The Truthfulness of God

Tonight as we study the truthfulness of God, we're going to start off with number one on our handout. God is truth. God is infinitely true in His entire being. He is authentic, right, and faithful.

So God is truth. That is who He is. He doesn't have a little bit of truth, or He's not sometimes truth. He's entirely truth in His entire being. In the Scriptures, in the Old Testament and also in the New Testament, there's not just one word for truth. When God is described as true, there are multiple words that describe God being true. There are about six of them in both Hebrew and Greek. We're not going to go through them tonight, but we are going to go through the synopsis of them, which I have here in this sentence: that He is authentic, He is right, and He is faithful.

The Bible talks about God as being the living and true God. That's what we mean when we say that God is authentic. In week two, we talked about God being the living God, the true God. And we looked at Bible verses like Jeremiah 10:10 that says that God is the living and true God. He's the only God. We looked at passages in Isaiah that talked about idols and how man would go and cut down a tree and then he would carve it into an image and paint on the eyes and paint on the ears. But those eyes couldn't see and those ears couldn't hear. And they would have to be propping up that idol and moving that idol. That idol was just a dumb piece of wood. It was as empty as the vain men who created them. But God is the true and living God.

Toby and I, when we are out and about and we're running errands, if we want some fast food, sometimes in Mount Dora we'll go through Taco Bell. And I like me some Taco Bell, but Taco Bell is not true Mexican food. It's not authentic Mexican food. It's yummy, but it's not true Mexican food. Well, when we say that God is true, we mean that He is the only authentic God. He's the only true God. And that's part of the definition of God being true — that He is the one and only God.

Secondly, we see that God is not only true in the sense that He is the authentic God, but God is true in the sense that He's altogether right. You can't understand truthfulness apart from God's righteousness. Everything about God is right. He's right in His entire person. He is right in the way that He sees and understands things. We talked two weeks ago about God being omniscient, that God knows everything, but He doesn't just know everything. He knows all things perfectly, everything perfectly as it truly is. Not only is His knowledge perfect, but God's will is true. His will is right. His plans are right. We often wonder, are these plans really God in control? We can be assured that His plans are right, altogether true for us. God's judgments are true. God is a God of true weights and true measures. The Scriptures often chastise men who use false weights and false measures. They use a false scale of justice to judge themselves or to judge others, to take advantage of others. But God's justice is always true. He is true in that He is right. He's also true, or right, in all of His words and in all of His ways. Everything about God is right. And so when we discuss God's righteousness, that's part of God being true. He's true in every aspect of His being.

God is not only true in that He is authentic and He's not only true in that He's right, but He's also true in that He is faithful. That's part of understanding what it means that God is true — that God is ever faithful. God is a God who is a covenant God, a God who makes and keeps His promises to His people. He cannot break those promises, because God is true. Have any of you ever been in the Marine Corps or have family members who are in the Marine Corps? What is the Marine Corps motto? Semper Fi — always faithful. God is truly always faithful. He's always true in His promises and in His relationship to His people.

We talk about human beings in our relationship with one another, maybe between a man and a wife. And sometimes, unfortunately, you find out that a man or a woman hasn't been true to their spouse. And what an awful thing that is — the betrayal, the hurt that that causes. God will never betray you. He'll never hurt you. He's always faithful. And that's part of God being true.

Look in Deuteronomy 32, verses three through four. "For I proclaim the name of Yahweh. Ascribe greatness to our God. He is the rock. His work is perfect. For all His ways are justice, a God of truth without injustice. Righteous and upright is He." He's described as a God of truth. That's one of His defining characteristics. The application for this is simply to commit yourself to the God of truth. Be faithful to the God who is always faithful to you. Be true to the God who's always true to you. Be righteous and walk righteously towards God who always walks righteously toward you.

Psalm 31:5 is a Psalm of David and he says, "Into Your hand I commit my spirit. You have redeemed me, O Lord, God of truth." Of course, Jesus quoted this when He was on the cross. And this is a verse that's been cherished by many saints who were on their deathbed, who were comforted. Martin Luther was greatly comforted by this verse on his deathbed.

But David didn't write this in the case of him passing away. David wrote this in the midst of life while he was surrounded by his enemies and it seems like he was flailing about and he had no hope. He was caught up in turmoil and he was being oppressed, and he committed himself to the God of truth. And we can commit ourselves to the God of truth in life or in death, because He is the God who's authentic. He is the God who's always right. And He's a God who's ever faithful to us.

