"What is Truth?" - Pontius Pilate, 33 AD

"What is truth?" - Pontius Pilate, 33 AD

Picture this: you are scrolling online and you come across a post by a content creator that is giving a scathing review of a brand you are acquainted with. As far as this content creator is concerned, the brand creates the worst quality of products and no right-thinking person should be patronizing them. 

You want to hit the comments section in defense of their brand, but you see several comments corroborating the original point with their horror stories with the brand. 

You back-click and check out the rest of the posts by this creator. Of the top 10 watched videos, there's a pattern: praise for male-led brands, knocks for female-owned brands (or we can switch this up in the way that resonates: praise for white-owned brands, knocks for black-owned brands).

You are fully convinced there's heavy bias at play at this point, and you call this out in the comments section so their audience sees them for whom they truly are. The responses to your comments center on "but this is true!" "But they have shared the truth about this brand!" However, in that moment, your perception of truth is pretty far from what your contenders have in mind.

The first time I read the opening quote in the Bible, I thought that was an odd statement to make. How hard could it be to detect the truth from falsehood? Growing up has made me understand the complexity that made Pilate utter those words.

Truth is considered a virtue across board. Everyone says they prefer truth to lies, or falsehood. But we look closely, "truth" for many people is really:

"... what shows me and my community up in the most favorable light". 

"... what aligns with my existing mental model of the world."

"... what is comfortable to accept."

"... what makes me feel good". 

And therein lies the problem. Because none of those definitions are actually about truth. They are about comfort. About validation. About self-preservation. Truth has become a garment we tailor to fit our bodies, instead of a standard we measure ourselves against.

We are waging a daily battle in defense of the truth. The bitter, mostly uncomfortable, but true truth. Because we live in a world where everyone is urged to cater to their personal delusions of grandeur. You can rename yourself or take on a completely different identity and the rest of the world is urged to respect your choices or risk being termed intolerant. "Fake it till you make it" is the mantra of the day. We call ourselves kings, queens, bosses, lords and similarly grandstanding labels - even when we have nothing to indicate these are earned. Filters, photoshop, and now AI effects help us create and pass off a completely different world than what we actually exist in. You only play those games so long till it starts to cloud your internal sense of what's right and what's true. And once that internal compass is compromised, everything downstream is affected - your decisions, your relationships, your convictions... and your faith.

The prophet Jeremiah lamented a society where "everyone deceives his neighbor and no one speaks the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies and weary themselves committing iniquity" (Jeremiah 9:5). That was thousands of years ago. But read that verse slowly and tell me it doesn't sound like a diagnosis of our present reality. Social media has become a marketplace where lies are packaged as exposés, bias is marketed as objectivity, and slander passes for "keeping it real". And Christians are not exempt from this marketplace - many of us are active vendors.

What's scarier is the strong allure to defend our tribe, our community, our type, our own. We have a clannish sense of allegiance to what's considered right in our herds, and some go to great extents to paint black white or white black as long as it aligns with their version of events. Some bend over backwards to construct extensive arguments to defend the indefensible, whitewash perversion, and protect oppressive systems.

"Woe to those who call good evil, and those who call evil good" (Isaiah 5:20).

Those are lines from the Bible that many of us seem to have forgotten. Many may have no idea that the practice of falsifying truth attracts a biblical curse.

Truth is not something you construct, it is something you submit to. It is not shaped by your preferences, your affiliations, or your comfort. It shapes you.

Jesus said "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life" (John 14:6). Notice He didn't say "I have the truth" or "I teach truth" - He said He IS truth. That means truth is not a concept to be debated. It is a Person to be encountered. And when you encounter Him, the tribal lenses fall off. The need to defend your camp at all costs loses its grip on you. Because you realize that truth doesn't take sides - it takes over.

So here's the uncomfortable question we must ask ourselves: when you share that post, make that comment, take that stance - is it truth driving you, or is it tribe? Is it the Holy Spirit, or is it herd mentality wearing a Jesus t-shirt?

Truth is not a weapon to be wielded against your opponents. It is a mirror to be held up to yourself first. And the God of truth is not interested in which side of the aisle you sit on. He is interested in whether you are willing to let His truth - the real truth, the uncomfortable truth, the kind that doesn't always make your camp look good - govern how you think, speak, and act.