day 821: Arguing For Truth

"For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth."

I've been doing some work with a very successful company who's corporate culture is based on finding, knowing, speaking and operating to the truth. I've introduced a number of people to the company and after meeting and learning about the culture they can't help but compare their own corporate culture to what they have just seen. Usually it is not a favorable comparison. Many cultures do the opposite of looking for the truth. Instead, they don't want to have tough conversations, or ask hard questions, or call someone on their opinion because they don't want to hurt their feelings, or the discussions can never get beyond judgement or evaluation. But, defining truth and then working towards that definition can yield amazing findings and results.

John Stott, who recently died, was the rector of All Souls Church in London from 1921 until last year. He was a prolific writer and had much to say about truth and what we can do to argue for the truth of Jesus by being practical and smart in our persuasion. In Christianity Today he wrote; "I'll give you one quick example. You cannot force people to go to church by legislation. You can't force them to rest on Sundays. Nor can we simply quote from the Bible as if that settles the matter. But we can put forward our best arguments. We can argue that psychologically and physically, human beings need one day's rest in seven, and that is it socially good for families who are separated during the week to have a day together on Sunday. We can argue for legislation that protects workers from being compelled to work and encourages family life. In this example, we're neither imposing our Christian views, nor quoting the Bible dogmatically. We are simply using every argument - physical, psychological, sociological -in order to commend the wisdom and truth of biblical teaching. Why? Because we believe in the power of truth."

Reverend Stott's good words fit for our Purposed worKING. Let's not miss the opportunity to argue for the truth.

Reference: 2 Corinthians 13:8