00:00 We have selected the theme
00:03 “Be a Champion of Truth!”
00:06 You may have heard of the word “champion”
00:08 used in the context of sports.
00:11 What is a champion?
00:13 The word can have different meanings.
00:15 The word is related to the French word champ,
00:18 meaning “field.”
00:20 That word has its origin in the Latin word campus,
00:23 also meaning “field” or “battlefield.”
00:27 The Bible speaks of a champion on a battlefield
00:30 in 1 Samuel 17:4:
00:36 “Then a champion came out from the camps of the Philistines;
00:40 his name was Goliath.”
00:44 Goliath was a champion for a wrong cause,
00:47 namely, to take the lead in defeating
00:49 the ancient Israelites in battle.
00:51 In our modern time, according to one definition,
00:55 a champion is “an ardent defender
00:58 “or supporter of a cause
01:00 or another person.”
01:02 Christians today are ardent defenders
01:05 and supporters of the truth.
01:07 The Watchtower of January 15, 2012,
01:11 said on page 8: “Other champions
01:15 of Bible truth rose up in the centuries that followed.”
01:20 Years before, The Watchtower said:
01:22 “This magazine will never shrink in fear
01:25 from championing the truth!”
01:28 “The Watchtower has been championing
01:30 ‘the cause of Kingdom truth.’”
01:33 So, are you a champion?
01:37 In a sports competition,
01:39 only one individual gets to be the champion.
01:42 But in the case of true Christians,
01:44 all can be champions of the truth.
01:47 All Christians are to defend the truth
01:50 and become conquerors —winners.
01:53 It’s necessary to defend the truth
01:56 because in today’s world
01:58 truth is being attacked and distorted.
02:01 We are surrounded by a sea of lies
02:04 and misrepresentations.
02:06 How did such lies get started?
02:09 They started in the garden of Eden
02:11 when Satan told Eve lies.
02:14 Satan, through his deceptive statements,
02:17 became “the father of the lie.”
02:20 All the problems in the world
02:22 —all calamities (also your personal calamities),
02:27 all wars, all diseases, all crimes,
02:30 all unhappiness, sorrow, and death
02:33 —started with the original lies
02:36 in the garden of Eden.
02:38 Satan is “the father of the lie.”
02:41 But today there are many “children” of the lie.
02:45 Every one of us is affected.
02:47 We are surrounded by a sea of lies.
02:50 A lie is “a false statement
02:53 “deliberately presented as being true;
02:55 a falsehood.”
02:57 A lie is the opposite of the truth.
03:00 Lying involves saying something incorrect
03:03 to a person who is entitled to know the truth about a matter.
03:07 But there is also something that is called a half-truth.
03:11 The Bible tells Christians to be honest with each other.
03:15 “Now that you have put away deceit,
03:18 . . . speak truth,” wrote the apostle Paul
03:21 at Ephesians 4:25.
03:23 Lies and half-truths undermine trust.
03:27 A German proverb says,
03:30 “Who lies once is not believed,
03:32 even if he says the truth.”
03:34 So we need to speak openly
03:36 and honestly with each other,
03:38 not withholding bits of information
03:41 that could change the perception of the listener
03:43 or mislead him.
03:45 As to lies, there are different types.
03:49 Some politicians have lied about matters
03:51 they wanted to keep secret.
03:53 Companies sometimes lie in advertisements
03:56 regarding their products.
03:59 What about the news media?
04:01 Many try to report events truthfully.
04:04 But we should not be gullible
04:06 and believe everything newspapers write
04:09 or everything we hear on radio
04:11 or see on television.
04:14 Then there are religious lies.
04:16 If Satan is called “the father of the lie,”
04:19 then Babylon the Great, the global empire of false religion,
04:22 can be called the “mother” of the lie.
04:25 Individual false religions
04:27 could be called “daughters” of the lie.
04:30 Some lie by saying that sinners
04:33 will get tormented in hell forever.
04:36 Others lie by saying,
04:38 “Once saved, always saved.”
04:40 Again, others lie by saying that the earth
04:44 will be burned up on Judgment Day
04:46 and all good people will go to heaven.
04:49 Some worship idols.
04:51 Paul wrote at Romans 1:25:
04:57 “They exchanged the truth of God for the lie
05:00 “and venerated and rendered sacred service
05:03 to the creation rather than the Creator.”
05:07 Then there are many lies of a personal nature
05:10 that people express in everyday life.
05:12 A businessman may get a phone call
05:15 but tell his secretary to answer the caller
05:18 by saying he is not in.
05:20 This may be considered a small lie.
05:23 There are small lies, big lies,
05:26 and malicious lies.
05:30 A child may have broken something but when asked initially,
05:33 out of fear of punishment, denies having done it.
05:37 This does not make the child a malicious liar.
05:40 In contrast, what if an entrepreneur
05:44 tells his bookkeeper to falsify the entries
05:46 in the books in order to save on taxes?