Remember when Moses wanted to see the face of God and God said, "You can't see My face, you'll die, but I'll let you see the backside of My glory," and He puts him in the cleft of a rock. When God passes before him, He recites His character. And we've referred to this once before in our Bible study. So we want to read it again because notice what it says. "Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, 'The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in faithfulness and truth.'" That is who He is. He cannot cease to be faithful and true.

Jesus, when He was on trial before Pilate and all the people were bringing accusations against Him — saying that He blasphemed, saying that He was going to destroy the temple, that He was greater than the temple, all these things — Jesus didn't answer a word to them. Remember, Pilate says, "Don't You hear these accusations against You?" Pilate therefore said to Him — this is in John 18:37-38, it's on your handout — "Are you a king then?" Jesus answered, "You rightly say that I am a king." In other words, "You said it," is what He says basically in the Greek. "For this cause I was born and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice." Jesus says, "I have come to bear witness to the truth," to bear witness to God Almighty. And everyone who hears His voice is of the truth. And what did Pilate famously say? "What is truth?" He didn't care about truth.

We do not have that luxury to be ambivalent toward the truth. We must commit ourselves to Him who is faithful, to Him who is true.

Bible point number two. God is eternally true apart from and before all creation. God is the source and objective standard of truth. All true knowledge has its basis in God's nature and discloses facts in His being.

God has always been true. All His attributes are eternal. So His truth is not dependent on His creation in any way.

Human beings have an awful way of talking about the truth. We talk about truth in terms that are finite. We'll say truth is relative — what may be true for me may not be true for you. Truth is situational — this truth for me right now may not be true for me tomorrow. We even have people who claim to be intelligent — you see it on college campuses — and they'll say, "I'm speaking my truth," as if truth were individualistic.

And that cannot be. God's truth is eternal apart from and before all creation. It's not a changing truth. It's not a situational truth, an individual truth. It has its basis in the very being of God, just as God's love has its basis in the being of God. God is the source and objective standard of truth. He's the source of all truth and the objective standard of truth. And what we mean by that is this: truth, because it has its basis, its source in God's being, can never be arbitrary.

What is true is not true simply because God says it's true. Now you may think, "Well, why not?" Well, if it was simply a matter of God saying so, God could say that something inherently good is evil, or someone could say something inherently evil is good. But even God can't do that. That would be denying that things are good in and of themselves, or that things are evil in and of themselves.

But truth is not arbitrary. Truth finds its objective standard in the very nature of God. Everything that is good corresponds to God's nature. Everything that is evil or bad is antithetical to God's nature. It's in rebellion against God's nature. So it's not an arbitrary matter like our rulers of this day and age. They love to change laws like that. If you don't know the law, before you know it you may be guilty of breaking it without even knowing it. There's that saying, "Show me the man and I'll show you the crime," because law is a changing thing among men. But true truth is not arbitrary. It's objective, and its objective standard is found in the person of God Himself.

All true knowledge has its basis in God's nature and discloses facts in His being. Everything that we know morally — moral truth — finds its basis in God. It's all a reflection of His character, of His perfect being. But also all other truth — that which we don't even consider moral truth, scientific truth, mathematical truth — it all finds its basis in the being of God.

I'm going to get on my soapbox here. Young ones, especially those of you who have college ahead of you, you may be discouraged from pursuing a degree or studying the physical sciences or the earth sciences, because so many of them are held captive by vain reasoning, by men who try to ascribe them to naturalistic origins or naturalistic beginnings apart from God. Don't let that deter you from studying them, because everything that you learn mathematically and scientifically, if it's true knowledge, it's going to be based in the very character of God. That's what we call general revelation. It teaches us about who God is.

Today I was servicing pools — I do 24 or so a day — and one of my customers has all these potted plants around their pool. It's very beautiful. They have a green thumb; it looks like a garden. And as I was cleaning the pool, I was looking at this bromeliad. You know what a bromeliad is? And this bromeliad, it hasn't rained in a week or so up in Mount Dora, but this bromeliad in the middle of it had water. If you know what a bromeliad looks like, it's got like a coil or a cylinder that the plant makes tightly woven around, and it catches the water inside there. And when you study it closely, you notice that not only was it catching water, but all the leaves of the bromeliad are all radiating from that center in a pattern that never overlap each other, but in a pattern to catch the maximum optimal level of sun to make energy through photosynthesis. Mathematically, we call that a Fibonacci arrangement, a Fibonacci order. And you see that in all of nature. You see that in the petals of a sunflower. You see that in the shape of a garden snail's shell. You see that in the eyeballs of a fly. What I'm getting at is when you study nature, you're learning something about the character of God — the divine orderliness, the perfection of God. So all knowledge, whether religious or scientific or mathematical, has its origin in the being of God.

