How do we assess, let alone follow, the Truth, when the strategy of some is to, in their own words, "flood with zone with shit"? They spout a torrent of false, extreme, contradictory, even absurd and impossible information to confuse and demoralize most people so that they either throw their hands up in frustration, not knowing what to believe, or latch on to the collection of lies that most easily appeals most to their grievance, anger, hatred, ignorance, and paranoia.
This kind of thing even appears on friends' Facebook feeds. I mean, I see lengthy screeds of incoherent babble, replete with capital letters so we know how serious and upset they are, but almost all of which is, at best, a wildly negative spin on narrowly selected actual facts, or, at worst, just made up nonsense, all willfully impervious to any kind of evidence to the contrary no matter how overwhelming. (I have defriended people who try this on my own feed.) In order to justify the level of hysteria they want to maintain, they have to pretend we live in a hellscape of crime, corruption, and invasion, so they can blame their political adversaries for creating it.
The latest event is the search carried out by law enforcement of the home of the former President. Apparently, one common prevalent text message reaction shared among his supporters was "lock and load!" a reference to firearms. This is very dangerous because there are people out there who will commit violence. Indeed, they have already done so! I am concerned that we are just waiting for the next Timothy McVeigh or Dylan Roof, someone twisted into believing that their cowardly act of mass murder will spark the "race war," or "civil war" that many pundits and influencers are openly calling for. They already say that the January 6 sacking of the Capitol building by an artificially incensed mob was some kind of dress rehearsal for future actions.
The Lord Jesus lived under the systematic oppression of the Roman Empire. The media environment was dominated by Roman propaganda with an overlay of legalistic religious nationalism by the leaders of his own people. How does he cut through a social world similarly deliberately flooded with malicious disinformation? How does he locate and articulate what is true amid a system far more swamped and corrupted by lies than ours?
Jesus recognizes that we find Truth by interacting with the bodies of suffering people. He comes to serve the victims of all this fabricated mental, verbal turbulence. We find him directly addressing people and a planet in pain, doing small, individual things to bring God's love into the real lives of those who bear the brunt of this shitstorm. He heals, he liberates people from demonic bondage, he feeds the hungry, he welcomes the excluded, and lifts up the marginalized. He literally walks, eats, travels, talks with, and touches people. He listens to them, and responds to them. He even says that serving them is serving him.
The Lord does not concern himself with mental constructs. Neither does he posture or project a particular inviting image. He has no wealth, wields no power, and places no trust in popularity or fame. Indeed, he consistently rejects all of these personal benefits. His whole life is an expression of God's self-emptying love.
Demonic forces will always flood the zone with lies and nonsense as a way to produce profit from the confusion, anger, fear, and violence that gets generated. For them it is all about what they can gain for themselves.
The Lord Jesus is about solidarity with the suffering, empathy with the confused, service to the needy, and healing the broken. He also has some choice, harsh words for those who, rather than alleviate the pain of others, cynically use it for personal gain.
In all this, he reveals himself as the Truth, which is the generous outpouring of love and goodness from God to those in need. And that's the Way we know and participate in the Truth: by sharing in his ministry of sacrifice and service, reversal and redemption, justice and blessing, and flooding our world with love.
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