Truth and Belief

Because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me.

Which one of you convicts Me of sin?

If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? (John 8:45-46)

I felt compelled to come to this study of the book of John for one main reason: to both discover and to enter into the experience of real, soul-saving belief. The word believe and its true meaning has seemed to elude me for much of my life though I have certainly not lacked exposure to discussions about it. I have always been surrounded by religion and the claims of religion along with appeals to believe. But very seldom did I receive satisfactory answers to my queries about just what it means to really believe or what it was I was supposed to believe, at least answers that seemed practical and meaningful. I find this still true today. Usually I am handed religious clichés which only served to frustrate and confuse me instead of helping me to understand and enter into a transforming belief in Jesus Christ.

I knew that John was the one disciple that probably talks and discusses the whole idea of belief more than anyone else in Scriptures which is why I chose to immerse myself in this book. I want to enter into saving belief in Jesus for real and for myself, not just talk about it, expostulate on it and hope that maybe I somehow absorb enough of it to stick. I want my heart to experience true belief at a level so deep that it goes far beyond my conscious awareness, for I suspect that this is the kind of belief that Jesus kept talking about, not the intellectual, fact-oriented, emotion-deprived belief that I generally was taught growing up. While there is a need for accurate facts and the proper use of intellect to grapple with issues and provide a context for checks and balances in my religion, without a far deeper engagement of my heart my head belief will only lead me to end up on the wrong side in the judgment, demanding entrance into heaven based on my performance of religion without really knowing Jesus. And by what I have been learning, that is the prerequisite He identifies as the only valid preparation for entrance there.

So anytime I come across references to belief in these passages I try to engage both my mind and my heart to be open in tandem so as to allow the Spirit of God to draw me deeper into true belief. I want Him to unmask the false ideas I have about it so I can get past them into a more intimate relationship with God. By what Jesus was saying to these very devout, religious leaders in His day, they evidently had similar problems with belief or He wouldn't have had to say such blunt, direct statements to them attempting to get past their stubborn defenses and trying to get closer to their hearts. Because I believe Jesus always spoke the truth in love, I want to get past my own false assumptions about Jesus' attitude and tone of voice when He spoke these words and allow the real truth within them to have its intended effect on my own heart.

What I see in these immediate verses is something like a sandwich. Between the two nearly identical references to truth and belief in the surrounding verses, Jesus inserts this curious question about convicting Him of sin. Of course I have heard the typical explanations for this question along the lines of Jesus being perfect, etc. But now I am starting to sense that maybe there is something much more potent in here, something God may use to unlock yet another area of my heart and expose more false foundations that have prevented me from entering into deeper, genuine belief.

Just what does it really mean to convict someone of sin? That entails making sure I know as well as I can what the words actually mean that are in this question. What does the idea of convict actually convey? What is the true concept of sin implied by Jesus distinguished from the mostly distorted definitions I hear from most religious people around me? And evidently Jesus was inferring here that these religious leaders were trying to convict Him of sin or the statement simply wouldn't fit in this passage or make any sense in the context. And since that is likely the case, how might I fit into this scenario? Is it possible that maybe I am secretly or unconsciously trying to convict God of sin without even realizing what I am actually doing, because it sounds so religiously ridiculous to even suggest such a thing?

If I am willing to admit that maybe I might be having at least part of the same problems as these religious people were having, then maybe the words of Jesus might have more effect in bringing truth into my own mind and heart instead of bouncing off me like they did these men. If I have to struggle to grasp the true meaning of Jesus' words then it may be likely that I have the same problems that these men did who found it nearly impossible to believe in Jesus. But I don't have to follow in their footsteps of unbelief because I can learn from their mistakes and allow the admonitions of Jesus to have better effects in my life. That is what I want to do and I want to grasp more clearly what these words really mean and how they might transform me and draw me into the belief that these men failed to embrace.

I will try to reduce this to the simplest form in order to make it more clear to my mind.

Jesus always says things that are true, in every respect and implication of that term, both factually and in spirit.

These men seemed to live in constant resistance to accepting or synchronizing with most things Jesus was saying. Instead they kept arguing, countering, accusing and feeling more and more angry at Him to the point of wanting to exterminate Him violently

Jesus identified this problem as unbelief, both about His words and His true identity.

At the center of this is this question about convicting Him of sin. As I have been coming to view it, sin is simply all attempts to live life apart from God, out of sync with the principles that God has set up and by which His universe operates. Sin is the attitude of independence from reliance on God which then results in sins, the outward symptoms that we mistakenly identify as the real problems. Sin is an attitude, a perspective about reality more than outward acts or violations of arbitrary rules and demands.

Jesus actually unpacks this in His immediate previous statements about the originator of sin, the devil. In essence He simplifies sin into two main issues with Satan: his actions and his way of interpreting reality. Jesus states unequivocally that Satan lives to take away life, to diminish life to the point of destroying it. And secondly, Satan's whole system of viewing reality is calculated to deceive. He has constructed his whole system of living life apart from God on a massive, confusing but often compelling system of lies that sound very plausible and believable.

Jesus contrasts Satan's government with the government of God or what the New Testament sometimes calls the Kingdom of Heaven.

Jesus only deals with real truth.

The devil only deals with lies, but so compelling many times that they fool people into thinking they are true. That does not mean that he only lies but that he mixes so much 'truth' into his ideas that they become fatally dangerous and yet very believable.

He who is of God hears the words of God;

for this reason you do not hear them,

because you are not of God. (John 8:47)