All right, take your Bibles and turn to Psalm 19. Psalm 19. Psalm 19, I'll be reading verses seven through 11. Psalm 19, verse seven. The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever. The rules of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold. Sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant warned. In keeping them, there is great reward. Of all verbal skills, lying comes early and easily for all of us. Polite speech, on the other hand, takes 1,000 repetitions by us as parents teaching our kids for polite kind speech. But lying? We're born with the seeds of deceit, ready to sprout as soon as the first signs of vocabulary come about. In fact, researchers say, or they regard lying as one of the first signs of normal cognitive development in a toddler. And let's face it, that's exactly how we were all born. Scripture gives testimony to this. Psalm 58 verse 3, we are estranged from the womb and go astray as soon as we are born, speaking lies. Ever since Satan slithered into the garden and twisted the truth, humans have displayed an aptitude for speaking with his forked tongue. I mean, here humanity were. They were in the garden, in paradise, had everything given to them. They had the commands of God, which were very good. You can eat of any tree except for one. Only that one. Eat of everything else but only one. And if you eat it, you're going to die. And enter the liar. And he does what all liars do. He, first of all, besmirched the truthfulness of the lawgiver, then he twisted the truth, and then he flatly denied his claims. And not surprisingly, humanity wasted no time adopting the same speech. The first words out of Adam's mouth after the fall was a lie. He says, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself. Now, of course, he wasn't afraid because he was naked. He was naked before the fall. He's afraid because he transgressed the law of God, and the penalty was death. And instead of confessing his guilt, he added to his guilt with a lie. But in contrast with man, The Lord says, Isaiah 45, 19, I, the Lord, speak the truth. I declare what is right. Or as we've just read from Psalm 19, verse 9, the rules, the decrees, the ordinances of the Lord are true and righteous. This divine attribute of trueness is of utmost importance for our consideration of God's nature. Because if he is not true, And he can't be trusted. And our salvation is not true. And our faith is vain. But as the writer of 1 Kings 8, 56 says, blessed be the Lord who has given rest to his people according to all that he promised. Not one word has failed of all his good promises. God is true. And he is so true. that according to Romans 3 and verse 4, in comparison with God, the most honest man on the earth is a liar. So let's again consider this divine attribute of the trueness of God. We looked last time at the definition. We're using Wayne Grudem's from Systematic Theology. God's truthfulness means that he is the true God and that all his knowledge and words are both true and the final standard of truth. Notice the first part, that God is the true God. speaks of reality. Contrary to the makers of Coca-Cola, God is the real thing. Everything else thought to be God is just imaginary beings. That's what we saw from Jeremiah last time, Jeremiah 10, concerning heathen gods. They are the work of the craftsmen, of the hands of the goldsmith. Every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols, for his images are false, and there's no breath in them. They are worthless, a work of delusion. But of Jehovah God, he writes in verse 10, he is the true God, the living God. He is the real thing. He is reality. As to the characteristics of truth, we learned last time that truth is divine. It must be, because anything that is true has been always true. It has always been. And God is the only one who has always been. We learned this through our study of his self-existence and his eternality. So this means that truth is not of this world. Truth did not originate with man. Truth comes to man through the Lord God of truth. We also saw truth as singular or absolute. God will never say one thing that will cancel out another thing that he has said. In other words, there is no such thing as one truth for me and a totally different truth, contrary truth, for you. There is one. Truth is one for everyone because God is true and God is one. We also learn the truth is immutable, Psalm 119 verse 89. Forever, O Lord, your word is settled in heaven. The word of our Lord stands forever. Truth does not fail. Truth never changes. Truth is always the same. It is forever. It endures. And we started looking at some explanations of God as truth. And we saw, again according to Grudem's definition, that God is true and that all his knowledge is true. His knowledge is perfectly true. Job 37, 16 says God is perfect in knowledge. That is, he never makes a mistake. He is never mistaken in his perception or his understanding of the world or of our lives. He is always right when he speaks about us. All that he knows, all that he thinks, is a true and correct understanding of reality. And so also are his words true. Isaiah 45, 19, I, the Lord, speak the truth. I declare what is right. 2 Samuel 7, 28, O Lord God, you are God and your words are true. Proverbs 30, verse 5, every word of God proves true. God's truthfulness can also be stated negatively, that we saw last time. Numbers 23 verse 19, God is not man that he should lie or the son of man that he should change his mind. Has he said and will he not do it? Or has he spoken and will he not fulfill it? God cannot go back on his word. He can never be proven false. He is true. Always. It is part of his nature. It is what he is. Now if God is reality, and if God is the only true God, and if God's knowledge and words are true, then according to our definition also, God is the final standard of truth. God's truthfulness means that he is the true God and that all his knowledge and words are both true and the final standard of truth. Whenever the Bible speaks of truth, you never have the indefinite article before it. A. A truth. As opposed to another truth. It always has the definite article. The. The truth. So