Truth (Day of Pentecost, May 20, 2018)

[Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 104:24-34, 35b; Acts 2:1-21; John 15:26-27; 16:4b]

O Holy Spirit, assist us we contemplate your word, that we may be enlightened by your truth. Amen.

Dear Friends in Christ,
     Today, my sermon will be a little longer, because I intend to talk about truth. That’s a complicated subject. I’ll start with the Gospel reading:

For when the Counsellor comes, even the Spirit of Truth, he will bear witness to me; and you also are witnesses, for you have been with me from the beginning. They will put you out of the synagogues; indeed the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think they are offering service to God. And they will do this because they have not known the Father, nor me.

     Today is the Feast of Pentecost, when we celebrate the event that traditionally marks the beginning of the Christian Church, the coming of the Holy Spirit into the lives of the Apostles. Jesus calls the Holy Spirit the Counsellor, the Spirit of Truth. Truth seems like an obvious concept, but in these days of alternative facts and fake news, we’ve realised it’s not that simple. We’ve realised that it’s not easy to know the truth.

     Truth. “What is truth?” Pilate asked when Jesus was brought before him for trial. He knew that in a court of law truth is difficult to come by. That’s why when we are called to testify, we affirm that we will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
     Here’s a story about a witness who took that affirmation a little too seriously:
     During a trial in a small town, the local prosecuting attorney called his first witness, She was a proper, well-dressed elderly lady, the Grandmother type.
     She was sworn in, and asked to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help her God.
     The prosecutor approached her and asked, "Mrs. Jones, do you know me"
     "Why, yes I do know you, Mr. Williams”, she said. “I've known you since you were a young boy, and frankly, you've been a big disappointment to me. You lie, cheat on your wife, manipulate people, and talk badly about them behind their backs. You think you're a rising big shot when you haven't the sense to realize you never will amount to anything more than a two-bit paper-pushing shyster. Yes, I know you quite well."
    The lawyer was stunned. Not knowing what else to do, he pointed across the room and asked, "Mrs. Jones, do you know the defense attorney?"
     She again replied, "Why, yes, I do. I've known Mr. Bradley since he was a youngster. He's lazy, bigoted, and has a bad drinking problem. The man can't build or keep a normal relationship with anyone, and his law practice is one of the worst in the state. Not to mention he cheated on his wife with three different women. Yes, I know him."
     The defense attorney almost fainted.
     At this point, the judge brought the courtroom to silence, called both lawyers to the bench, and in a very quiet voice said, "If either of you asks her if she knows me, you're going to jail, and I will personally throw the key into the river."

     Of course, it’s impossible to tell the whole truth. We can tell the truth only as far as we know it, which is never the whole truth, and is always mixed with error. And sometimes, a witness will lie. That’s why the lawyers cross-examine witnesses, hoping to sift truth from error and falsehood, and to tease out the details that will complete the picture. It’s a messy process. The jury’s task is to come to a verdict that’s beyond a reasonable doubt. Even so, sometimes innocent people are convicted of crimes they did not commit.

     As Oscar Wilde said, “The truth is rarely pure, and never simple.”

     Let’s recall Luke’s story in the Acts of the Apostles. They hear a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and see flames of fire above their heads. Then they begin to speak foreign languages. Later, when the Apostles preach the Good News in the public square, everyone that hears them understands them in his mother tongue.
     It’s a story full of drama, and mystery, and the supernatural. Imagine it happening right here and now, in this safe, well-built church building.
     The sound of wind fills this space. I don’t know about you, but if I heard that sound I’d worry about hurricanes and tornadoes.
     Flames of fire appear above everyone’s heads. I’d worry about the fire spreading and burning down the building.
     And then the babble of languages I don’t understand. Have we all gone crazy?
     Oh, it’s a great story, one that confounds our common understanding of how the world works, one that tickles our minds with fear, one that reaches deep inside us to touch the terror of losing your mind.
     No wonder it’s what we usually think of when we recall the arrival of the Holy Spirit. It’s like a tale of science fiction or fantasy. It’s about strange and inexplicable events, not about the ordinary round of chores that fill our days from morning to night. It’s exciting. Dramatic. Wonderful. Mysterious.

     But the Gospel for today feels different. Jesus knows he will soon start on his final journey to the Cross, and he’s giving the Disciples last minute advice and instructions. He doesn’t say anything about rushing winds or tongues of flame or strange languages.
     Jesus talks about truth. He talks about the coming of the Counsellor.
     And he talks about murder, about a time when his followers will be killed by people who think they are doing God’s work.
     However, the Counsellor, the Spirit of Truth will become his followers’ companion on their journey of witness and martyrdom.
     So let’s take Jesus’s lead, and think about truth.

