The truth will set you free! This is a much-used phrase. You find it in Martin Luther King’s speeches, inscribed on the headquarters wall of the CIA, and it was used in one of the most recent Marvel movie franchises. I would suggest that this scripture should not be read as superficially. We often hear it used in the sense that knowledge is power, or we can set somebody loose from their bondage if we can enlighten them of their false notions and correct them. Maybe those ideas are useful in a certain context, however the Bible means something quite different
Notice John 8: 31-32 ESV: ” So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in Him, ‘If you abide in My word, you are truly my disciples indeed. And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”‘ Knowing the truth is conditioned upon “abiding in My Word”. The freedom being talked about is not merely the absence of limits.
It’s also important to look at the context of the statement both in what Christ said specifically in this phrase but also in the context of John’s book in general. In this section of scripture, it follows immediately after Christ has been presented with the adulteress who was brought to him by the Pharisees, and He was asked to condemn her. He showed her mercy. That’s important to what this scripture is really about. The rest of this dialogue with the Pharisees is about Christ’s identity: that He is the Son of God and that He is the Way to Eternal Life. There are three parts we need to understand – Truth, Freedom, and Abiding – before we can grasp the meaning of “the truth will set you free.”
TRUTH
Pilate asked Jesus a rhetorical, sarcastic, and cynical question that feels relevant to us in the modern world. He said, “What is truth?” We have limitless information so we can basically “know” anything. But has society ever felt less sure of truth! It became subjective first and now it’s just a matter of opinion. Today, it’s impossible to know what is true and what is not in the news media. We’re in a post truth period.
What does the Bible say about truth? It includes physical knowledge, facts, observable understanding about our environment. Including academic study, scientific discovery, practical know-how. Knowledge of that kind is indeed commended in the Bible. Daniel and his cohorts in Babylon were selected based on their “gifts of wisdom” and became educated in “the language and literature of the Chaldeans” (Daniel 1:3-4).
God’s creation is a fantastically complex and rules-based system, and He gave us minds, brains capable of dissecting, putting back together, and understanding much about our physical world. Yet, the Bible also cautions us about that type of knowledge. It says, “the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God” (1 Corinthians 3:19). Ecclesiastes 8:17 NET, sums it up: “…No one really comprehends what happens on earth. Despite all human efforts to discover it, no one can ever grasp it. Even if a wise person claimed that he understood, he would not really comprehend it.” So physical knowledge according to the Bible isn’t a satisfactory definition or a complete enough definition of the truth.
The next aspect of truth that we can find in scripture is scripture. Truth, in the Bible, is synonymous with the moral laws, statutes, and teachings contained in the book: “. . . having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth—” (Romans 2:20 ESV). 2 Timothy 3:16 states that “All Scripture is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and instruction.” Scripture itself is a worthy teacher. Interesting to note that in Deuteronomy 4: 4-8, the statutes and judgements that were given to Israel are equated with the sum total of wisdom and understanding that was possessed by the nation of Israel.
In John 17:17 Christ prayed: “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.” That’s quite a bit more complete than the idea that scientific knowledge is where we get the truth. But it’s again, not the end of it because a revelation is also an important component of truth. A full “enlightened” truth is not just from printed words. It’s received from God: “. . .God has revealed to us through His Spirit.” “that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; …” (1Corinthians 2:10; Ephesians1:17-18).
Truth requires not only knowledge of facts of the physical world and an understanding of God’s prescribed way as we’re given in scripture. It also requires spiritual understanding and discernment that can only be gained from the Holy Spirit given to us by God. Truth is not just these observed facts, it’s not just a book of instructions. It’s a whole package. Truth is reality. Truth is the way things are. It’s not something that you can write down. It is an understanding of what is really out there and can only be perceived with the right lens, through the Holy Spirit, with the instruction of scripture. It starts with the recognition that God is the Creator, and that God defines what truth is. God’s will, God’s desires are truth. He created all things. It’s reality and God determines what it is.
FREEDOM
Next let’s look at this concept in John 8:32 about freedom. Freedom is the reward that is offered to those who have truth. But when most people read this section of scripture, the thing that revs their engine, the thing that gets them going about it is the idea that they’re going to get freedom. It’s not so much truth. It’s the end result which is promised. The problem is that the notion of freedom that we bring to that discussion is most often wrong.