we read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read like 2nd Timothy, read So any departure from Scripture is to pursue that which is in error or false. And you need to understand this, that God's words are true not just because you agree with them. God's words are true not because they may agree with a poster someplace. God's words are true because He is true. God's words are the standard by which truthfulness is judged. In other words, whatever conforms to God and to his word is true. And whatever doesn't is not true. It's just that narrow. Truth, you see, is not what we would like things to be. Truth is not what the majority says. Truth is not just that which we are in agreement. Truth is that which is consistent with God Himself, for He is real. He is actual. He is truth. And so when we read something in God's Word that goes contrary to something that we have always believed, We've been taught this all our lives, but you come across a passage of scripture that goes contrary to what you have always believed. You must change your view, because God's words are true, because He said it and He is true. And this goes for our experiences as well. They may seem real to you, but that doesn't make them true. or right. Just because you have a spiritual experience, a vision, an outer body experience, some ecstatic speech, doesn't necessarily make it a true experience from the Holy Spirit. The experience must be in agreement with God's Word in order to be true or real. For it could have been brought about by Satan. as he influenced Adam and Eve in the garden, in their experience. God's Word alone must be your final authority for what you believe, what you do, what you practice. Not your judgment, not your opinion, not the majority, for unless your experience measures up to the truth of God's Word, it's a false experience. Every experience, every thought, must measure up to God's infallible, inerrant Word. That's the standard. Which means, fourthly, truth is not subjective, but objective. A subjective perspective is one that is open to other interpretations because it's based on personal aesthetics or opinions. An objective perspective is one that is not influenced by emotions, by opinions, by personal feelings. It is perspective based upon fact. It's a propositional fact. It is, in other words, objective truth is that which does not originate with ourselves, but is from a verifiable source outside of ourselves. And that's how God's truth comes to us. It's not subjective. That is, it's true for me, but not true for you. It's objective truth that is revealed in a clearly defined way, with words that have precise meaning. So Jesus says, to the Father in John 17, thy word is truth. And then in discussion about that truth, he'll say in Matthew 5.18 that even the smallest letter and even the smallest stroke of a letter is true and will stand forever. And he, like Matthew 5, and he'll say, truly, truly, or verily, verily, I say it. Whenever Jesus says truly, truly, or verily, verily, whatever your version, however it puts it, mark it down. He's making an important statement. Now, everything Jesus said was important. But when he says truly, truly, you better sit up and take notice. This is really important. It's like taking a yellow highlighter and going over it. And he says in Matthew 518, truly, truly, verily, verily, I say unto you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest stroke of a letter will pass away until all is accomplished. In other words, objective truth, down to its most minute detail, as recorded in the written word of God, is pure, unadulterated truth. It's not subjective. It's not truth for me, but not truth for somebody else. No, it is not dependent upon our feelings or our experiences. It is fact-driven, divinely given. Now, let's look at some implications, then, of God as true. We considered some last time, if God is true, and we are in his image, we are to be, he expects us to be true. We are to be truthful in our words, we are to be truthful in our attitudes, we are to be truthful in our actions, having our actions back up what we say. But there are some other implications that we need to draw today. Number one, God's truth. If God is true, then God's word is reliable. He's trustworthy. Numbers 23, verse 19. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it? Of course, it's demanding a negative, of course not. The Lord can be trusted in everything he says, because he is true. And according to Psalm 19, he tells us in all kinds of ways, demonstrating that the Lord's word is true. He says it's sure. It's right, it's pure, it's clean, it's true, and it's righteous altogether. It's a word that can be trusted to do what it states and deliver what is promised. As a doctor gives the right medicine and as a counselor gives the right advice, so God always gives what is right and good for what ails our minds and our affections. It is like undiluted wine. There is no mixture of error in it, and so it can be trusted. Look what John MacArthur has to say about this matter, and it's on your outline there for you. The truth has never offered the wrong counsel, never given the wrong solution, nor offered the wrong remedy. God's word contains no contradictions, no errors, and no unsound principles. It is not filled with absurdities or contradictions or fantasies. It is entirely consistent with itself and perfectly consistent with all that is truth. The facts set forth in scripture are reliable. The historical events described in the Bible are true history, not mythological or fanciful or allegorical. The doctrines taught in the Bible are without error. The details of the scripture are accurate. Scripture itself is completely free of all errors and all deficiencies. And the reason for that is because God himself is true. He is true in all his character, in all his being, and so he can be trusted. He's reliable. We can trust that he will be faithful to his words, and that we can depend upon that his promises will be fulfilled. Deuteronomy 7 verse 9, know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments for a thousand generations. That's just another way of saying to infinity and beyond. Psalm 