Absolute Certainty: the Evangelical Myth

Epistomology: The Achilles Heel of my faith. That old question of ever-elusive certainty: sure you experienced something profound, but does that make it real? Or should we like Scrooge blame indigestion for our superstitions? (“There’s more gravy than grave about you!”)

Conservative Christians claim to have this slippery truth and to be honest I join my generation in their collective sigh of exasperation. I’ll tell you an evangelical secret: Christians don’t actually FEEL more certain of their dogmas than other people. But they are told that certainty will win people. They are told that presenting one’s argument as “absolute truth” will fill a deep hungry void left in the heart of every postmodern. I don’t buy it.

Honestly, I think the rallying cry of “absolute truth” in the church is a tired and obnoxious rhetoric which we oughta crumple into the trash can of religious brain farts.

It was the quest for this elusive certainty that just about sent me off the cliff of lonely agnosticism a few years ago. Who told me this junk about certainty? I was rescued from that cliff when I started suspecting that true things are certain by degrees and in comparison with other things. And that’s different than saying “That’s a cool truth for you bro, but I’ve got my own truth that works for me.” The question was no longer, "can I posit from scratch with certainty and conviction the existence of an omnipotent loving Creator who became a person to save the world from sin?" Rather, I started asking, "is this Christian story (in spite of all perceived hurdles) true enough, beautiful enough, and strong enough to to start living it... to jump off a cliff for it?" And my conclusion rather surprised me one morning after 6 months of hard searching: "I think it is!"

(BTW, I kinda doubt that the "it works for me" pragmatism is a good rubric for judging a worldview. Same for happiness and perceived profundity. Jesus said fruit (as in outcome) is a much better rubric and I tend to agree… and BTW, I don’t think our evangelical “unfruitfulness” comes from a deficient gospel as much as a deficient commitment to maturity.)

A buddy of mine wrote a paper in seminary suggesting that you can objectively argue that Fat Tire is better than Bud Light because of the ingredients and the brewing process. And if you prefer Bud Light, well, I won’t argue that point, but I might rightly argue you’ve got a faulty set of taste buds!

I like the way you put it, Jesse Dukes. Truth is relational and Truth is a person. If you get to know that person, you’re getting to know truth. It seems like Jesus proposed that he IS that person. That “I am the way, the truth, and the life” bit? I think it was pretty radical in his context just like it is in ours. He didn’t hold up the bible and say, “here it is folks! A manual of the universe. Absolute truth in a book!” He said, “Look, you’re right, there IS absolute truth and now you can sit down and have coffee with Him every morning. Isn’t that better anyway?”

I don’t think many postmoderns are out there seriously arguing that Absolute Truth doesn’t exist. Not many are denying the basic principles of arithmetic or physics. They’re just asking for a really compelling reason to believe that “Joe Christian” has somehow tapped into that Truth!

So far, we haven’t given them that reason. Not because our apologetics are crappy, but because our lifestyles are crappy. Even if you can convince me that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, you’re going to have to go the extra step of proving that you KNOW him well enough and you TRUST him enough to be LIKE him: to act like him, think like him, and feel like him (credit to Bob Dukes for that one).

The point is, I think it’s time to talk less about knowing and more about trusting. That’s it.  If we really think truth is a person—not a book or an algorithm or a line of code—then we should stop sermonizing about what we know and start chatting about who we know. And within our churches, I think we ought to renew our commitment to maturity. We gotta start brewing people (instead of programs or doctrines) with better yeast, in smaller batches, for a good long time. Then when they come out they'll taste damn good and be so heady they make everybody else drunk on Jesus.  I mean… am I off my orthodox rocker here?