The classical definition of Greek philosophers of freedom was an idea about transcendent “self-realization” which can be accomplished through virtue. The Greek philosophies had a sense that the physical is bad and if you can transcend the physical and get to a more virtuous state then you can be free. At least their approach to freedom had a nod to morality. You did need to be virtuous to attain your higher self and be free.
The modern understanding of freedom is much more licentious. It’s really just unrestricted personal expression. That idea that any boundary, any limits on you and what you want to do infringes on your freedom.
Christian author Oliver O’Donovan said of this concept in his book Resurrection and Moral Order: “Nothing could be more misleading than the popular philosophy that freedom is constituted by the absence of limits.” The freedom that Christ promises is much more lasting, much more profound than what you would think of in the more humanistic sense of “don’t tell me what I can’t do”. Christ’s definition of freedom means being reconciled to the God family, fulfilling the purpose for which we were created (Romans 6.22).
James 1:25 references “the perfect law of liberty” and that he who looks into that perfect law would be blessed in all he does. The abundance and the blessings come from that understanding of the law which is a restrictive element. Freedom coming from the restriction of that law.
Freedom is not really an absence of limits. Physical life as God designed it cannot be without limits. It is inherently constrained because that’s how God made it. We have a choice. We can either choose to line up with the way God created things and be quickened by the synergy of being in concert with God’s purpose for us, or we can choose to be enslaved by sin. Enslaved in the sense that we are burdened by the result of our sin, trapped into the cycle of repeating our sins.
This notion is difficult for us to get our mind around that being constrained by God’s way is freedom. Richard Bauckham wrote in “God and the Crisis of Freedom” : “When I love God and freely make God’s will my own, I am not forfeiting my freedom but fulfilling it. God’s will is not the will of another in any ordinary sense. It is the moral truth of all reality. To conform ourselves freely to that truth is also to conform to the inner law of our own created being.”
When we come into conformance with what God asks of us it’s not like coming into conformance with the laws that are set up by man. It’s coming into conformance with your Creator and what He’s made you to be.
ABIDING
We see that the key to unlocking the full meaning of John 8:32 is the part of the scripture that nobody ever quotes. Nobody ever says, “If you abide in My word, you are truly My disciples, and you will know the truth.” That’s the New King James Version. The NIV says, “If you hold to my teachings….” The New American Standard says, “If you continue in My word…”. To abide is to live in, to dwell in, to make your home in. It’s required to know the truth to obtain this freedom. That’s the prerequisite. We must abide in truth, the teaching, the word, God’s word. We’re talking about the truth contained in scripture. Psalm 119:160 says: “The entirety of Your word is truth, And every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever.”
As we’ve seen, the truth is observable facts, it’s scripture, and it’s revealed understanding. We are to abide in scripture, we are to use God’s Spirit and those behaviors have a freeing effect because of the way God’s law works. Simply living within the bounds of God’s law creates blessings, creates freedom, creates abundance.
But there’s another facet. John 1:1 says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The word we are to abide in to know truth and to be set free is, in fact, Jesus. “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by Me” (John 14:6).
Christ Himself said that He is the truth. He didn’t say that He would show us the truth or that He would model the truth. He said that He is the truth. He is the truth personified. We need understand who Christ is and what He’s doing for us.
He said “. . . ‘I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.’ And He said to them, ‘You are from beneath; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.’ . . . ‘If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free'” (John 8:12, 23-24, 31-32).
We can now put Christ in that scripture. He is the Truth. We must establish who Christ is to have a right relationship with Him. He is the all-powerful Creator. He is the Eternal God of the Old Testament (I Corinthians 10:1-4) who did all of those amazing powerful miracles that were observed. He wrote or inspired to be written the entire Bible. He gave up His Godhead and died. He is the resurrected King, and He rules over all things for eternity. He animates life. Colossians 1:16-18 says “For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, dominions, principalities, or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.”
Christ is huge. He is everything and for us to compartmentalize Him or limit His participation in our life and His ability to give us freedom is to really damage our relationship with Him. What he is offering – grace – is not a gooey, condescending hand out. It’s real freedom. And it’s that freedom that is the only freedom that we can have. John 8:36 states: “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.”
Staff