Romans 3, verses 3-4 says, "For what if some did not believe? Will their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? Certainly not. Indeed, let God be true and every man a liar, as it is written that you may be justified in Your words, and may overcome when You are judged." When he quotes "as it is written," he's quoting from Psalm 51, which Hal recently did a wonderful job of expounding here a couple of Sundays ago.

And in that verse, verse 4 of Psalm 51, David says, "Against You, and You only have I sinned and done this evil." And he's saying that You may be righteous when You judge, justified when You judge. What he's doing — he's not arguing with God's standard of right or wrong. He's totally complying and agreeing with it, saying, "God, You alone are true. In fact, Your character is the standard by which I am being judged. So therefore You are just to judge me, and when You hold me accountable, You're holding me accountable by the true standard. So let God be true and every man be a liar." The application is this: trust in God who is good, merciful, and true.

Would someone read Psalm 100, verse 5 for us? It's on the handout. "For the Lord is good, His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations." Amen. God is good — good all the time. His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations. What is true today will be true tomorrow because God's character does not change.

Romans 2, verses 5 through 9 talks about those who rebel against God's truth. It says, "But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart, you are treasuring up for yourselves wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render each one according to his deeds. Eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality. But those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness — indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish on every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek." It doesn't matter your heritage. What matters is what you do with the truth. Do you obey it or do you oppose it?

Bible point number three. God is infinitely true in all of His ways.

Romans 9:14 says, "What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? Certainly not." God is altogether righteous. He's altogether true.

Back in the 60s — well, I was born in 72, but a lot of the TV shows that you'd watch as a kid were from the 60s. There was a popular TV series called Batman. Do you remember that? It had Adam West, very colorful, almost comic-looking appearance. And there were a whole host of bad guys, from the Penguin to the Joker, to the Riddler. And whenever it would show the bad guys, the screen would tilt. It would be crooked. And the reason why is to let you know that these guys were crooked. They weren't right. Whenever you walk by your house and you see a picture that's crooked, doesn't it bother you? And you stop and what do you do? You true it up. You align it right to where it's level. Well, with God, He is infinitely true in all of His ways. There is no crookedness in the ways of God. All of His actions toward us are altogether right, altogether trustworthy.

Remember that God is forever true. He's not just true yesterday, but He's true today and He's going to be true tomorrow. 2 Timothy 2:13 says, "If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself."

If He were not true to His character, He would be denying Himself, but He can't do that. He must be true to His character. We often hear in our society, "You've got to be true to yourself. You've got to be authentic. You've got to follow your heart, follow your dreams, do what you feel is right." That's awful advice, because our hearts are all wicked and deceitful. But God's heart is always true. He cannot deny Himself. He always follows His character and never acts in opposition to it.

Psalm 25 is a beautiful psalm that talks about following God's ways, His ways that are always true. "Show me Your ways, O Lord. Teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation. On You I wait all the day. Good and upright is the Lord. Therefore He teaches sinners in the way. The humble He guides in justice and the humble He teaches His way. All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth to such as keep His covenant and His testimonies." We are so crooked we need to be taught. We need to be led in the paths of righteousness, in the paths of truth. And God is happy to lead you there. That's what His word is, is it not? Does it not tell us the right way to live, the right way to walk?

Hal preached earlier this year on Psalm 1. "Blessed is he who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scoffers. To walk in righteousness is to be a tree that's planted by the waters, and has its fruit in its season." What a blessing that is. That's what God's word is there for. So go to the Lord and follow His paths, and He will gladly show you His true way.

Bible point number four. God is infinitely true in all of His word.

Every word of God is sure. Every word of God you can bank on. It's a promise to us all throughout Scripture, from the Old Testament to the New Testament. It's full of promises. Psalm 119 talks about this. It's a beautiful psalm, a very long psalm. It says, "The entirety of Your word is truth, and every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever. Princes persecute me without a cause, but my heart stands in awe of Your word. I rejoice at Your word as one who finds great treasure. I hate and abhor lying, but I love Your law."

God never lies. His word is always true and we can trust in His word. The application is this: we are to be sanctified by God's word. We're to be sanctified by God's word. Our words are not what sanctifies us. Our words are full of untruth. We can't help but lie sometimes.

Do you remember the gentleman who was the news anchor? I'm trying to remember his name now. Brian Williams on NBC. Brian Williams took over the news desk. He was the anchor and he read the evening news. He had a large audience. A very young man. He figured he could be in that job for 20, 30, 40 years and be the next Walter Cronkite. But what happened to him? In his personal life and on the news, he kept telling stories that were embellished. He would embellish those stories, aggrandizing himself, saying he was on a battlefield and his helicopter was shot down by an RPG. Well, the men who flew those helicopters said, "No, that's not true." And it snowballed to the effect that people couldn't trust him. And so he was removed from that prestigious job, because if he couldn't be trustworthy in his word, how could people trust him to read the news to them each and every night? That's the way we are oftentimes.

