Rags
The Bible points to so many different examples. One in particular I'm thinking about right now: there's a Scripture that says that our best works of righteousness are like dirty rags in God's eyes. Meaning, the best that we can bring forward is nothing compared to who Jesus is and who the Father is.
These people were so wrapped up in themselves—they forgot their history. They had experienced slavery to different people groups, some more powerful than they—the Romans. More recently for them, the Babylonians, the Egyptians. They were under slavery. But they said they had never been slaves.
They allowed their standing now to blind them to their past and blind them to their present. They were stuck in sin.
Everyone Is a Slave to Sin
Jesus brings the conversation forward and He says: "Everyone is a slave to sin. If they believe in Me, the truth—the truth will set them free."
Your Truth May Be Shaken
Maybe you're in a position right now where you're wrestling with a bunch of people saying they have the truth, or your truth right now is shaken. Jesus is offering you something so much stronger and more resolved than what you've experienced in your life.
Again, I'm not saying that your life doesn't hold value because it does, and your experience matters. But Jesus is exposing something even deeper. We all deal with what sin brings into our lives. We've said no to Jesus so many times. We've walked away from Him. We've put Him at the back of our minds when He should be at the front.
He's saying, "All you have to do is believe."
Saved by Grace Through Faith
There's a Scripture that says that we are saved by grace through faith. It's not of ourselves, not of our works, so that we can't boast. Jesus is making it so that all we have to do is say yes to Him.
Paul writes later in a letter to the church, he says that when we die to ourselves in the same way that Jesus died, and we rise with Him in new life, that we are no longer slaves to sin. Paul is actually quoting Jesus.
We Have the Ability to Choose
When we put our faith in Him, we have the ability to choose. We're no longer sinning out of control. We actually have a choice. This is the truth. This is the good news of the Gospel.
A Call to Decision
I would ask today: if you haven't decided in your heart that Jesus is the Lord of your life, take a moment and ask Him to do so, to step in and give you the freedom to choose righteousness. It'll set you free.
If You've Stepped Back
If you have chosen Jesus and you feel as though you haven't been living for Him—you have stepped back into old patterns and you just wish you could go back and start over—let this be the moment. It's never too late.
Repent. Give your worries to Him. Confess the things that you're not proud of and turn from those things. The same truth that set you free at the beginning will walk you into freedom again.
He doesn't change. He's always available. Call out to Him and Jesus will set you free.