05:50 This lying to the tax office
05:52 is certainly a serious lie.
05:54 It is a deliberate attempt to mislead somebody
05:58 that has the right to know.
06:00 It also robs the government of what they have established
06:03 as legal income.
06:05 We can see that not all lies are the same;
06:09 there are small lies, big lies,
06:11 and malicious lies.
06:13 Satan is a malicious liar.
06:16 He is the champion of the lie.
06:19 Since Jehovah hates liars,
06:21 we should avoid all lies,
06:23 not just big or malicious lies.
06:28 But can we find the truth?
06:30 Some say, “Truth is relative.”
06:33 It is like saying, “This is truth for you,
06:36 and this is truth for me.”
06:38 This claim is not logical
06:41 when it comes to religious truth.
06:43 Either God is a Trinity or he’s not.
06:46 Either the soul is mortal or it is not.
06:50 Either there is a future paradise on earth or there is not.
06:54 Either homosexuality is acceptable to God or it is not.
07:00 Either participating in wars is permissible or it is not.
07:06 Truth is definite, not relative,
07:08 because Jehovah conveyed the truth to his servants.
07:12 Psalm 43:3 says:
07:15 “Send out your light and your truth.”
07:18 Jehovah is a Revealer of truth.
07:23 One of several reasons why Jesus came into the world
07:26 was to “witness to the truth.”
07:28 At John 18:37b,
07:32 he said: “For this I have been born,
07:35 “and for this I have come into the world,
07:37 “that I should bear witness to the truth.
07:40 Everyone who is on the side of the truth listens to my voice.”
07:46 So if we listen to Jesus, or read in the Bible
07:49 what he taught, we can learn the truth.
07:52 Jesus was the personification of the truth.
07:55 He said: “I am the way
07:58 and the truth and the life.”
08:01 We can find out what the truth is
08:03 by diligently studying the Bible.
08:06 Truth is that which is a fact.
08:09 For true Christians, the entire text
08:12 of the Hebrew and Christian Greek Scriptures
08:14 constitutes the truth.
08:16 Psalm 119:160
08:19 says of Jehovah:
08:21 ‘The essence of your word is truth.’
08:25 That is why it is good to do
08:27 daily Bible reading with meditation
08:30 and weekly family worship.
08:33 At Matthew 24:45-47, we read
08:37 that for the time of the end, Jesus would appoint
08:40 a “faithful and discreet slave,” or Governing Body,
08:44 to explain the Bible to His followers
08:46 and help them to grow in understanding of the truth.
08:51 Whereas Jesus’ teachings
08:53 and the written Word of God are inspired,
08:56 “the faithful and discreet slave” is not inspired,
08:59 although it champions the truth.
09:03 Nevertheless, the faithful slave
09:05 provides spiritual food.
09:07 Whereas in the first century
09:09 there was supernatural knowledge
09:11 available for apostles and Bible writers,
09:14 in the time of the end, Jehovah does not bestow
09:17 this miraculous gift anymore, as explained
09:21 at 1 Corinthians 13:8.
09:24 Although there is no divine inspiration today,
09:28 still Jesus leads his people progressively
09:31 through the services of the faithful slave.
09:34 Jesus trusts that the imperfect faithful slave
09:37 will do its best to convey spiritual food.
09:41 Do you also trust the slave?
09:46 Whereas the truth of God’s Word does not change,
09:49 our understanding of the truth does change
09:53 because we are not perfect yet.
09:55 We understand more about the truth today
09:58 than Christians in the first century.
10:01 Do we keep up with the progressive understanding of truth?
10:05 Daniel was told: “Many will rove about,
10:09 and the true knowledge will become abundant.”
10:14 This is a gradual process.
10:16 We are still roving about.
10:18 During the Millennium, Jehovah will reveal
10:21 additional truths to mankind.
10:24 At Revelation 20:12,
10:27 it mentions scrolls that will be opened.
10:30 The apostle John reports that the dead are to be “judged
10:33 “out of those things written in the scrolls
10:36 according to their deeds.”
10:38 Evidently, then, these scrolls will contain
10:42 additional information for mankind during the thousand years.
10:46 It stands to reason that after the end of the Millennium,
10:50 there will be additional truths to learn.
10:53 Still, according to Ecclesiastes
10:56 chapter 3, verse 11:
11:00 “Mankind will never find out
11:02 the work that the true God has made.”
11:05 But how do we know we have the truth?
11:09 At Pentecost 33 of our Common Era,
11:12 true Christians numbered only about 3,000.
11:16 Today, we are millions.
11:18 And on average, every weekend
11:20 more than 5,000 are getting baptized.
11:24 But this in itself
11:26 is not proof that we have the truth.
11:29 Truth is not measured in numbers.
11:32 Why do we know we have the truth?
11:35 For one, because we remain
11:37 in Jesus’ teaching, John 8:31.
