Everything

What is it that causes my close friend from high school to recklessly lose his virginity? What drove my uncle to have an affair or my aunt to divorce? Why do my friends become alcoholics or drug addicts? Why did my cousin run away from home and why did my other cousin commit adultery? Why did an elderly missionary friend of the family kill himself?

What makes them so different from my friend from high school who lives under the same roof as his girlfriend and yet remains abstinent? What causes my rich uncle and aunt to take several missions trips to Ecuador? Why do my parents and siblings return to Mexico City when their friends and family are here? What causes a bunch of college kids to attend a Bible study by their own will?

Something is missing. There is a worldwide need for something incredibly important for life and it is not food.

If only there were scientific laws on life and humans so that we could all learn the balance of life and religion. I took a Psychology class a while back and I thought it was interesting how Psychology tries to come up with scientific laws on how to maintain a healthy, happy mind. I also took a couple Sociology class less than a year ago. Sociology is the quest to come up with scientific laws on how to have healthy, happy masses of people. But there is something incredibly important, missing in the quest for a healthy, happy life because all attempts seem to fail.

A coworker recently asked me why I was cautious about watching movies with nudity and sex in them. What should I say? Should I say, “The Bible tells me so” and leave it at that? Or is there a reason why the Bible tells me to abstain from lusting? Is the Bible just a super long list of rules that God jotted down for no reason? Or is the Bible stating scientific laws in life that bring about certain consequences for certain actions? Is there a bigger picture of which all the puzzle pieces logically connect?

I told my coworker that someday I hope to get married and make a lifelong commitment to my wife. When that day finally comes, there are certain thoughts, desires, and discoveries that come with purity and virginity that I want to save and give as a present to my wife. My coworker replied, “Well… I guess I can understand that.” Our conversation continued until with got to philosophies behind how a person can change lifestyles. It’s incredible how powerful truth can be when you point it out to someone who believes a lie.

Maybe there are scientific laws for life and for a healthy, happy life. And maybe Psychology and Sociology just have the equation mixed up.

We turn to the Bible and see that Acts 17: 27-28 says, “His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though He is not far from any one of us. For in him we live and move and exist.”

Maybe the main problem is that in our equation, life and religion aren’t the same thing when they should be. According to Paul, God is our environment. God is the scientific law. God is the Truth. God is everything.

In saying that we don’t need God and that we can do what feels good, we fool ourselves into believing a Lie. This Lie hands us the Truth of fun, pleasure, and selfishness and removes the Truth of God’s intentions. The Lie leads us astray by offering ice cream and once our hands are occupied with holding the delicious ice cream to our mouths, the Lie snatches us, throwing us into his car and kidnaping us to his hideout. There, the Lie chains us the ground and satisfies his thirst for our blood.

It is the Truth that sets us free and places us where we were intended to be: walking with God.

Behold! The need for Truth is everywhere. I’m beginning to see it everywhere I go and with every person I talk to and in every situation they share with me. Sometimes it seems like I’m the only person who needs Truth and other times it seems like I’m the only person who recognizes Truth. I’m positive that you have felt the same way. This world spends all of its time and resources getting us to believe in Lies. Culture is programmed to eat and breathe Lies.

Do you see the need as well? Will you strive to find Truth and point it out to those around you? Will you strive to eat and breathe Truth? Will you strive to live, move, and exist in Truth?