The best that we can do is point someone to God's word. That's how we edify someone, because it's God's word that sanctifies us.

Let's look at John 17:15-17. "I do not pray" — this is Jesus' high priestly prayer — "I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth." When you go to God's word, it has a great effect on you because it acts as a mirror and it shows you yourself. It shows you your need for the Lord. And it shows you all these wonderful promises that He always keeps. And so it sanctifies us. It conforms us to the image of Christ.

John chapter 8: "Then Jesus said to the Jews who believed in Him, 'If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.'" So if you abide in God's word, you'll know the truth. That's one of the Scriptures our church has built on, is it not? To continue in His word, to abide in His word — because you'll know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.

John chapter 8, verse 44. He speaks to those who are unbelieving Jews. He says, "You are of your father the devil. The desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. And when he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me. Which of you convicts Me of sin? And if I tell the truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears God's words. Therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God." Jesus is uttering piercing words there. Truth is found in the character of God.

Bible point number five. Truth is God perfectly revealed and known. This is only by Christ, the divine mediator.

We can only know God in the person of Jesus Christ. Look at John 14:6. "Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.'" Before "truth," there is the definite article. He's not saying, "I am a truth. You can take Me off the cafeteria line if you want Me today, or you can choose another truth later on." No, He is the truth. He is the mediator, the way to God.

When Toby and I, our kids were little, we used to live down in Jupiter, Florida. Every two or three years they had the Palm Beach Yacht Show. They would rotate it to different cities each year — maybe in Miami one year. And it was fantastic. They would take the area between Palm Beach and West Palm Beach on the Intracoastal. They would bring in months ahead of time all these docks, and they would bring in the greatest yachts you've ever seen. They had yacht vendors, people who were building yachts, people who were selling yachts, people who were outfitting yachts. They had music, food, all kinds of stuff. And we would go have fun for an hour or two and go home.

But I have a friend that still lives there, and he would stay all day long, because he's enamored with all things nautical, loves boats. One year he was there, spending all day asking questions. You could see boats off in the distance — like Oprah's boat or Michael Jordan's boat — but you couldn't get onto those. Those were just for display only. And he was asking a vendor all kinds of questions, and a man came up and stood beside him and quietly just eavesdropped, nodding his head and smiling a bit. And when my friend had finished asking questions, the man introduced himself. The man was a personal representative of Paul Allen. Paul Allen is passed now, but he used to be very well known. He was a childhood friend of Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft. At that point, Paul Allen was one of the richest men in the world. He owned the Portland Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks and owned a large share of Microsoft. And he had at that time the largest yacht in the world — 413 feet, a city all by itself. And this man who worked for Mr. Allen, his task at the boat show was to go and find people who really were into boats, to talk to them and say, "Would you like a personal tour of Mr. Allen's yacht?"

And so this friend of mine was in heaven. He got to go from stern to bow and get an in-depth look at this yacht over several hours with a man who worked for Mr. Allen. And how wonderful it was to have access to that yacht that everybody else could only see from a distance. In a small way, that's a picture of what Christ does for us. Christ is our mediator who brings us to God. He reveals God to us because He perfectly reflects and displays the character of God — God who's invisible, who we cannot see with our own eyes, but we can see Him in the person and work of Jesus Christ. And He is the way, the truth, and the life. The application is to study the person and work of Christ.

After we finish this Bible study series, we're going to have a break for a couple of months until February or so. If you want to continue reading in theology, I encourage you to read what's called Christology, which is the study of the person and work of Christ — who He is, that He was God and He was man, that He was perfect without sin. What He did — His teachings, His death, His burial, His resurrection, His ascension, His royal session in heaven, His intercession for us, the sending of His Spirit. That will strengthen your faith to heights and bounds you can't even imagine when you reflect on the person and work of Christ.

John 14:7 says, "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also, and from now on you know Him and have seen Him."

Bible point number six. The Spirit of truth forever abides with and in us.

John 14, in the upper room, Jesus is talking with His disciples and He says, "And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever." Christ is our first helper, and He's going to give you another helper. That's the word "paraclete." In first-century Judaism, you would typically have a family lawyer, someone who would act as your advocate. You would basically pay him a retainer, and this advocate would know your family, he would know your children. And if you ever came into trouble, or your children ever came into trouble, this advocate who's already intimately familiar with your family would rush to your behalf to help you.

