Truth

Relativism is the belief that there’s no absolute truth, only the truths that a particular individual or culture happen to believe. I was driving today and saw a bumper sticker I’m sure you’ve seen many times. The video below will give you a brief history of the origin of this aggregation of symbols:

COEXIST has become a symbol to promote world peace and specifically peace among the various religions, which is a good thing (I believe this was Bono’s message in the video). However, it has also become a symbol of religious relativism.  Religious relativism says that there are no absolutes regarding god and a divine creator. In other words, each religion of the world has it right and each leads down a path to God.

Below is a short video by Sean McDowell that outlines why Christianity is different from all the other religions of the world. I hope you will take a couple of minutes to watch

http://fervr.net/videos/what-makes-christianity-unique

Let me close with this to make my point about truth. In John chapter 18, Jesus has been arrested and is taken ultimately to Pontious Pilate, the fifth Prefect of the Roman province of Judea. The Jewish leaders want Pilate to judge and sentence Jesus, so Pilate confronts Jesus and here is part of that exchange from John 18:

37 “You are a king, then!” said Pilate.

Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”

38 “What is truth?” retorted Pilate.

I emphasized the response by Jesus, “the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth.” God sent His only son on a rescue mission to save the world and to save you and me. The purpose of that mission was to bring forth the truth. As teenagers, you may already encounter other teens who adopt a religious relativism view. I can almost certainly guarantee you will encounter this mindset in the next few years. Our culture promotes this view and the view that no one is wrong and no one is right, we all should just accept each person’s viewpoint and belief system and morality. There has to be absolute truth! God created the world and the universe in order, not chaos. It isn’t relative, it’s definite. Because He loves us, Jesus wants us to know that there is only one truth and only one way to God.