Truth Unfazed

This is Part 2 of 4 from a sermon on Truth, the first in "The Transcendentals" series preached at Summit Church (Naples) in January 2026. It has been lightly edited for publishing. Click here to listen to the audio.  

Though truth is under siege, truth is unfazed.

Though we are frustrated by society’s denial of objective reality, truth is not. Truth will remain true even if all the earth denies it. As Psalm 119:160 reminds us, “The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever.”

Truth: Moral Furniture of the Universe

And we feel the reality of this whenever we run against the grain of reality. For example:

• If you think driving laws don’t apply to you such that you run stop signs and lights, you will eventually be creamed by a car or ticketed by a cop.

• If you think you are a bird and can fly such that you jump off this roof, you will fall to the ground and break your legs.

• If you believe you are a man trapped in a woman’s body such that you remove your breasts and ovaries, take puberty blockers and testosterone, you will be sorely disappointed to find out that you are still a woman, who now must live with lifelong consequences of bodily mutilation.

What I am trying to say is this: if humans decide not to live in accordance with truth, they are deciding to not live in reality. And the problem of living in a make-believe world is that the real world is still real. It does not simply go away. Truth will always hit back. If one does not respect the rules of reality, the consequences will be severe.  

Similarly, if you believe that you can go on breaking all the commands of God with impunity, you will wake up one day and find yourself in a prison of your own making—enslaved to the very things you once thought were your saviors.

Here’s the way Proverbs 1:20-33 describes the situation:

20 Wisdom cries aloud in the street,
    in the markets she raises her voice;
21 at the head of the noisy streets she cries out;
    at the entrance of the city gates she speaks:
22 “How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?
How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing
    and fools hate knowledge?
23 If you turn at my reproof,
behold, I will pour out my spirit to you;
    I will make my words known to you.
24 Because I have called and you refused to listen,
    have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded,
25 because you have ignored all my counsel
    and would have none of my reproof,
26 I also will laugh at your calamity;
    I will mock when terror strikes you,
27 when terror strikes you like a storm
    and your calamity comes like a whirlwind,
    when distress and anguish come upon you.
28 Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer;
    they will seek me diligently but will not find me.
29 Because they hated knowledge
    and did not choose the fear of the Lord,
30 would have none of my counsel
    and despised all my reproof,
31 therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way,
    and have their fill of their own devices.
32 For the simple are killed by their turning away,
    and the complacency of fools destroys them;
33 but whoever listens to me will dwell secure
    and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”

While it may seem cold to hear wisdom laughing at our calamity, it’s not—it’s just. To deny the reality of wisdom from above; to deny the reality of truth; and to deny the God who stands behind it is to purposefully blindfold yourself and to run at breakneck speed upon a narrow ledge while claiming you can see just fine. Could the result be anything but tragic?

Just because someone makes a truth claim doesn’t mean it’s true. Only when someone sees what is actually true and lives in light of it will their claim be justified. And that is what we should all want! To see what is actually true and live in light of it. If we don’t, we will live our lives blindly bumping into the universe’s furniture that God put there for our good. 

Therefore, wisdom’s laughter isn’t meant to shame the reader; it’s meant to warn him of what will come if he rejects wisdom. If we believe ourselves to be autonomous beings who can bend reality to our own wills, nothing good will come.

God Created an Ordered World

And the reason for this is because of Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

Before anything was, God was. He created and designed everything—from a blade of grass to glorious humanity—to be a certain way, to function a certain way, to pursue certain ends, chiefly to bring Himself glory 

God also designed the various laws of the universe that would govern the things he created. And in humanity’s case, God provided a moral law to govern our bodies and souls.

While someone can deny God’s Law with their words and rebel against it with their actions, no can change it, nor will he ultimately deny it. God’s laws are true and do not change because God is true and does not change. And we are hiscreatures living within his world. Every day, if we pay attention, there are fresh reminders of an intentional order to things that we can’t do anything about. We are at our best when we are aligned to that order, and at our worst when we reject it.

So though truth is under siege—leaving a wake of destruction—truth is unfazed. It isn’t worried. For it doesn’t change. It is as firm and fixed today as it was when God spoke at the very beginning, saying “let there be…” And there was. And truth still calls out to the simple and foolish today, saying, “turn aside from your simple and foolish ways and pattern your lives after the pattern of God’s moral law that you might flourish.” 

The Problem of Sin

Here's the problem, though. While some people pattern their lives after God's moral law better than others, all of us have rejected aspects of God’s moral law that we didn’t like or were particularly hard for us to follow. And because of this, our world and our souls have fallen into a state of disrepair.

It all started in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve questioned the truthfulness of God’s word, doubted the goodness that God had for them through obedience to that word, and found more delight in the forbidden fruit than with the living God. And all of us have done the same. We all reject God’s truth—which is good and brings beauty—by believing the lie which is evil and brings sorrow.

Denying God’s truth and rejecting his laws is what the Bible calls sin. Or, as one writer defines it, sin is that “blamable human vandalism of these great realities and, therefore, an affront to their architect and builder.”[1]

The consequences of this vandalism are not only the present absurdity, confusion, and pain, they’re also eternal, for God and his law are eternal. And since we’ve sinned just like Adam and Eve, we’re liable to the same consequences as them—being cast out of God’s presence.

And though we might think that a good thing, it’s not, for in God’s presence alone are truth, goodness, and beauty. To walk away from him is to walk away from them. And in their place is only error, evil, and disgust.

But in God’s incredible grace, that’s not the end of the story. The same God who gave us a moral law by which we might know how to live in His world also gave us His Son—truth embodied—to be our Savior and reunite us to God and restore us to his intended purpose.

Works Cited:

[1] Cornelius Plantinga Jr., Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1995), 16.