Boy, elections sure do make me hungry. Famished, actually. For TRUTH.
This year’s season of “Election Smackdown” is thankfully over, but it may take us awhile to scrub off the mud. The whole thing made Maury Povich’s “who’s-yo-daddy” televised paternity-test craziness appear almost civilized in comparison.
So, now we have a bunch of elected officials whose characters have been sliced, diced and thoroughly marinated in slime for months. Kinky emails; alleged extramarital trysts; payoffs. Political victors don’t emerge as golden heroes — they look like Rocky Balboa after the 15th round – bloody, bruised and reeling from months of character bashing.
I found myself believing almost nothing of what I read or heard during this campaign season. T.V. commercials, campaign calls, mass mailings, and newspaper grandstanding were all wasted on me because my mind was hopelessly mired in a bog of cynicism.
Nearly every candidate was portrayed by opponents as a thieving, lying, adulterating reprobate. I did my civic duty and voted, but I felt like I was trying to find the least rotten apple in a barrel full of ’em.
Throughout the campaign, I kept wishing that somehow the candidates could be lined up, given a potent truth serum and asked a few simple, pertinent questions. That’s it. No spin. Just truth.
My theory is that some political candidates are probably pretty honest, decent folks who allow themselves to be hijacked by individuals and organizations much more interested in power than truth.
And when truth isn’t a priority, it usually becomes a casualty.
“What is truth?” Pontius Pilate asked centuries ago, as he tried to wash guilt off his hands and heart. But he didn’t really want to know. Had Pilate passionately cared about truth, he would have recognized it as it stood plainly and powerfully before him in the person of Jesus.
That’s how it is with those who sacrifice truth on the altars of power, popularity or pleasure. They don’t find it because they really aren’t seeking it.
One of my favorite descriptions of Jesus is found in John 1:14, where it says that Christ was “full of grace and truth.”
How refreshing in a world where truth too often gasps for breath under mucky layers of innuendo, spin, deception, and convenient lies. We can choose to recognize or ignore it, proclaim or deny it, embrace or hate it, but I believe truth is always there.
And I long for it. I haven’t always perfectly spoken it or lived it, but I think I’ve always longed and looked for it.
I obsessively read every biography in my elementary school library because fiction seemed like a waste of time – after all, it wasn’t true. I majored in journalism because I wanted to write about things that really happened.
As a college student, I had just about lost hope that I would find IT– the BIG truth behind all the little truths in life– and then, there IT was. There He was.
I’d searched so long and in so many places that I recognized truth when I finally saw Him. Jesus — full of grace and truth.
Jesus is never afraid when we honestly and passionately search for truth, for He knows where that search will end. I think He’s only afraid we won’t bother to search at all.
What is truth?
Pilate asked the right question with the wrong heart.
“I am the way, the truth, and the life …” Jesus said.
He added later, “And you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free.”
After all the lies shoveled our way in this world, who isn’t ready for that?