89 verse 33, I will not remove from him my steadfast love or be false to my faithfulness. Hebrews 10, 23, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. Why? For he who promised is faithful. God could never be unfaithful because he's true. It's contrary to his nature. He must remain himself and truth is what he is. God could never break his word. His promises will always be fulfilled. His purposes will always be performed. His words will always be accomplished. Isaiah 45, 19, I, the Lord, speak the truth. I declare what is right. It says God is true. He can be believed no matter what. no matter the consequence it might yield, no matter the teaching it may overthrow, no matter the man it may prove a liar, God is true. And if people just would never question or debate that God is true to his word, it would save us from so much doubt and anxiety and error. With all the agitation in the world around us, all the conflicts, all the trials, all the arguments, God's truth is a fixed position where every person can find rest and solace, where all the boisterous waves of human life may be stilled. If all people were willing to sacrifice their opinions when they appear to impinge on the veracity of God, how soon it would put an end to all religious wrangling and unbelief and erroneous boasting. If people want something stable upon which to build their lives, they must look no further than the God who is true. For God, Deuteronomy 32, verse 4, is a God of faithfulness. He does what he says. He fulfills what he promises, always. No one has ever believed God and been misled because he is true. God has never made a wrong diagnosis of someone's problem. He has never given an inaccurate estimate of the way things are. God can be trusted, and we must trust Him if we want His blessing. For this divine attribute, according to Louis Burkhoff, In his systematic theology, he says, this attribute is the ground of our confidence, the foundation of our hope, and the cause of our rejoicing. It saves us from the despair to which our own unfaithfulness might easily lead. It gives us courage to carry on despite our failures and fills our hearts with joyful anticipations. That God is true gives us hope when difficulties come. This is how David used this attribute, his knowledge of this attribute of God. Psalm 1830, he says, this God, his way is perfect, and the word of the Lord proves true. How does he apply that? The very next phrase. The word of the Lord proves true. He is a shield for all those who take refuge in him. In other words, His promises become shelters in which we can hide. His precepts, being right, give surety of step and direction for our lives. His words supply strength to continue to persevere in righteousness. God's truth can be relied upon to do what it says it will do. And according to Psalm 19, it does a whole lot. It will revive the soul. It'll make wise the simple. It'll bring joy to the heart. It'll enlighten your eyes. It'll warn the wayward and reward the faithful. For all these things, the word of God can be trusted because God is true. He's reliable. Spurgeon quotes a man in his Treasury of David, his commentary on the Psalms, And on this psalm, Psalm 19, he quotes a man that equates God's word with the pool of Bethesda. Remember that? Where when there was a stir, all the sick people gathered around. And when the waters were stirred, the first one, tradition said whatever went down in the pool, he was healed. And the man says, the scriptures are like the pool of Bethesda. into which whoever enters after the Holy Spirit has stirred the water is made whole of whatever disease he has. He that has anger's frenzy, being furious as a lion, by stepping into this pool of the scriptures shall in time become as gentle as a lamb. He that has envy's rust, greed's leprosy, luxury's palsy, shall have the means and medicines here for the curing of his ailments. Is your mind heavy? The statutes of the Lord rejoice the heart. Is any man in want? The judgments of the Lord are more desirable than gold, and to keep them is great reward. Is any man ignorant? The testimonies of the Lord give wisdom to the simple. In other words, because the Lord is true, We can rely, we can depend, we can trust, we can rest and lean ourselves and know that he'll hold us up. Because God is true. His words are true. And we'll know that whatever ails our minds or our spirits, they'll be healed. And whatever moral lack we may have, it will be met. because God is true, He is reliable. Another implication is that if God is true, then His truth is revealing. It is God's truth is a light that illuminates the world perfectly for us. Psalm 119, 105, Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. and not only reveals the pitfalls, it shows us the right way to go. 2 Peter 1, verse 19, we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawn. The world in which we live is a dark place. It's a world full of uncertainties, It's a world that is blinded by Satan, according to 2 Corinthians 4, that causes people to trust in everything but God, to trust horoscopes, to trust advice columns for how to live. God's truths are sidestepped so that, in reality, man becomes the measure of things. People run to the occult. They run to New Age religions, to Scientology. And they say we live in an enlightened age. But these kinds of things are all proof that we're living in the dark ages. But Christians have a light. We have God's truth that shines upon our path before us to expose all the wrong, dangerous ways of the world, and at the same time, to light up the right paths that leads to life. I mean, you can put a Christian down in a cellar with the lights out, but give him a flashlight and God's word, and he'll know more about what's truly going on in the world than every news anchor on TV. God's truth clarifies issues and shows us how to walk in darkness, in the darkness. Psalm 19, 7, that we've read, the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. In other words, it's just what Hebrews 4, 12 says, that God's word gives us discernment. See, those who trust or those who distrust God's trueness, according to Romans 1.22, they claim to be wise, but in