I CAN handle the truth! (with God's help)

 

"The truth shall set you free." [John 8:31-42]

In my heart and in my brain, I know that. But there is a disconnect.  Jesus’ words also made me think of Jack Nicholson’s line in A Few Good Men: “You can’t handle the truth,” which is spoken in a tense courtroom scene.  And I wonder if I’m somewhere in the middle of those two thoughts.

I know the truth will set me free.  I know I’m held back by my own unwillingness to accept that I can’t lie to myself.  The truth won’t set me free if I try to get around what I know to be true.  If I think I can think poorly of someone, if I think I can get away with feeling better at someone’s expense, if I try to skirt what I know I should be doing in my prayer life and the rest of my life.  I know the truth.  And I know how accepting the truth can set me free.  I’m a flawed and broken person as we all are.  God loves me the way I am.  I’ve become a slave to sin, to the easy way, to things that momentarily make me feel better but do not offer consolation.

I think I sometimes feel I can’t handle the truth that God loves me because of my flaws and my brokenness.  But He does.  Like the people in John’s gospel grappling with the ideas Jesus presented, I look for loopholes or other explanations.  I need to remain in the word of God and truly be a disciple.  I can see the truth that I can pay attention to the large and small things every day where I know I can do the right thing.  I can look for and choose those “Holy Moments” in life.  I know that truth will set me free.  And I know that I can handle that truth with God’s help.

God of all Truth, Your Word is liberating, transforming and fills us with hope.  May I turn my mind to You and to Your holy Word so that I may know the Truth as You speak it and allow that transforming Truth to set me free.  Jesus, I trust in You.