"You can't handle the truth!"

"You can't handle the truth!" So said Col. Nathan R. Jessep in A Few Good Men. Handling the truth is not an easy thing to do, particularly when it reveals things about us that we would rather not be known. But when it comes to the light of truth exposing the depth of our own sinfulness and idolatry, we find the truth not just difficult but impossible to handle. Only in the gospel can we "handle the truth" about ourselves. Richard Lovelace writes:

"Through faith in the Messiah, the soul is able to face reality again with cleared vision. As T.S. Eliot said, 'Humankind cannot bear very much reality.' But through the light shed by the Holy Spirit on the Messiah and his saving work, the soul can take in at a glance the truth about its own standing before God. It can bear the bad news about the justice of God and the depth of its sin, because it can see in the same glance the good news of the grace of Christ available simply through faith" (Richard Lovelace).