reality, they're fools. But according to Psalm 119, verse 99, the writer says, I have more understanding than all my teachers because your testimonies are my meditation. I remember when we were in high school, Pastor Fred and his best friend Stanley, Stanley's in the ministry as well today, but they would get together and they would just have contests to see who could memorize the most scripture. And they would be accountable to each other and they memorized so much scripture and it impacted Fred in school. So he'd get into these debates with teachers, whether it was public or later on he went to a Christian school. They could never win over him. He always had the right answer. Why? Because he made the meditations of the Word his meditation, so that he was wiser than all his teachers. They may have known more, but he knew what to do with truth. in the world of politics, in the world of entertainment, in all of the different facets of culture and society, we need God's light. We need the bright shining torch of God's word to light our way. To give us, as Paul says in Colossians, the mind of Christ. So that we can see the world as it is and be able to really understand what is going on in it. To avoid falsehood, to discern error, we need the truth of God's Word. And lastly, God's truth is not only reliable, it's also, in revealing, it is also authoritative. Truth is never something that we must just ponder or consider. Neither is it simply one option among others to be chosen or rejected. Truth is sovereign. It reigns supreme and requires acceptance. This is the reason liberalism denies the truthfulness of the scriptures and instead makes it simply just a collection of human writings. For if it is not divine truth, people can maintain their own autonomy and do what they want and be not constrained to do anything that they don't want to do. But if it is divine truth, it carries with it an innate authority, which gives it the right to make assertive demands upon our lives. Truth is demanding. Truth calls for a verdict. We can't simply be a hearer of truth and then just set it aside. It requires us to make a decision. Having heard the truth, we need to react to it. We need to do something. Truth requires a response. That response can be negative, it can be positive. We can disregard the truth. We can reject the truth and do what we want, but we'll be in error and we'll suffer the consequences of not accepting it. 2 Thessalonians 2.10 says, people perish because they refuse to love the truth and so be saved. But a proper response to truth is to obey it, to live it, to love it, so that you can receive the blessings from following it. No one can be saved apart from surrendering to God's truth. 1 Timothy 2.4, Paul says, to be saved is to come to the knowledge of the truth. In other words, salvation is not one made up by Muhammad, or Joseph Smith, or Mary Baker Eddy, or the Hare Krishnis, or Buddha. And it's not one to be changed by so-called Christians like Arius, or Charles Finney, or Robert Shuler, or Watchtower representatives. We must accept God's assessment of ourselves We must accept God's assessment of our sin. We must accept God's assessment of our condemned state before Him. And we must accept God's assessment of the remedy for our sin and our predicament because of it. That is, we must accept His Son, Jesus Christ, who is the way, the truth, and the life. The only way, the only truth. Any other belief system that bypasses these things is another gospel. A false gospel. An erroneous gospel. And therefore, a gospel that doesn't work. A gospel that doesn't save. Because it's not based on truth. To receive God's blessing, we must hear God's truth. We must accept God's word as true. We must obey God's truth, because it is the final authority for what is real. And if we don't accept it as true, then God will not accept us, and we will suffer loss, the loss of our souls to an eternal condemnation. Bowing to the authority of God's truth is necessary for salvation and eternal life. And if you're a believer, you especially are to pattern your life after the truth. 2 John 4, John writes, we are commanded by the Father to walk in truth. So do that. Walk in truth. Be characterized by the truth. That's what it means to walk by. That's your pattern of life. May your pattern of life be that which is true. You are saved by truth. You are sanctified by truth. That's what Jesus said in John 17. Sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth. We are saved by truth. We are sanctified by truth. And we are to love and desire. the truth. And you will find that they are more to be desired than gold, even pure gold. And that by them you will be warned, and by keeping them you find there is great reward. Let's pray. Our dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word, because it is true. It tells it like it is. It's the real thing. It reveals to us our true condition before you, that we are helpless, that we are hopeless, that we are condemned because of our sin, and that there's nothing we can do to remedy our situation because we're so sinful. We're also thankful for the truth in your word that tells us that we can be saved from that predicament by looking to you who is alone true, and to your son who is truth, the way, the truth, and the life. We pray that everyone here, Lord, who is convicted of their sinful state, may they recognize that they are hopeless without you, the only true God, And may they turn to you and turn and follow the Lord Jesus Christ and find there the truth and the only way to life. Help them to rest in realizing that you are faithful, that you are true, that you are reliable, that you are trustworthy. They can trust what you've said in your word. They can depend on it, that it will come to pass. And if they only believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they'll be saved. We also pray that you'll help every one of us as believers to walk in the truth, to speak the truth, to not be hypocritical in the way we live, but that our actions will back up our words, that we will be true image bearers of you. We'll be marked by trueness, honesty. May that be our characteristic. In Jesus' name we pray.