Objective Moral Truth and the Church

Recalibrating our Moral Compass

Image by Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

Objective moral truth exists, because God exists, it flows from who God is. By objective moral truth, I mean that some things can be declared to be morally wrong, even if the majority of people believe them to be right, because God declares them to be wrong. But objective moral truth may not be what we think it is. According to the Bible the highest expression of objective moral truth is not found in any document or list of rules, but in a person — Jesus Christ.

In this astonishing statement, Jesus himself claims:

‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’ (John 14:6 NIV)

Jesus is not here using truth as an adjective, as in “I am truthful”, but as a noun, as in “I am the truth”. How can a person be “the truth”? We will come to that shortly.

In part one of this three-part series, I made the case that the Bible supports the Church adapting significant issues to suit the culture surrounding it. The aim of this adaptation being to remove hinderances to the good news about Jesus. You can read part one in, “A Biblical Case for Cultural Adaptation in the Church”.

Accepting such a case for cultural adaptation, immediately raises the question of how far such adaptation should go. Indeed, it can be the fear of sliding into moral relativity that hinders us from seriously considering any cultural adaptation at all. The fear being, “Where does it stop!”

The One Who IS Moral Truth

If Jesus is THE truth, this must include moral truth. So how can Jesus BE moral truth? Here are two ways:

1. Jesus is the truth about God. The Bible says that Jesus is God; he is the invisible God made visible to us in human form. Therefore if Jesus is the truth about God, he is also the truth about goodness and morals, since all goodness flows from God.
2. Jesus is the truth about human beings. Jesus is 100% God, but, in a way that we cannot fully comprehend, he is also 100% human. He shows us what human beings were meant to be; his response was always the right response, because he lived the perfect, moral life.

So if Jesus is moral truth, the way he acts and the things he says define moral truth for us. Morality is often defined in negatives, what not to do, but when asked what the greatest commandment was, Jesus didn’t give us a negative, he gave us a positive, well two positives:

Jesus replied: ‘“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’ (Matthew 22:37–40 NIV)

It takes great wisdom to answer a complex question so simply, but then Jesus is the wisest person who ever lived. Moral actions, right actions, flow from love; love for God first and our neighbor second.

Love for our neighbor means being committed to their good, even at our own expense. This kind of love is: patient; kind; protecting; trusting; hopeful; and persevering. This kind of love does not: envy; boast; dishonor others; or keep a record of wrongs. Neither is it: self-seeking; easily angered; or proud. This kind of love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth (1 Corinthians 13).

If this is how the Bible defines love for our neighbor, what about love for God?

Love for God

According to Jesus, love for God is more important than love for our neighbor. In the Old Testament God defines love for him as obedience:

Love the Lord your God and keep his requirements, his decrees, his laws and his commands always. (Deuteronomy 11:1 NIV)

In the New Testament Jesus underlines obedience to God as love for God:

Jesus replied, ‘Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me. (John 14:23,24 NIV)

So, if we want to live a moral life that expresses love for God, then we will want to obey him; and in order to obey him we need to know Jesus’ teaching. If we love someone, we also want to please them, which is why the apostle Paul said:

… find out what pleases the Lord. (Ephesians 5:10 NIV)

The Bible is full of indications of what pleases the Lord, as well as what grieves him. Some of the clearest expressions are found in the form of lists in the New Testament. Those who do the items in these lists are variously described as: wrongdoers who will not inherit the kingdom of God; doing what ought not to be done; filled with every kind of wickedness; those who have sinned; the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious; those who will have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead; those who will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulphur; those who God gave over in the sinful desires of their hearts; and people to be avoided. The actual behaviors in the lists are also described as: evils; sins; things to get rid of; and behaviors, because of which, the wrath of God is coming.

You get the picture — the behaviors in these lists are wrong in God’s eyes and are therefore morally wrong. Those who love God, who want to please him by living a life that is morally good, will seek to avoid these things.

The Sin Lists

So where are these lists of sins and what do they contain. I have looked at the following lists which contain 58 different sins (according to my accounting):

1. 2 Timothy 3:2–4: Slander; Boastful; Disobey parents; Love of money; Proud; Ungrateful; Unholy; Without love; Unforgiving; Not lovers of good; Rash; Conceited; Abusive; Brutal; Treacherous; Without self-control; Love of self; Lovers of pleasure
2. Galatians 5:19–21: Sexual Immorality; Idolatry; Envy; Rage; Drunkenness; Jealousy; Selfish Ambition; Discord; Impurity; Debauchery; Orgies; Witchcraft; Hatred; Dissensions; Factions
3. Romans 1:29–31: Slander; Deceit; Greed; Envy; Malice; Murder; Arrogance; Boastful; Gossips; Disobey parents; Insolent; Strife; Depravity; God Haters
4. Mark 7:21,22: Sexual Immorality; Slander; Deceit; Greed; Envy; Malice; Murder; Arrogance; Theft; Adultery; Lewdness
5. Ephesians 4:25–31: Slander; Deceit; Envy; Malice; Rage; Theft; Lewdness; Bitterness; Anger; Brawling
6. 1 Corinthians 6:9,10,18: Sexual Immorality; Slander; Idolatry; Greed; Theft; Adultery; Homosexuality; Drunkenness; Swindlers
7. Colossians 3:5–6: Sexual Immorality; Slander; Deceit; Idolatry; Greed; Malice; Rage; Impurity; Lust
8. 2 Corinthians 12:20: Slander; Rage; Arrogance; Jealousy; Selfish Ambition; Discord; Gossips; Disorder
9. 1 Timothy 1:9,10: Sexual Immorality; Deceit; Murder; Homosexuality; Slave traders; Vile; Unbelieving
10. 1 Peter 4:3: Idolatry; Drunkenness; Debauchery; Orgies; Lust; Carousing
11. Revelation 21:8: Sexual Immorality; Deceit; Idolatry; Murder; Witchcraft; Cowardly
12. Ephesians 5:5: Sexual Immorality; Idolatry; Greed;
13. Hebrews 13:4,5: Sexual Immorality; Adultery; Love of money
14. Romans 1:24–27: Sexual Immorality; Homosexuality

That’s quite a list! You will notice many repeat offenders in the lists. I don’t believe that any one list is intended to be exhaustive, neither do I think that even taken as a whole they are exhaustive. But perhaps taken as a whole, they can provide us with a clear sense of what displeases the Lord; a sense of how he wants us to obey him and therefore a good indication of moral behavior.