     Well then, what is truth? Is there some test we can apply to distinguish it from falsehood and error?
     Here’s an interesting fact: Children learn how to deceive around the same time as they learn language. That’s because learning to talk about what is so is the same as learning to talk about what is not so. Learning how to speak the truth is also learning how to lie.
     Truth, then, is a feature of language. Mulder in The X-Files used to say,”The truth is out there”. He’s wrong. The truth isn’t out there. What’s out there is reality, it’s the way things are, it’s the facts. The truth is in what we say about the facts. This is I think obvious. After all, we define a liar as someone who does not speak the truth. What he says is false.
     Go a step further: Anything that can be expressed in language may be true, or not. That includes our beliefs and attitudes and values. And our beliefs, our attitudes, our values determine what we decide to do. That means that the truth is bound up with right action, with choosing to do what’s right.
     And that means that beliefs, attitudes, and values had better be true, or we may choose to do what’s wrong. Jesus warns the disciples that the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think they are offering service to God.
     Well, we know from our own history of Christians killing Christians that this warning applies to us too, both as victims and as perpetrators. Religion has been used as a reason and justification for murder for all of recorded history, and it’s still being used that way today.
     Knowing what’s true and what is false can be a matter of life and death.

     So how can we tell whether what we’ve said is true? The answer to that question has puzzled philosophers for ages. It sounds like a simple question, until you try to answer it.
     Here’s a simple example: How do you know that the bird you saw on your lawn this morning is a robin? By comparing what you saw to what you know and remember about robins. But maybe you’re no expert. Well then, did you see a robin, or a bird that looks sort of like a robin? If all you have is a hazy memory of a glimpse of that bird, how can you tell? But you’re pretty sure you saw a robin, right? Well, maybe not. It all depends on how well you remember what a robin looks like.
     So truth depends on memory. When we talk about events our memories are incomplete and often mistaken. It gets even more complicated when we want a reliable account of how the world works. We need that in order to make good decisions.
     Science can tell us what will likely happen when we choose this or that action. But it can’t tell us what we should do. What we should do is determined not by the facts, but by our beliefs, our attitudes, our values. And that’s complicated, because we use beliefs and attitudes and values to judge the beliefs and attitudes and values that we want to apply. Trying to apply this test of truth, we can get into circle with no way out.

     And that’s where the Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, comes in.
     Jesus emphasises two aspects of the Spirit’s work: first, he confirms our witness; and second, he helps us divide truth from error.
     Jesus connects the witness of the Spirit of Truth with the disciples’ own experience: You also are witnesses, for you have been with me from the beginning, he says. The Spirit shows us the truth, the validity, the reality of our experience. He confirms that our experience is real enough, and therefore that its meaning is valuable. We need this confirmation because we need to believe that our experience has meaning. If we can’t believe that, we fall into despair. We lose hope.
     More than that, we need to communicate our experience, to bear witness to how the world looks and feels to us, to testify that our faith gives meaning and shape to our lives. The Spirit supports us in this: he gives meaning and shape to the story we tell. He gives meaning and shape to our lives.
     Because a story is not just a list of things that happened. It’s a shape of cause and effect, of goals and struggle, of failures and successes, of suffering and joy, of decisions and plans. The truth is in that arrangement, in what the facts mean.
     More than that: We are the story that we tell of our lives. When our memory goes, when we no longer know that story, we lose our selves. The Spirit confirms the meaning of our life-story, he recognises each of us as valuable and precious. For the Spirit of Truth is also the Spirit of Love.

     Well and good: The Spirit confirms how our story is true, he confirms our understanding of how the facts make meaning, he confirms our sense of who we are. That’s a good thing. If, that is, we know that what we’ve come to believe is true. It’s not enough to feel that way. It’s all too easy to believe what we want to believe. We need a rule, some principle that will help us separate truth from error.
     This is especially important when we make choices. As I said earlier, we make our choices according to our beliefs, our attitudes, our values. Get those wrong, and we will do the wrong thing. Jesus said, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think they are offering service to God.
     As we know only too well, people have killed each other throughout history, convinced that they were offering a service to God. They have gone to war because they disagreed about the truths of religion. They have used religion to justify wars they couldn’t justify any other way.
     They have done so because they have been utterly convinced that they knew the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Over and over again, humans have believed that they knew it all. That they knew all they needed to know. That the Spirit revealed this truth. That there was no doubt. They will do this because they have not known the Father, nor me.
     I won’t give you examples, it’s too depressing.
     Surely, the Spirit is grieved by such misuse of the truth. How can the Spirit of Truth and Love justify murder?
     The answer is, he doesn’t. The Spirit bears witness to the truth, but only if we let him do his work within us. Truth is about what we know and believe. Every Sunday, we sum up our Christian beliefs in the words of the Creed. We believe these words to be true because of the Spirit. We witness to the truth of these words by our actions.
     We act according to our understanding of what these words mean. We want that understanding to be true, so that we may act as we ought. The Spirit gives us this understanding. The Spirit has given us a rule to separate false from true understanding.
     Jesus quoted that rule. We’ve heard it many many times: Love God with your heart, soul, mind, and strength; and love your neighbour as yourself.
     If what we believe agrees with that rule, that belief is true and trustworthy. If what we do obeys that rule, we will do what is right. If we live our life according to that rule, the Spirit of Truth and Love abides within us.
     Let us pray:
 O Spirit of Truth and Love, enter into our hearts, minds, and wills, that we may by your grace separate truth from error, and thereby may be able to act according to your will, glorifying God, and witnessing to the love of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Father, now and forever. Amen.