That's the picture of the paraclete here, the picture of the Helper. "I'm going to send you another Helper," He says. "That He may abide with you forever." Not just a visiting helper who would come and help you in a time of trouble, but one who's always with you. He says, "The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you." What a glorious presence — that every single Christian who has confessed Christ as Lord, at the moment of regeneration they are sealed by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth who is with us and in us. The application is to trust His guidance and revelation. Trust the Holy Spirit's guidance and revelation.

John 16, Jesus says, "However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth, for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak, and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, and He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you." He'll take Jesus Christ who is the truth and declare Him to you. Isn't that what the Holy Spirit does? He is the one who guides us into the truth, and He's the one who reveals truth to us. We find that revelation in the Scripture. Isn't that what Peter says — that the holy men of old, inspired by the Holy Ghost, wrote the Scriptures? It is written and superintended by the Holy Spirit. He is the author of Scripture, and He leads us and guides us into all truth.

"But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me."

Bible point number seven. The God of truth is our shield and buckler. It's an interesting word. You'll see it at the very end of Psalm 91, verse 4, if you want to see how to spell it — B-U-C-K-L-E-R.

A shield, of course, is very important in battle. A shield is what you would stand behind. You've often seen pictures of Roman soldiers with this big, almost rectangular shield. Sometimes they would duck behind and form a wall with their shields. A buckler in Roman times is actually a smaller shield that would protect their forearm. But in Hebrew times before the Roman army, going back to the days of Moses, the armor that a king would wear that would cover him entirely would often be referred to as the buckler. In other words, whether it was chain mail or whether it was leather armor, it would totally surround you and keep you.

And what we mean by this is that God's truth protects you and surrounds you. It keeps you. Look at Psalm 91, verse 4. "He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge, my fortress, my God. In Him I will trust. Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence. He shall cover you with His feathers. And under His wings you shall take refuge. His truth shall be your shield and buckler." It will protect you. It will surround you. It will keep you. We need God's truth. People are unprepared to face this world because they don't know God's truth. If you aren't clinging to God's promises, you aren't clinging to truth — you're clinging to falsehood by definition.

So when you go out into the world and you're faced with opposition, when you're faced with discouragement, when you're faced with turmoil, and you're clinging to falsehood, you're standing on shaky ground. But when you stand on the truth, when you have God's truth before you like a shield, when you have it as a buckler covering you and encompassing you, you can stand firm against the wiles of the devil, can you not? You can stand firm in the face of discouragement and death and destruction and pestilence because you're under the wings of God, covered by His truth.

The application is to gird yourself with truth so you can stand. Ephesians 6:14 says, "Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness."

Soldiers would often have long flowing garments, and so they have a girdle or belt that they put around them to be able to move around. And that belt would actually hold everything together. They could put their sword in there, they could put their water in there, whatever they needed. It basically composed them and put them together. That's what God's truth does, does it not? Does it not gird us up so we can stand, so we can do battle? We need His truth.

Psalm 40, verse 11 says, "Do not withhold Your tender mercies from me, O Lord. Let Your lovingkindness and Your truth continually preserve me." That's a prayer we can all pray. Let Your lovingkindness and Your truth continually preserve me. Psalm 43: "O send out Your light and Your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to Your holy hill and to Your tabernacle." Bring me to the presence of God. That's what the truth does. Jesus, who is the way, the truth, and the life — the one and only way to God.

Bible point number eight. God's truth is the ground of our reconciliation.

1 John 1:8 says, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." If we refuse to admit that we are sinners, to confess that we are sinners, there is no hope for reconciliation. Unless you agree with God's truth — unless you, like David, say, "Against You, and You only have I sinned and done this great evil in Your sight" — there is no hope for reconciliation. There are some people who go to the grave thinking that they are okay, that they are not a sinner, that they are relatively good.

That's a lie. That's falsehood. Only by acknowledging the truth of God do we have the ground of reconciliation. The application is this: confess your sin and trust Him who is faithful, who is true. 1 John 1:9 says, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Here in this definition we talked about God being true as being authentic, God being true as being right, and as being faithful. And what does it say here in 1 John 1:9? That He is faithful and just — He's just, He's right — "to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." He's faithful, He is true, He's right. He's the only authentic and real God.

1 John 1:10, the very next verse: "If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us." So every single soul in this world will one day have to give an account to the God of truth.

We can accept His truth in this life or we can face His truth in the next. Woe to those who wait for the next. But in this life, we have the glorious promise of God that if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Trust the God who is always true.