Perhaps your initial reaction to these lists will be like mine, an honest acknowledgement that I am a sinner, closely followed by overwhelming joy and gratitude that even though I am immoral and unrighteous by nature, God has made me righteous in his eyes by his grace through Jesus Christ. I need saving and so I believe and trust in God’s promise of redemption:

But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. (Romans 3:21–24 NIV)

It’s important to remember that these lists of sins were given to those who believed in Jesus, to the redeemed, to Christians; not to condemn us, but to help us avoid the consequences of sin and live lives that please the one we now love, because he loved us first. So in that light, what can we learn from studying these lists that will help us to live lives that please the Lord?

I like to analyze things, I’m an engineer, I can’t help it. If we categorize these behaviors into groups, it can make them easier to deal with. I’m sure there are other ways to categorize them, but here is my suggestion:

I have ranked the sin groups by total number of mentions across the lists. As Jesus indicated to Pilate, some sins are greater than others (John 19:11). I’m not suggesting the number of mentions is necessarily an indication of importance, but it could indicate the level of concern to the apostles at the time, and therefore be an indicator for us and our own behavior. So the sin group with the highest number of mentions is wrong attitudes; followed by harms to a neighbor; followed by sexual immorality; followed by bad behaviors; followed by idolatry.

What I find interesting about these groups is that the kind of sin we perhaps most naturally think of first like sexual immorality was not upper most in the apostles’ minds. Sexual immorality, serious as it is, was indeed the individual sin mentioned most in the lists, but as a group, wrong attitudes were mentioned more often. Was this because, as Jesus said, wrong attitudes lead to wrong actions? The wrong attitudes mentioned most by the apostles were: Greed; Envy; Malice; Arrogance; Rage; Jealousy; Selfish Ambition; and Boasting. If we have a tendency to down play the need to rid ourselves of these attitudes, perhaps we need to recalibrate our moral compass.

Loving Others

I want to come back to the importance of loving others, because there is a great danger in focusing on moral truth in this way. The danger is becoming modern-day Pharisees, who use such knowledge to judge others rather than stir ourselves towards living lives that please God. How can we avoid this danger? The answer lies in looking to the one who is moral truth — Jesus.

At the beginning of his Gospel, the apostle John repeats two characteristics of Jesus that he clearly feels are very important:

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth… For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. (John 1:14,17 NIV)

John sums up what it was like to be with Jesus in two words — grace and truth.

In what way was Jesus full of grace? Whatever it was, it had an impact on “tax collectors and sinners”. These people were seen as immoral by the religious leaders, who rejected and avoided them, and yet they flocked to Jesus. Why? GRACE! Jesus welcomed them, and he didn’t condemn them. Jesus condemned no one. On one occasion, when speaking to the Pharisees, Jesus said:

‘You judge by human standards; I pass judgment on no one.’ (John 8:15 NIV)

Jesus also said:

‘If anyone hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge that person. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world. There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; the very words I have spoken will condemn them at the last day.’ (John 12: 47,48 NIV)

So Jesus does not judge someone who does not obey his words, he did not come to judge the world. Why? Because he was full of grace. I must point out that as Jesus indicates here, God the Father will judge those who reject Jesus “at the last day”, on the day of judgement. That is why Jesus says he came “to save the world” from that judgement, by dying on the cross.

Now if Jesus came full of grace, how much more should we his followers, and the Church, his body, be full of grace too. If Jesus did not judge or condemn anyone, then how much more should we, fellow sinners saved by grace, also not judge or condemn anyone.

Jesus was also full of truth; we saw earlier that he is the truth. But in what way was Jesus full of truth. Well even though Jesus condemned no one for sin, he did not shy away from talking about sin. About 57 times, according to my reckoning, he talked about sin; sometimes he says, “Your sins are forgiven” (Matthew 9:2); and sometimes he says, “Stop sinning” or “leave your life of sin” (John 5:14 and John 8:11).

Therefore Jesus addressed sin through his teaching and interactions with others, not to condemn them, but to love them. He also expressed truth very forcefully at times, particularly to the self-righteous who considered themselves more righteous than others. To the Pharisees Jesus gave this stern warning and strong rebuke:

‘You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. But I tell you that everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned.’ (Matthew 12:34–37 NIV)

Did Jesus not love the Pharisees? Yes he did, but “love does not delight in evil” (1 Corinthians 13:6 NIV). He encourages us to practice and teach moral truth too:

Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practises and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5: 19 NIV)

So let us acknowledge the reality of objective moral truth, as lived out by our Lord Jesus. Let us seek to practice moral truth and teach moral truth. Let us be careful what we approve of, for:

Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. (Romans 14:22 NIV)

At the same time, let us do all things out of love for God and others; let us be full of grace; let us condemn no one. Let us hate sin, but love the sinner more.

Let us be full of grace and truth!

The third and final part of this series is called “How to be in the World but not of the World”, and seeks to address the question, “If the Church should adapt to the culture of those it seeks to serve, whilst at the same time holding to objective moral truth, how then shall we live?”.