I am James Hong and welcome to the Surpassing Value Podcast. The fuel and desire for this podcast was born out of a compulsion to flesh out what's been going on in the midst of an ocean of megaphones that may not actually withstand the test of scrutiny. As a signpost theologian, I will do my best to filter out the impurities and point people in the right direction.

For episode two, I wanted to lay the foundation for other episodes and address the concept of truth and flesh out some of its implications. I know at first glance this might seem unnecessary, but in an age where postmodernism has reached its tentacles into even casual conversations, even inner thinking, I thought it would be important some groundwork was laid.

After all, we're in an era where the mantra of postmodernism, that all truth is relative or all truth is subjective, has reached cultural acceptance. In many cases, it's not enough to be merely sympathetic, but a lot of times it means to bow the knee. Along with this, the privatization of moral values has completed the recipe that has led to the end of any objective search for truth being considered a noble task.

Moreover, the sharing of lives with someone who espouses a differing ideology than you once considered the norm for sophisticated and civil people has been displaced and now the opposite is actually true. It is political anathema to treat another person who has a differing ideology as fully human. For example, did you know that the two late United States Supreme Court Justices, Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, they considered each other best friends.

We're talking about two icons of their own respective judicial philosophies that are completely at odds with one another. One is considered by many to be a conservative icon. Another is considered by many to be a liberal icon. But these two intellectual giants shared life together and they came from a time where that was the norm for how sophisticated and civilized people behaved and conducted themselves.

Now that type of thinking is extinct like the woolly mammoth. It is more acceptable to hate someone who has a differing ideology than you. And if you don't toe the line, you eventually end up getting canceled. We live in a cancel culture. And you see that with Ellen DeGeneres and with J.K.

Rowling. In any case, going back to our discussion of truth, let's start with defining truth and work out from there. In order for us to have a discussion about truth or true, we need to have a working definition that we all agree upon. So here's a Merriam-Webster entry for truth.

Entry number one, the body of real things, events and facts, actuality. Number two, the state of being the case, fact. Number three, a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality. To A, the property as of a statement of being in accord with fact or reality. Let me read that again. It is the body of real things, events and facts, actuality.

The state of being the case, fact. A transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality, or the property as of a statement of being in accord with fact or reality. Isn't it interesting that despite this being the dictionary definition of truth or true, we could still hold to some following notions. What's true for you is not what's true for me.

Or that's your truth. In many cases when people state this, they could very easily be misspeaking and inserting the word truth for some other word like taste or opinion. But undoubtedly our culture has so privatized and declared truth to be subjective when by definition truth is a transcendent fundamental and/or the body of real things.

So by virtue of the definition I just stated, here are some things that truth is not. Truth is not necessarily what makes you feel good or better. Truth is not necessarily what the majority says is true. Truth is not necessarily good intentions. Truth is not necessarily what the consensus is.

Truth is not necessarily what is the most pragmatic or practical. It is not what makes you feel good or better necessarily, what the majority says is true necessarily, good intentions necessarily, what the consensus is necessarily, whatever is the most pragmatic or practical necessarily. Here are some qualities of truth that truth possesses inherently or intrinsically by nature of being truth.

By nature, truth is exclusive, fixed, corresponds to reality, and by extension of the first three it withstands the test of scrutiny. It is exclusive, it is fixed, it corresponds to reality, and by virtue of that it withstands the test of scrutiny. I want to give you some examples of these intrinsic qualities to illustrate the points that I just made.

Truth is exclusive because two thoughts existing on the same wavelength cannot both be true. To say it another way, truth is exclusive because two thoughts on the same plane of thought cannot both be true at the same time. To give you an example, both the Chiefs and the Rams cannot both be the best team in the NFL.

Either it's the Chiefs, it's the Rams, or neither. But the one thing it cannot be is that both cannot be the best, since the best implies that there is no other. I cannot say both the Dodgers and the Rays won the World Series. It's either the Dodgers, or the Rays, or neither.

This case was the Dodgers. Truth is fixed because by nature whatever is true does not change. Truth is fixed because by nature whatever is true does not change. The square root of 9 is 3. It's always been 3, it continues to be that, and will forever be so. The square root of 9 will never be anything other than 3.

It will never be 3.00001. It will never be 2.99999. The square root of 9 is 3, and will always be 3. Truth also corresponds to reality. For example, gravity exists. You might hate gravity. I might hate gravity. You might want to fly. I might want to fly. Let's say we both go up to the 8th story of a building, and I am so convinced of quote unquote my truth.

I'm so convinced of it. I'm so convinced of it, and I want to fly so bad, and I hate gravity so much, I decide to jump off the 8th story. Now in that case, only one person's truth is going to correspond to reality. And my truth, that gravity doesn't exist, will not correspond to reality because it is not true.

