Truth Sets

I propose that there is such a thing as Pure Biblical Truth; it’s the truth as our Lord Jesus would have understood it. That Pure Biblical Truth is a subset of that larger set of beliefs we call Christian Orthodoxy. Christian Orthodoxy includes all the ideas that a person can believe and still be considered a Christian by historical definition. Many ideas that are orthodox are not biblically correct, but they are taught by whole denominations and considered acceptable ideas for Christians to hold. For example, there are churches who teach that certain spiritual gifts (charismata) have passed away, and other churches who teach that those spiritual gifts continue operating legitimately among believers to this day. Both beliefs fall within the circle of Christian Orthodoxy, but since the two beliefs contradict each other they cannot both fall within the set of Pure Biblical Truth.

Our goal is to bring our Personal Beliefs more and more into conformity with the Pure Biblical Truth, but some of our beliefs inevitably fall outside that circle. That’s okay so long as they still fall within the circle of Christian Orthodoxy AND we are continuing to seek the Lord for better understanding. However, sometimes our beliefs fall both outside of the Pure Biblical Truth AND outside of Christian Orthodoxy. Then we have a spiritual-theological problem, and we used to call it Heresy. Heresy happens too often in American Christianity today. Respected evangelical (or pseudo-evangelical) theologians are proposing, for example, that God’s punishment of the wicked after the judgment will not last forever. Others are proposing that God is not omniscient, for He does not foresee the choices that humans will make. These ideas fall outside the circle of Christian Orthodoxy, and we must reacquaint ourselves with the Scriptures that invalidate them.

The relationship between our different Truth Sets is illustrated below. Notice how the set of our beliefs (the red circle) overlaps both the set of Pure Biblical Truth and the set of Christian Orthodoxy. Unfortunately, our Personal Beliefs sometimes stretch outside of Orthodoxy -- before we realize it!