The Bible Is The Truth

Today’s reading: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24

Today’s reading brings to mind an old-school newsroom saying I heard (and taught) in my reporter days: “If you mother says she loves you, check it out.”

That’s a great, wise, and definitely memorable piece of advice. But I like the scriptural version better.

“But test everything; hold fast to what is good;” (Verse 21)

Who knew  Paul was a journalism teacher?

I’m no longer, technically, a journalist these days, but I continue to practice (and teach) the main principal I learned as a reporter: never stop searching for The Truth.

I test things all the time, and I certainly do hold fast to what is good — even if doing that means giving up some ideas that I discover to be not so good.  This keeps me in a perpetual state of growth, and I believe it is a very healthy way to live. The Bible is my guide on all matters.

But I came upon this approach to searching for The Truth only after I left the world of journalism. I wish my teachers, editors and mentors had done a better job. It’s sad (and frustrating) to realize just how rarely The Bible was mentioned in the newsrooms (and schools) where I worked.

Over the last 15 years or so, I’ve made several false-starts at a comeback in journalism, yet I remain confident I will one day start a successful news organization. I say “start” because I currently know of no group that practices journalism the way I know is best: by using The Bible as the only measure of The Truth.  (Even The Christian Science Monitor, which is owned by a church, is reluctant to relate the stories it reports directly to The Bible.)

This project, I admit, is a difficult one. The main obstacle is in convincing a large audience that The Bible is, indeed, The Truth.

But that’s okay. The Truth is on my side (not to mention many of history’s greatest thinkers, from C.S. Lewis, to John Wesley, to St. Thomas Aquinas, to even Mark Twain and Gandhi).

Thanks be to God for that.