AP

Psalm 47:6-9  Sing praises to God, sing praises; sing praises to our King, sing praises.  For God is the King of all the earth; sing to him a psalm of praise.  God reigns over the nations; God is seated on his holy throne.  The nobles of the nations assemble as the people of the God of Abraham, for the kings of the earth belong to God; he is greatly exalted.

[Those of us who have been nurtured on “Scripture in Song” find it hard to read the words of this Psalm without singing them!]

One of the most vociferous criticisms the world at large levels against Christians is our claim that we worship the ONLY TRUE God.  The whole process of multiculturalism in Australia is founded on the belief that there are many different expressions of ‘truth’, and that it is irrational – even logically impossible – for anyone to claim to have absolute truth.

At University I was taught in Philosophy (and, sadly, by some, even in Theology) that ‘the very concept of the possibility of absolute truth is a nonsense’.  Over against all this, Jesus makes a statement in real history, that HE takes to be universally valid for ALL TIME: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  NO-ONE comes to the Father except through ME.” (John 14:6)!  In spite of attempts by some of my lecturers to do so, this cannot be construed in any other way than a claim by him to be the source of absolute truth and the only means by which Man can have authentic life in the presence of God for ever – ie the ONLY path to heaven.

Moreover, if this claim is NOT in fact true, Jesus should be written off as either ‘crooked’ or ‘cracked’, but NOT CHRIST – a ‘liar’ or a ‘lunatic’, but NOT LORD!  Unsurprisingly, Psalm 47 shares the same worldview as Jesus.  The God who WILL one day be acknowledged by ALL nations as the ONE TRUE GOD is not the product of man’s imagination in whatever form that might take.  We did not ‘CREATE’ HIM, HE created US – and therefore HE is the One who defines ‘TRUTH’, and he has done it in an ABSOLUTE way – revealed  in Creation, in his Written Word, and, ultimately in the Lord Jesus Christ!  For instance, Psalm 19 and Romans 1:18-20 leave NO room for valid argument against this!  The peoples of the earth today are NOT all worshipping the SAME God under different names or identities.

The one true God is the One who revealed himself to Man through Abraham (and many others subsequently).  By implication he is the God of the Christian Scriptures, the Bible.  Jesus made another outrageous claim: “I tell you the truth, … before Abraham was born, I AM!” (John 8:58).  Abraham’s God is the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Let us not be seduced by the world’s ‘wisdom’, or be intimidated by its opposition to the revealed truth of God’s Word.