Here is another one of those words that we use but have totally different meanings for adults and young people. That word is TRUTH. Truth to most of us is something that is objective, it is something outside ourselves, and you can discover it. When Jesus said, “You shall know the truth,” – the truth is there, you can study it, you can come to an understanding of what is true and often true for all people and all places and times. Truth is there to be discovered.
Almost all of us reading this have been trained in a particular style of thinking or analysis. What I mean is – when you read a book, it does not have to be the bible, any book, you ask yourself, “What is the truth the author is getting at?” What is the evidence he is presenting for that truth? To an adult, it is important to understand the truth that the author is writing about so we might understand the truth.
For young people today that is no longer true. We as a generation have got to wake up! Today, truth is not there to be
discovered. Truth is there to be
created. You don’t discover truth now, you create truth. There is no truth apart from yourself. In the mind of this whole new culture, all truth is personal. All truth is personal perspective. You can say, “You have a right to your own opinion”, but today all opinions are right. See the difference? Today, all truth is personal opinion.
You’ve heard this – “You need to determine what is right for you and what is wrong for you, but don’t impose your values upon me, you need to give me the freedom to determine what is right for me and what is wrong for me and to live it out unhindered.” What’s this saying? It is saying that you create truth, you create your values, your lifestyle, and your truth claims, and all are equal. Say you’re sharing Christ with someone from the younger generation today – X gen on down – and you start saying anything about Christ being the truth and they’ll respond something like this, “Oh wonderful, that’s true for you, buts it’s not true for me.” What’s it saying? You don’t discover truth, all truth is personal, it’s personal perspective, and personal opinion. Same words, different language.
Now when kids read a book they are not conditioned to ask, “What is the truth the author is giving?” but rather, “What does this say to me?” Whatever it says to you is just as true as whatever the author was writing. You say, “That’s crazy!” tell me about it, but that is exactly what is happening. Same words, different language. They are conditioned to ask, “What does this say to me?” It doesn’t matter what it says to the author, – it doesn’t matter what really happened, whatever your perspective is, whatever your opinion is, that is as equal to what anyone else might think or feel. All truth is personal and you create it.
Let me give you an example; when many of you were growing up and you were in bible study it was kind of like this, “Well, Randy, what do you think Jesus
meant by this?” David, what did Paul mean when he said this?” What was important to discover is what Jesus meant by it, it was important to discover what Paul meant by what he said by what is the truth in it. You don’t do that anymore. Look at bible studies now – what you are likely to hear is something like – “Randy, what does this mean to you?” “David, when Paul said this, what does it mean to you?” That is not the question, the question is,
what did it mean to Jesus and how does it apply to you? However, in most bible studies today, it has been inverted. Why? Because it doesn’t matter what it meant to Jesus, whatever it meant to you is just as true as whatever it meant to Jesus. It could be diametrically opposite; it doesn’t matter what it meant to Paul, whatever it means to you is just as true!
Next will talk about Pilate and his question, “What is truth”
So when teaching and discipling, how do you find the balance between keeping truth truth (not my definition), and teaching kids to take that truth into their own lives?
Again, a very accurate depiction of Gen Y and the invasion of postmodernism into American philosophy. It’s interesting that Chuck Colson describes this as a subtle infiltration of our minds and worldviews over the past hundred years, affecting everything from the music we listen to to how we daily live our lives.
By and large, modernists are saying, “That’s crazy. These kids are doomed!” I see a lot of the Church giving up on the next generation of young people who, even belivers, are trying to figure out what Truth means to them. I think that’s wrong.
Yes, this generation has seriously called into question a lot of doctrine and generally taken-for-granted biblical truths, but the reason is actually quite beautiful: the search for authenticity. Gen Y refuses to be “religious” just because it assuages fears of hell or makes them feel good about themselves. There are many people who want something real and true, but they’re testing the faith of their parents and seeing if it actually holds water.
Sadly, many are getting disillusioned with the Church and the faith of their parents, but it’s because they want something that will transform their lives completely in a very relevant way. I don’t know if I’m communicating this well or not, but this means that there is a lot of hope for the future of the Church. If we encourage these young people to not quench the Spirit, to test doctrine, to seek out the pervasive reality of the Gospel on a day-to-day basis, this could change our culture… and the world.
But there are well-meaning “church people” who refuse to accept the changing direction of the church (which, is actually a reversion to older church practices, in many cases) and want to impose their own prejudices on what Christian faith should look like in an institutional setting as well as in our culture. This will only frustrate millenials.
Somehow – though I’m not sure exactly how – we need to challenge postmoderns to find the real Truth, not their parents’ version of it or a watered-down Christianese explanation of tough issues. There are a lot of people in their twenties that are rejecting the Church, because no one is helping them in this discovery – so, they are just throwing out authority altogether, which is not good.