John 7v16-18:
Jesus answered, "My teaching is not my own. It comes from him who sent me. If anyone chooses to do God's will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him.
What we know and teach about Christ should never be what we think He should be or be like, but simply what the Word says about these things. Even Jesus Himself, in the passage above, clearly said that His teaching about truth wasn't according to what He thought it should be (in that human part of Him), but what it was in truth. Jesus says above, 'It comes from him who sent me.' What we say truth is should always have a source, and that source is the Word:
John 1v1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning. 3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.
6There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
Jesus Himself, in what He spoke and in His example and acts (His life), showed us the light, which is the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The rest of the Bible is that same light and same truth, and so that is the Christian's source, standard and test of all that is truth and true. John knew this full well, as the scripture above says that he was a WITNESS to the light, and a WITNESS to the truth, but not the truth himself, nor did he have any light himself apart from that which was given and learnt from Jesus (/the Word).
We, like John, are only witnesses to the light, not the light ourselves. Yes, we have been given the life of Christ, been made children of Christ, and been imputed with Christ's righteousness, so in that sense, we have been made children of the light, but still we have been grafted into the tree of Christ, and so our source of light, and thus truth, is still Him. We become very much mistaken if we begin to believe that we can start making up what Christ is like in order to fulfil our own desires about how we believe our following after Him should be like. Similarly, we cannot make up what we believe we think Christ should do, or how we believe He should work according to what makes good sense to us, or according to how we interpret His work or His words.
Obviously we will never be perfect here, as we are all sinners, and we all see 'through a glass darkly' on this side of eternity. We will not always get truth right. Sometimes we will misinterpret things or believe something that is erroneous, but the important thing is to always have a heart to want to know the truth as it is in the Word of God. If we do our best to know the Word and check what we believe with the Word, and interpret it as best we can, then that is all that God asks of us. Sometimes we will disagree with each other over minor things in the Word, but God does not upbraid us for this, as long as we don't become disagreeable with each other over non-essential truths, for God wants us to be united and at peace with each other. The important thing is to keep humble about the truth we believe according to what we see in the Word.
Similarly, when it comes to witnessing and evangelising, no matter in what manner or what setting, we must be very careful to faithfully teach the whole truth and whole truths about the way, the truth and the life, which is obviously what Jesus described Himself as being. Jesus is not ok with us picking and choosing what we'd like to reveal about Him, He wants us to reveal Him as He truly is. If we pick and choose, we start to do what the scripture says above:
v18 '...He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him.'
If we pick and choose in this manner, we start to evangelise because we have things in mind for ourselves and something to gain for ourselves. This also applies for what we think we may lose. We begin to teach and evangelise based on trying to protect our own honour and our own interests, and this is what Jesus warns about in the above scriptures. Jesus says that those that do this have something false about themselves, for they do not preach Christ for the reason they should, but they do it for human interests. Again, if we are human beings, no one has been perfect in this area, and all have sinned here, and so we have need of being reminded, and often so, about how we should go about teaching and preaching about Christ. To block or curtail truth or to only preach half-truths is to make what we are saying un-truth and to make lies. Jesus never did this in order to be honoured by men or to gain something from them, and neither should we. And he especially didn't care for what He would lose amongst men, as He always had honouring His Father as His number 1 priority. All our needs are met by Christ and He secures those things; He is our protector, our shield and help, why should we fear what man can do to us? Why should we fear loss because of man, when God is our portion and our exceedingly great reward? God looks after the sparrows, and how much more will He look after us! God will look after us, but He is not pleased with us if we become cowardly about the truth (Rev 21v8), and this should be our great concern. Far better for men to be displeased with us, than for God to be!
Lastly, in the scripture above (v17), Jesus says that if anyone chooses to do the will of God, they'll find out whether the truth that is being taught them is really true. The reason for this is that they'll find out what the source is; whether it is earthly or heavenly. The difference between the earthly and the heavenly is monumental, for the earthly has no power in it; to change, move or enable us in any sense, while the heavenly is the complete opposite. The heavenly will definitely change and grow us, and will have the power in it to do so. If what we hear is from the Father and from the Son, then we will see that it is pure and that it can be worked out in our lives, and that when it is, it changes not only us, but those we come into contact with as well. The truth is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and so we will see the evidence of this in our lives and through what is worked out in our lives. If there is the fruit, then we have also received the source of truth and truth as it really is. If there is no lasting fruit, then we haven't received the Word correctly or what we have received has much error in it. This doesn't mean we will be perfect, as we will always be sinners on this side of eternity, but it does mean that His grace will be sufficient for us, to keep us following Christ no matter how much we may stumble or fail (Matt 18v21-22). But we always know if we begin to follow our own version of the truth, because we will know that we are following sin and ourselves instead of Christ.
In all our speaking about truth and thus speaking about Jesus, our highest goal and our greatest desire should be to honour Him. The way we do that is to honour the truth of the Word (as scripture says that He is that Word and that light!), and to honour the Word as that highest standard of truth and the blueprint of all that is true. The way we dishonour Christ is to start trusting the thoughts of our heart to be true and the way and thinking of the world to be true, and to start trying to mesh both those things and the Bible together. We, like John, need to be witnesses of the light of the world. We need to point to the light and point back to that as much as we can. When we start making things up, we point to ourselves and to others we believe can be sources of truth (apart from the use of the Word). When we don't know what the Bible says about what we preach and teach, then we are in great danger and so are our listeners. What's more, men will eventually find out that what we've told them isn't true! Not only will that reflect badly on us (and even men may act against us because of it), but what really matters is that it will reflect badly on Christ because of us! Because of us, men will incorrectly blame and walk away from Jesus, and stop following or not even begin to follow His path! The consequences for preaching half-truths and un-truths are therefore monumental! The easy way to guard against this is to teach and preach the Word as it truly is, and so to trust God to protect us and also to bring about what He is intending to through His truth.
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