Truth withstands the test of scrutiny. Truth withstands the test of scrutiny by extension of it being exclusive, fixed, and corresponding to reality. Truth can be inspected, it can be explored, it can be vetted, it can be interrogated, it can be dissected, it can be audited over and over and over again with a fine tooth comb and at the end of it, guess what?

Truth will remain truth despite whatever truth-seeking process you put it through. It doesn't matter what kind of truth-seeking process you put it through. Truth remains truth. Truth does not need to hide and has nothing to hide. If you are seeking the truth of a matter, consider these characteristics. Nobody has said to be arrogant, to be smug, to be pompous.

And also, don't give into the dialectic that if you do hold to truth, having these characteristics, that by virtue of that, you are automatically arrogant, smug, or pompous. Some people might accuse you of being narrow-minded for believing that truth is exclusive when that's an inherent quality of truth. Do not give into such anti-intellectualism.

That would be the equivalent of being called arrogant because you state that the sun is hot. The sun is by nature hot. That is a fact. Believing in an inherent quality of truth does not equate with arrogance. To drive this point home even further, consider the following. If someone says "all truth is subjective", that statement itself is self-defeating since that statement has to be objective in order for it to be true.

The "all truth is subjective" statement must borrow capital from the objective worldview in order for it to be true. But if someone borrows that capital, they have just disproved what they were trying to prove, namely that all truth is subjective. But if that statement needs to be objective, what have you just done?

It is inescapable, isn't it? So now, let me ask you then. Why is this important? Why should anyone bother? Does truth matter? My answer is a resounding yes. Truth absolutely matters. Doesn't truth matter to someone who is accused of committing a crime? What if that were you or a loved one accused of committing a crime?

Would you not think truth mattered? Doesn't truth matter if you're flying across country in an airplane? Aren't you hoping that the engineer who built the airplane used truthful mathematical propositions as opposed to faulty ones? I'm sure truth would matter to you if you were 40,000 feet in the air.

I'm sure if you were 40,000 feet in the air, you're hoping that the engineer who built the plane built it on the truthful proposition that the square root of 9 is 3 and not 3.0000001 or 2.99999999. Precision would be of high importance in that case, wouldn't it? Exclusivity, which is an inherent quality of truth, matters a lot, doesn't it?

Doesn't truth matter if you're in the hospital and the doctor is telling the nurse how much medicine to give you or a loved one via an IV? Truth matters in every academic subject of study, in every area of life, and all aspects of personal matters. All of life corresponds to truth.

What you think is good and evil, virtue or vice, whether you're religious or not, matters immensely. The lack of any truth convictions about abstract principles of life matters immensely. To say the same thing yet another way, theology or lack thereof, is immensely practical. And let me tell you, none of us like bearing the brunt of a lie.

Life has consequences for being wrong. We might not like that, but those consequences will still come. And many times, it might not even be you or me bearing those consequences. It could easily be those you have the most influence over. And for most of us, that's our friends and family.

I want to go even deeper by demystifying why we should care. I want to stay on this topic. There are dialectics that the culture pushes on us that aren't the correct dialectics for investigative inquiry. Just so we're all on the same page, a dialectic simply means discussion and reasoning by dialogue as a method of intellectual investigation.

A dialectic means discussion and reasoning by dialogue as a method of intellectual investigation. This is typically done through setting up opposing viewpoints and trying to resolve a conflict between the two. Let me give you some examples of what our culture deems to be dialectics. The sports analogy that I used just now, the daughters in the race, that would be a dialectic because those were the two baseball teams in the World Series.

The Lakers and the Celtics would be another dialectic because these two teams went at it in the Magic Johnson era and the Kobe Bryant era. Some political ones could be conservative vs. liberal, democrat vs. republican, marxism, socialism, communism vs. free market capitalism. My point is that a lot of times we automatically assume these dialectics because the culture pushes them on us and not necessarily because they are the correct dialectics we should be thinking about.

This is where it becomes dangerous. Let's say I want to talk about the dangers within the democratic party or the dangers within the republican party. A huge swath of people will automatically assume that the person speaking is either a loyal democrat or a loyal republican. And for many, they cannot extricate themselves from a culture-induced dialectic and so when we see this dialectical image, we don't see any other configuration of these opposing viewpoints so we automatically assume, well, this conversation has no value because it's merely political.

And therefore, any discussion into this has no real spiritual, philosophical, or theological value. What many people fail to understand is that for many people, it is precisely on theological grounds that informs our political leanings and not vice versa. However, the vast majority of people will villainize others who do wish to engage in the conversation precisely because it has immense theological importance.

But the thing is, it is much easier to deal with straw men, it is much easier to caricature another's position as opposed to thinking honestly, thinking critically. Many just want to remain willfully ignorant because in your willful ignorance, you could feel morally superior and our culture has equated outrage as a moral virtue.

And so, for that reason, a lot of people engage in feeling outraged because they like the perspective that they think they are getting from others. And that is a cultural phenomenon, not an inherently good one. But an inquiry into truth requires that we question even whether or not our starting positional dialectic is even true.

