When an English word no longer captures the sense of the biblical Greek word, choosing a substitute is a smart adjustment. Knowing God accurately so that we can be fruitful witnesses in the world means, in part, using God’s words in the way that God uses them instead of the distorted way that the world often does.

Two troublesome hurdles confront Christians when they try to engage others in their communities for the cause of Christ. Those obstacles are the words truth and faith. My warning doesn’t concern our task of persuading people of the truth about God, Jesus, and Christianity. That detail is critical but is not my focus here. My caution also doesn’t concern our mission to encourage others to put their faith in Jesus. That, of course, is equally vital.

Here is my concern. When we use the words truth and faith in conversations with non-Christian friends and family nowadays, I’m convinced that they frequently hear something entirely different from what we have in mind. Those words do not mean the same thing to nonbelievers as they do to us. Consequently, unbelievers simply do not understand our message—at least, not the way that we’re trying to communicate it.

Take the word truth, for example. Classically, that word was just a synonym for the word fact. If a statement was true—whether in science or history or ethics or religion—then it was a fact. It was an accurate description of the way the world was. Simple. Not so simple anymore, though. That little word has gone through an overhaul in recent times. When Jesus said, “Your word is truth” (John 17:17), or when Paul referred to the “truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:5), or when Luke wrote to Theophilus so that he would know “the exact truth” (Luke 1:4, NASB), they were talking about facts. Indeed, that’s what virtually everyone means when they use the word—except when talking about religion or morality. Then truth changes into something completely different.

Beware when any possessive pronouns are used to modify the word—as in “your truth” or “my truth” or “their truth.” That simple adjustment radically changes the word’s meaning. Ever since people became convinced that no one could really know objective truth in the areas of religion and morality, truth got relativized. It morphed from being a synonym for fact into being a synonym for belief. Facts are facts. Beliefs, though, are either true or false, which is why calling a “belief” a “truth” is not only confusing; it’s odd. If a person’s belief isn’t accurate, then it’s incorrect, mistaken, misguided, or just plain wrong, but it certainly isn’t a truth. Nevertheless, the muddle persists.

A virtue of this move, some think, is that it engenders an amicable tolerance.

Read More