11:41 Second, we know we have the truth
11:43 because of the deep bond of love
11:46 for each other, John 13:35.
11:50 Third, we know we have the truth because our conduct
11:54 adheres to the high moral standards of truth,
11:58 John 15:10.
12:00 Fourth, we know we have the truth
12:02 because we remain neutral in the controversies of the world,
12:06 as Jesus advised at John 17:14.
12:11 Fifth, we know we have the truth
12:13 because we are God’s name people.
12:16 Acts 15:14 speaks
12:18 of “a people for his name.”
12:21 Jesus said: “The truth will set you free.”
12:25 It sets us free from fears —like the fear of death,
12:29 fear of the future, and an exaggerated fear of man.
12:33 It also sets us free from false teachings,
12:36 from spiritism, and from astrology and magic.
12:40 It frees us from immorality and its consequences.
12:44 There are no other people on earth
12:47 that are as spiritually free as we are.
12:50 Do we appreciate that freedom?
12:54 Truth leads to freedom.
12:56 Second Corinthians 3:17 says:
12:59 “Where the spirit of Jehovah is,
13:01 there is freedom.”
13:03 The truth penetrates schools. How so?
13:08 By means of our children who preach the truth
13:10 to classmates and to teachers.
13:13 Do you go to school?
13:15 Do you champion the truth at school?
13:18 How can you do this?
13:20 You do this not only by preaching but also by your conduct,
13:23 by your dress and grooming,
13:25 and by taking a stand for the truth when others want you
13:28 to participate in unchristian practices.
13:32 You also champion the truth by remaining honest
13:35 and not cheating on your exams.
13:38 And Jehovah will love you for that.
13:41 The truth also penetrates prisons.
13:45 Reports have come in from many countries
13:47 telling of the good work brothers are doing
13:49 in contacting prisoners in various prisons,
13:52 helping some to rehabilitate their lives spiritually.
13:56 In a number of such institutions,
13:58 regular meetings are being held
14:00 and several prisoners have studied to the point
14:03 of dedication and baptism.
14:07 The truth penetrates even walls of monasteries.
14:11 In Mexico, in 2009,
14:14 a nun was baptized who, because of the truth,
14:17 had left her monastery and order,
14:19 although she was the mother superior.
14:23 The world is in utter confusion.
14:26 What a blessing to know the truth!
14:29 We rejoice in it!
14:31 We have the truth on our lips.
14:33 We have the truth around our hips.
14:36 Ephesians chapter 6 says that “the belt of truth”
14:39 is fastened around our waists.
14:42 We are ready to teach it.
14:45 We talk the truth, and we walk in the truth.
14:48 Those who continue to walk
14:50 in the truth will walk in it forever.
14:53 Help your students to love the truth
14:56 and to live the truth but, if necessary,
14:58 to be willing to die for the truth and for Jehovah.
15:03 The truth is invincible
15:05 and will conquer this wicked world.
15:08 In some countries, we may have many enemies
15:11 who may want to silence us.
15:13 But the apostle Paul said
15:15 at 2 Corinthians 13:8:
15:21 “For we can do nothing against the truth.”
15:26 Neither can our enemies suppress the truth.
15:30 Do we appreciate that we have the truth
15:32 —the only truth?
15:34 Is this arrogant to say? By no means!
15:38 It would be a sin if we would not say so.
15:41 Jesus was not arrogant when he said:
15:43 ‘I am the truth.’
15:46 To know the truth is not enough.
15:48 We need to champion it.
15:51 There are still many lovers of truth out there;
15:54 search for them.
15:56 Who will help you in your search?
15:58 According to John 4:23,
16:00 Jesus said that Jehovah is searching for ones
16:03 that want to worship in truth.
16:06 The majority will not listen to the truth
16:09 because ‘they love the darkness rather than the light.’
16:12 The truth may expose their sinful conduct,
16:16 and they may not have the humility
16:18 to want to repent and change.
16:21 We still have to preach to them —to warn them.
16:24 Ezekiel was told:
16:26 “You must warn them from me.”
16:29 The principle applies to us as well.
16:34 Paul speaks of “the sword of . . . God’s word.”
16:37 Use it well to champion the truth.
16:41 Train your students to be good defenders of it as well.
16:46 The time will come in Paradise after the final test
16:49 when it will not be necessary
16:52 to champion, or defend, the truth,
16:54 because nobody will attack it anymore.
16:58 Right now, whether we are adults,
17:00 teenagers, or children, let us follow and imitate Jesus
17:05 —the greatest Champion of truth!
17:08 To that end, keep studying the truth.
17:11 Keep spreading the truth.
17:13 Keep loving the truth and Jehovah, the God of truth.
17:17 Hold fast to the truth as to a lifeline
17:21 —as this is what it is!
17:23 By staying faithful, whether you survive Armageddon
17:26 or are resurrected in Paradise,
17:29 you will be a victorious champion of the truth!