Another absolutely incorrect dialectic we heard about recently is abortion versus arrogance. That was an absolutely incorrect dialectic. Another reason you should care is because imbibing worldviews that are incompatible with truth are much more harmful than you might be cognizant of. Incompatible worldviews act to corrupt your mind and steer you away from the truth unknowingly.

They douse the desires of your heart that are inherently good. They blind you from interpreting reality correctly. Truth matters because love rejoices with the truth. That is 1 Corinthians 13. If you want to be loving to your neighbor no matter who they are or what they believe, you tell the truth.

Isn't it unloving to tell a cancer patient they have cancer because you are fearful of what they might say about you? It is usually a series of missteps that are rampant in our lives that leave us vulnerable, indefensible and ultimately impotent for any good work. Lies, even the ones you think do not matter or have any tangible connection to anything significant, do have the potential to pave the path to hell and that path is lighted with good intentions.

Ephesians 2.2 tells us that Satan is the prince of the power of the air. Or in other words, he is the prince of this world. 1 John 5.19 states that the whole world lies in wickedness. Ephesians 6.12 states that our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness.

All these verses point not only to the prominent power that Satan has, but it also points to how deceptive he is. And let me tell you, being deceptive many times is power. Don't get me wrong, we should fear God and not have this paralyzing fear of Satan. But there is a difference between having a paralyzing fear and being sober and understanding who Satan is.

Truth also helps you to understand the times. And understanding the times is always crucial. During the transition from Saul to David in 1 Chronicles 12, it tells us of noteworthy men who had their hearts turned toward King David. It talks about the mighty men of valor. Of relevance here, in 1 Chronicles 12.32 it states, "From the sons of Issachar, men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do, their chiefs were two hundred, and all their kinsmen were at their command." From the sons of Issachar, men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do.

We need people who understand the times. We need people with knowledge of what we should do. And so, if somewhere in your heart you're still unmoved by what I just said, consider for a moment that perhaps there is something crooked in your heart. I want to read to you John 18, 28-38, it reads like this, "Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the praetorium, and it was early.

And they themselves did not enter into the praetorium, so that they would not be defiled, but might eat the Passover. Therefore Pilate went out to them and said, 'What accusation do you bring against this man?' They answered and said to him, 'If this man were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered him to you.' So Pilate said to them, 'Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law.' The Jews said to him, 'We are not permitted to put anyone to death to fulfill the word of Jesus which he spoke, signifying but what kind of death he was about to die.' Therefore Pilate entered again into the praetorium and summoned Jesus and said to him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' Jesus answered, 'Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about me?' Pilate answered, 'I am not a Jew, am I?

Your own nation and the chief priests delivered you to me. What have you done?' Jesus answered, 'My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then my servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not of this realm.' Therefore Pilate said to him, 'So you are a king?' Jesus answered, 'You say correctly that I am a king.

For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Anyone who is of the truth hears my voice.' Pilate said to him, 'What is truth?' We know what happens after this. Pilate will find no fault in him, but the crowd demanding Barabbas over Jesus will cause Pilate to hand over Barabbas as opposed to Jesus despite Pilate's own admission that he had found no fault in Jesus.

Pilate sought to find a balance in all of this. In Matthew 27, as the crowds become more belligerent and demand that Jesus be crucified, he believes that by washing his hands and placing the blame on the crowds, that he is freed from the responsibility of his actions. Matthew 27, 24, when Pilate saw that he was accomplishing nothing, but rather that a riot was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd, saying, 'I am innocent of this man's blood.

See to that yourselves.' But guess what? Pilate doesn't get to make his own rules. And just like we learned about truth, the fact that Pilate states that he is innocent doesn't actually mean he is innocent. Just because he said, 'I'm washing my hands,' doesn't necessarily mean his hands are clean.

And with that, he orders Jesus to be crucified, the very embodiment of truth. After this, the very embodiment of truth is speaking truth to Pilate and Pilate's response is 'What is truth?' Are you someone who believes truth matters? Or are you more like Pilate, who says, 'What is truth?' and then just orders it to be crucified?

I want to read to you some more passages to solidify this point. Psalm 119, 160, "The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever." John 1, 14, "And the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory. Glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." John 4, 24, "God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." John 8, 32, "And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." John 14, 6, "And Jesus said to him, 'I am the way and the truth, and the life.

No one comes to the Father except through me.'" John 16, 13, "When the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come." John 17, 17, "Sanctify them in the truth.

Your word is truth." 2 Timothy 2, 15, "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth." If you feel the need to abandon truthful propositions to achieve some other perceived noble end, you are probably not being used to promote good, but rather evil.

Because something sinister is afoot, and you cannot see it. Integrity is greater than pragmatism. Be convinced that truth matters. Thanks for making it to the end. I'll continue to try to make the journey worth it. To him be honor, glory, and eternal dominion. James Hong out. (upbeat music)