Dear Friend,
In a movie some years ago portraying a military trial,
an emotional confrontation between a lawyer and a witness
reached its climax when the lawyer shouted,
"I want the truth!" The witness, equally intense, screamed right
back at him, "You can't handle the truth!"
That brief exchange is one that can be applied to many other
circumstances in life, and especially in humanity's
relationship to God.
In another famous, but nonfictional, courtroom drama, the
accused testified, "For this cause I was born, and
for this cause I have come into the world, that I should
bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears
My voice." Instead of hearing His voice, His examiner
replied, cynically, "What is truth?" Being a
product of his educational system, perhaps he was already
jaded and not really interested in what he figured could
only be another fruitless philosophical discussion. After
all, the "what is truth?" question had already
been endlessly debated for thousands of years. Today, nearly
2,000 years later, humanity in general still is no closer
to the answer.
The participants in this real-life situation were none other
than Jesus Christ and the Roman governor Pilate. By immediately
leaving, Pilate missed a golden opportunity to learn from
the One who knew best. But what Jesus would have told him
would have inevitably led him to confront the question: "Can
I handle the truth?"
By the end of Christ's brief 3½-year ministry,
He had already told many people the truth, and had seen many
people stumble over it. But He was uncompromising on its
importance. He stood by His words: "But the hour is
coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship
the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking
such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship
Him must worship in spirit and truth." Put simply,
the truth, and true worship, really does matter to God!
To this day, many people claim to truly worship God, but
not only are we at odds with each other over what is truth,
even worse, most of our ideas clash with the Bible!
Consider, for example, the most venerated religious observance
in Christianity—Easter. In just a few weeks millions
of people will tell their children that rabbits laid those
eggs they will be collecting on Easter Sunday. How can we
honestly perpetuate such myths as part of a celebration supposedly
honoring the One who explicitly tells us that it is a sin
to lie? And where did that name "Easter" come
from anyway? Did you know that the name, as well as the rabbits
and eggs custom, was part of pagan religious worship long
before Christ was born? How was it integrated into our churches
today? And what about the only sign Jesus gave that He was
the Messiah—that He would be three days and three nights
in the tomb? If He died on Friday and was resurrected Sunday
morning, how can anyone fit three days and three nights into
that time span? Does it make any difference, anyway?
The truth is, it does matter to Him, and the Easter
celebrations we see today have virtually nothing in common
with the way the early Church of God, the one Jesus built,
worshipped God.
Don't believe me, though—just because I write
it doesn't mean it's so! Neither does church
tradition, hearsay or human opinions. Jesus said, "Your
word is truth." God's Word, the Bible, says to
prove, or test, all things, and hold fast to what is good
(1 Thessalonians 5:21).
From the beginning, humanity hasn't done that. Most
people haven't been able to, nor wanted to, handle
the truth of God. As the apostle Paul wrote, they "exchanged
the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the
creature rather than the Creator…" (Romans 1:25).
We in the United Church of God are on a continual quest
for the simple, uncluttered truths of God. When Jesus said, "You
shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free," we
know that it frees us from the confusion that exists in the
world of modern religion, and provides real answers for real
problems, and real meaning to life.
Please continue with us on that quest for the truth. It
requires study, intellectual honesty, a willingness and courage
to confront traditional, perhaps cherished, beliefs. We want
to help—we want to share with you the eye-popping truths
that are right there in the pages of your Bible!
 As
a start, check out the answers to these Easter questions.
Try us out—send for our free booklet, Holidays
or Holy Days: Does It Matter Which Days We Keep? and
read the related articles on our Web site, www.gnmagazine.org.
The small amount of time you invest in this can have tremendous
rewards!
Yes, you can know, and you can handle, the truth, and the
truth can set you free!
 Sincerely,
Clyde
Kilough
President
United Church of God
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