Positivity VS Truth

Why are ‘negative’ statements so frowned upon, even if they are true? There seems to be this smoggy vile green ether in the air pressurizing church life conversation to speak only the ‘positive’ promises …

God does not work on the positive – negative spectrum, that is new age humanism. Jesus seems to much more work with Life & Death, Light & Darkness, True & False and Yes & No crystal clear opposites. With maybes and shades of grey not in his language. Yes and Amen. God is Truth, God is not Positive.

And yes, the Devil, Diábolos in the Greek means to slander or speak lies about people. Slander is not speaking negative things, slander is making false statements. The Devil invented one thing and that is character assassination by slander. He lives in the murky waters of positivity and grey.

It is not slander to say something ‘negative’ if it is true. It is slander if you lie about someone and damage their reputation with lies. In order to sound positive at all times we are all too often tempted to tell sweet white pretty lies. We like keeping to the narrative of our fantasy, not the promise of the Word.

We need not do this if we keep to “speaking the truth in love’ at all times. The Bible rates the truth and lie distinction, with nothing much said about “positive or negative” distinctions. Jesus is not ‘positive’ about us … you don’t die for someone you are positive about. You die for someone that you are madly in love with.

Speaking truth may sound negative at times and speaking a lie may sound positive. Let us stick with true and false leaving the murky waters of the compromising sliding scale measures of positive and negative. Let’s not be confused. God is God of Order, yes is yes, no is no, a lie is a lie (and any degree of it). God help us know the difference in a world increasingly drowning in a news media spewing out a frothy soup of lies, deceits and misinformation day and night!

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