You Can't Handle the Truth

On Sunday, Joe based his sermon on John 18:33-37. The last line of that passage is this: "Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

He compared the idea of "belonging" to the truth and following the truth or knowing the truth. Belonging to the truth has an inescapable nature to it. If we belong to the truth, the truth will pursue us, never letting us go. Even when we turn away from the truth, we still belong to the truth.

I am the way, the truth and the life.

As Joe told the children about belonging to the truth in the Children's moment, my older son wrote something on a piece of paper and then turned around and showed it to me. It said, "You can't handle the truth!" He meant it as a joke; it's the famous line from the movie A Few Good Men.

You can't handle the truth.

In the movie it means that we don't want to accept the truth; we aren't prepared for it; we would rather not hear it. But as I think about it, I think it has another implication, one that Grant didn't mean in his joke. We can't handle the truth. We can't control God. We can't manipulate him or trick him. All of our regular "tools" of handling something -- of maintaining control of our lives -- don't work with God.

We can't handle the truth. And that is another frustrating part about waiting. We aren't in control. We wait upon the Lord.