the difference between truth and trash…

there’s another part of this change of heart that happens in all of us.  that is…i know GOD’s truth.

truth is one of the ingredients.  i’ve got to know GOD’s truth. 

philippians 15.14 (nlt) talks about that when it says, a wise person is hungry for truth.  the fool feeds on trash. 

now truth and trash is all around us. both of them are all around us.  but the difference between the two is this, truth is something you have to go out and find.  trash just gets dumped on you all day long.  you don’t even have to ask for it.  that’s the difference.

and here’s the danger.  when we’re in pain, we’ll do just about anything to get out of pain.  a starving person will eat out of a trashcan because they’re starving.  when you and i are in pain we don’t distinguish very well between truth and trash. 

do you ever wonder why people believe some of the goofy things they believe?  because they’re hurting.  they’re in pain.  if i’ve got a steak sitting over here and a trash can sitting over here it’s a pretty easy choice.  but if all i see is the trashcan and i’m hurting i’m going to go into the garbage heap.  that’s why it’s so important for you and i to get truth into our lives.  it doesn’t automatically come.  that’s why it’s so important.  because trash is harmful.

when i talk about trash a lot of us think entertainment.  we think about movies, we think cable tv.  but there’s a lot of kinds of trash in life.  some of the trash that comes into our life is when we’re in a hurry and we ask for advice or we don’t even ask for it.  have you noticed you can get a lot of advice without even asking for it?  it just comes our way. 

if you’re going through a hurting time somebody walks up to you and says, “you’ve got to start looking out for number one.  you have to look out for yourself in this circumstance.”  i want to stand before you and say that’s trash!  that will hurt you.  because GOD made us to serve other people.  GOD made us not to live selfish lives.  i’m not talking about being co-dependent.  i’m talking about being a JESUS kind of servant.  and JESUS CHRIST came and said, “I didn’t come to be served.  I came to serve other people.”  that’s how GOD made us. 

just a thought from the front porch…