God is at work in the truth

by Josh Hauser

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Then he looked up at his disciples and said: ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God’ (Luke 6:20).

Read Luke 6:20–26

We have all done it, probably when we were kids.

‘Mum, can I have a chocolate?’ you say.

‘No,’ Mum says.

‘Dad, can I have a chocolate?’

The scam is as old as time. When we can’t find the answer we seek, we look elsewhere to get the answer we want.

We call it confirmation bias now. We tend to seek out voices that align with our own. We surround ourselves with people who think as we do. Social media learns what we want to hear and feeds it back to us. It feels good. It feels right. But it is an echo chamber. It makes us feel comfortable and insular, preventing us from hearing truth and growing.

This confirmation bias was around in Jesus’ time – think about the crowds of people that followed Jesus. Some wanted healing. Some wanted a political revolution. Some wanted their assumptions confirmed. People came looking for a messiah who matched their expectations. People wanted a king.

Luke 6 tells us about a time when Jesus came down from the mountain, stood on a level place and was surrounded by a large crowd. Luke tells us that Jesus looked at his disciples and said:

Blessed are you who are poor, for the kingdom of God is yours. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you because of the Son of Man.

But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort. Woe to you who are full now, for you will go hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.

For many in the crowd, this is not the confirmation bias the people would have wanted. Jesus starts verse 27, ‘But I say to you who are listening …’ This suggests that Jesus knew people switched off and that the truth of the situation didn’t match expectations, so they were already not listening. That is what the truth does to us at times – it makes us uncomfortable. If we don’t sit in that discomfort, then we can’t grow.

As Christians, we believe that God is active in the word; God is active in the truth. We believe that we have the ultimate source of truth available to us in God’s word.

Let’s not shy away from truth. Sometimes, we spend so much energy looking for the answers we want to hear. The challenge for today is to stop, listen and let God speak what is true, even if it disrupts what we want to hear. God is working in that uncomfortableness, so we grow into who God desires us to be.

Dear God, help us to listen to your word, trust the truth you speak and rest in the work you are doing through it. Amen.

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