Knowledge and wisdom in an age of deception and unreality.
The Roman Governor of Jerusalem’s iconic question, “What is truth?” has probably never been more apt than it is today in the 21st Century AD. Whether Pilate was being sarcastic or he was genuinely seeking for truth has been debated by scholars for 2,000 years. In light of the spat between the leaders of Britain and the USA over the tweeting of video clips, it would be good if all those involved paused to ponder his question.
We live in an age when technology has delivered the tools to create deception, whether by airbrushing photos or by deliberately producing deceptive videos, distorting the truth and creating fake news.
It is certainly unfortunate that the President of the United States should have retweeted video clips that had come from a doubtful source. It shows a lack of wisdom and a willingness to use material from a campaigning group to vilify millions of people who belong to a particular religion.
But it is equally foolish for the British Prime Minister to use the same medium of communication to point out the unreliability of the clips. Surely the more sensible approach would have been to make a quiet phone call. At least that way would have maintained personal relationships and not caused a rift between two friendly nations.
Knowledge AND Wisdom
The trouble with our generation is that we have enormous knowledge but we lack the wisdom in how to use it. There is good reason why Paul, writing to the church in Corinth where there was a lot of squabbling and disunity, referred to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. The first two of these he linked together as ‘wisdom’ and ‘knowledge’ (1 Cor 12:8).
Celestial truth cannot be understood by the normal processes of human reason – it requires divine revelation.
There is surely a very good reason for linking these two. We can acquire an enormous fund of knowledge in our media-saturated world, where we have the whole internet at our disposal. But without the wisdom of how to use this knowledge, we can create chaos and confusion rather than promote enlightenment.
Jesus is the Light of Truth
As we enter the season of Advent it would be good to ponder on the prologue of John’s Gospel where he focuses upon the theme of light and darkness - also the theme of Hanukkah and Diwali at this time of the year. The unique feature of Advent, according to John’s teaching, is that although the light of truth came into the world at the birth of Jesus, the world did not recognise him.
John says that through the coming of Jesus, God actually came and “made his dwelling among us” – literally – “he pitched his tent among us”, as foretold by the Prophet Zechariah (2:10). But our human reason cannot cope with this. Despite all the accumulated knowledge of centuries of human development, this celestial truth cannot be understood by the normal processes of the human brain. This kind of knowledge requires wisdom that is actually a spiritual gift which can only be received through divine revelation.
God actually has to do something to our human nature to enable us to receive this wisdom, which enables us to perceive truth that goes way beyond the realm of human reason. This is what Jesus had to explain to Rabbi Nicodemus who was a devout scholar, a highly educated man and a senior academic. But his whole mindset was limited to learning on the level of human reason. Only a spiritual revelation would enable him to perceive ‘Kingdom truth’.
It was like opening the curtains in a darkened room, bringing a flood of light that shows all the things that were in the room but previously hidden by the darkness – things that you could stumble over in the dark.
The trouble with our generation is that we have enormous knowledge but we lack the wisdom in how to use it.
Deceit is Easy
In our world today, millions of people are going about stumbling over fake news, half-truths and blatant lies. They are easily deceived because they don’t know the truth that sets them free from all the duplicity, deviousness and unscrupulous machinations of the crooked generation in which we live. They are trying to see in the dark; trying to discern falsehood without having ever known truth.
It should be a salutary wake-up call to us when the leaders of the nations are found peddling fake news. How can we expect our children to discern right from wrong and to be protected from the multiple dangers of the internet and social media, if our leaders shows so little discernment?
It is small wonder that our children peddle nonsense and vilify one another over their mobile phones, sometimes with devastating effects upon their mental health.
Season of Opportunity
During this season of Advent, we have the opportunity in very practical ways to spread the true message of Christmas – the true light that has come into our dark world.
But so much depends upon our relationships with others, and how we use the tools of communication society has given us. If Donald Trump and Theresa May had only spoken to each other instead of tweeting, an embarrassing international incident could have been avoided. Surely this is a lesson to us all.
Postscript
Last week there were comments left on the editorial, speaking of the need for greater interaction between authors and readers. I warmly respond to this - we want to make this site much more open to constructive and thoughtful correspondence. Our Editorial Board are grappling with this subject and we are open to suggestions from any of our readers as to how we can improve such interaction so that we can all learn from one another in our search for the truth.
As part of this, don’t forget that we have established a secure site for such discussion, in partnership with the team at Issachar Ministries. If you would like to use this (there is a fee for joining) please contact Jacqueline at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
