Truth and Consequences--by Linden Malki

Everything we say is a witness! If it were always truth, we wouldn't even need to say most of it. Things that are openly true and obvious are unfortunately not as common as they ought to be, and do need to be affirmed. There are a number of kinds of statements we say, and some of them are true. Some we think are true, some we want to be true but don't know if they are, some we want to be true but do know that they are not, some we are afraid that they are true but hope they are not.

God is always true, but He created us with our own will.  He knew that sooner or later we would guess wrong. God told Adam that there was only one thing forbidden: the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge in the center of the garden. As far as we can tell, when Eve was added to the mix, she was told about the Tree and the death penalty that was its fruit. Humans were not the only creature made with the capacity for choice; apparently angels were also free creatures; and there was one in the Garden waiting...

We know that story, and the result. They didn't die on the spot, but death became the fate of humanity. God, who cannot lie, confronted Cain with a judgment on his offering, and Cain, foreshadowing our subsquent history, took out his anger on his brother and tried to deflect the blame. We recognize this tactic; I suspect that every one of us, whether or not we would fall into the temptation that Cain did, can understand what was going on in his mind and heart.

This, then, is the world we live in. We are constantly confronted with questions, some of which are obvious and some not. We are constantly asked to bear witness to something we are supposed to know about.  There is always two parts to this: how much do we actually know, and how much are we willing to tell. This sounds simple, but it isn't; we may think we know about something and

actually be ignorant or misinformed. We then have the second choice: what do we tell?  How many factors are there in what we do or do not actually know, and then how willing are we to answer or not? Our actual knowledge is somewhere between zero and total truth; our willingness to tell is also somewhere from "I know nothinggg" and writing a book on it.

In the context of the commandment, the factors become "If you are My disciples, you will know the truth.." which is  "I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life, and no one comes to the Father except by Me." Following this, then, leads back to "...and the Truth shall make you free...So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed." (John 8:32-36; 14:6)