For the sake of Truth

Photo by Eduard Militaru on Unsplash

I’m a bit fussy with my food. I like it prepared with clean hands. Recently, I was a little shocked to have a cafe-bought hamburger prepared in my full view with bare hands that hadn’t been washed. When I requested the tongs be used, a voice came from the kitchen, “He washes his hands all the time.” Sorry, not good enough.

There didn’t seem to be respect for the truth. In this case, the truth is that there are practices and laws for food preparation that need to be adhered to. Otherwise, people get sick. Disease becomes rampant.

Here’s another scenario: imagine a mechanical engineer, a production supervisor, a fitter, a process engineer, and their manager in one room to investigate an incident. Each of them enter the room having their own story — their own form of the truth about what happened, and only their own vantage point that informs their ‘truth’. Through a facilitated process, they all leave that room four hours later with the same truth.

What was done was a process of truth collection, and through working together, finding which truths complemented understanding and which ‘truths’ didn’t, everyone walked out of the room with a reasoned understanding of what actually happened, and actions are taken to prevent such an incident from occurring again. That’s the power of truth. Truth prevents future loss. It helps and never hinders.

A third and final scenario: a conflict breaks out between two friends. He has his truth and she has hers. His truth seems right to him. Her truth seems right to her. And their individual truths are radically different. Their decade-long friendship is at a crossroad. They may soon find their friendship untenable.

What they desperately need is the truth; not his without hers, and not hers without his; they need a combined truth. They both need to work for the sake of the truth. It’s their only hope if they wish to deepen trust between them.

We either care about the truth or we don’t.

We either respect and uphold the truth,
or we deny it because of a lack of love.

Many people don’t care about the truth. I get that. Yet we all disrespect the truth at some point or other. We see this disrespect in anyone who disobeys the law. None of us obeys all laws all the time.

The aim of law is to uphold truth for love’s sake,
because law is designed to uphold everyone’s interest.

The power in truth is made manifest when two or more people agree that an individual truth is not enough. Wherever an individual does not settle only for their own version of events, and they seek another person’s perspective, they genuinely hope to understand the truth of what occurred. They desire a better and broader version of the truth. They do not rely only on their own understanding. And this is not only love, it’s wisdom too.

If anyone calls themselves a Christian and does not love, the Bible tells us, that they are a liar.

The way a person loves another person
is through their respect of truth.

They add to their own truth
the other person’s truth
to establish the truth
by refuting ‘truths’
that don’t match up.

If one person reveres the truth enough to care about another person’s truth, they have achieved the object of love.

If that cafe-bought burger was prepared according to the truth, and it was prepared hygienically, the hands that prepared that burger would have been loving hands.

Whenever someone does something that prevents us
suffering illness and disease, they practice love.

When a group gathers determined to find a collective truth that reflects a collective understanding, they establish the truth, and they love those who rely upon the finding of that truth. And the process they go through in seeing each other care for the truth proves to each of them that as individuals they’re trustworthy, because they’ve acted in a caring (loving) manner. In a situation of incident prevention, a future situation where a person may be injured does not occur, because the risk is mitigated. The person in the future situation is protected, because the truth has been sought, and the right findings have been found, and the right prevention measures have been taken, and they are thereby loved.

If the friends who are in conflict can be loving enough to desire to understand the other’s truth, they will find a broader version of truth, and they will have their individual opportunities to own responsibility for what they could have done better.

Vulnerability in one, secures the trust of another.

If each sees the other’s truth, understanding is achieved, and the situation of conflict converts into a situation of deepened trust.

We love people well when we respect their truth.
And we feel valued when our truth is important to others.
Truth, as it occurs in relationships, is a combined reality.