The Danger of Living by “Your Truth”

In Oprah Winfrey’s lifetime achievement award acceptance speech at the 2018 Golden Globes, she said, “What I know for sure is that speaking your truth is the most powerful tool we all have.”

“Your truth.”

“Those two words are so entrenched in our lexicon today that we hardly recognize them for the incoherent nightmare that they are,” wrote Brett McCracken in The Wisdom Pyramid.

“Among other things, McCraken writes, “the philosophy of ‘your truth’ destroys families when a dad suddenly decides ‘his truth’ is calling him to a new lover, a new family, or maybe even a new gender. It’s a philosophy that can destroy entire societies, because invariably one person’s truth will go to battle with another person’s truth, and, devoid of reason, only power decides the victor.”

“Your truth” also puts an incredible, self-justifying burden on the individual. If we are all self-made projects whose destinies are wholly ours to discover and implement, life becomes a rat race of performative individuality. “Live your truth” autonomy is as exhausting as it is incoherent. Depression is the inevitable result and “the inexorable counterpart of the human being who is her/his own sovereign.”

There’s also another problem with the “your truth” philosophy; it almost always clashes with and contradicts God’s Truth.

Living and speaking “your truth”are often touted as speaking with honesty and integrity. However, as Dr. David Zuccolotto, a former pastor and clinical psychologist, wrote, “Find your truth is no longer about honesty — it’s about authority. It doesn’t just encourage self-expression; it commands you to build a worldview from the inside out, as if your private sense of self could bear the weight of defining reality.”

Speaking “your truth” sounds poetic, but in reality, it is, as Zuccolotto suggested, like a sinking ship trying to navigate the sea by staring at its own reflection in the water. “Sooner or later, you run aground.”

While living “your truth” may seem on the surface as empowering and invigorating, it is subjective. It’s guided by one’s own feelings, perspective, and experiences. When it is considered from a Divine perspective, we quickly realize that Truth is objective. It is not relative, but absolute, founded and grounded on the nature and character of God Himself.

Furthermore, God made known Truth through the person of His Son, Jesus Christ, who proclaimed, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn. 14:6). Thus, truth is not created or discovered within us; instead, it is revealed by God, embodied in Jesus, and made known by the authoritative writing of Scripture.

Jesus promised to send the Holy Spirit, whom He called “the Spirit of Truth,” who would guide the apostles “into all Truth” (Jn. 16:13). Therefore, Paul could affirm this fact in Ephesians 3:3-5.

“how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already, by which, when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets”

Paul acknowledged this revelation 51 times in his letters with the word “truth.” Here are a few examples of his reference to the origin, nature, embodiment, and source of truth.

• “Truth in Christ,” Rom. 9:1.
• “In truth, the Word of God,” 1 Thess. 2:13.
• “The Word of truth,” 1 Tim. 2:15.
• “The truth of the Gospel,” Col. 1:5
• “The truth which accords with godliness,” Titus 1:1.

Paul and other Bible writers admonished their readers, and by implication and application, all of us in the 21st century, to respect the truth with these exhortations.

• “Believe the truth,” 2 Thess. 2:13.
• “Obey the truth,” I Pet. 1:22
• “Speak the truth in love,” Eph. 4:16.
• “Walk in the truth,” 3 Jn. 3.
• “Rejoice in the truth,” 1 Cor. 13:6.

Truth cannot be adequately understood by isolating one Bible truth to the exclusion of all other truths. Psalm 119:160 says, “The sum of your word is truth.” This calls us to handle the truth accurately, correctly, and understand it in its context. When we do, Divine revelation will be elevated above human philosophy, personal opinion, religious traditions, and ever-shifting societal standards.

When a culture is defined by the principles of “living your truth” and “speaking your truth,” it will inevitably drift into a moral abyss of confusion, contradiction, and chaos. The Old Testament prophet Isaiah warned against this perversion of truth: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness.” The “your truth” mantra, which rejects God’s truth, is doomed to failure and a moral mess.

R. C. Sproul was right when he wrote, “Truth is not determined by what people believe. Truth is discovered, not invented.”

Or as the late theologian and author Voddie Baucham succinctly said, “There is no such thing as your truth or my truth. There is only the truth, and it comes from God.”

–Ken Weliever, The Preacherman