Inquiry and the question "What is Truth"

  
   Using "inquiry" as a teaching method has become trendy in recent years.  "Inquiry" in this sense means using students' questions and interests to drive instruction.  In fact, using questions to teach has been a natural part of human development.  Think of any personal experience you've had with a curious pre-schooler and the barrage of questions she asked.  The Greek philosopher Socrates used questions to teach the young people of Athens, while Jesus asked and was approached with hundreds of questions recorded in the Bible.
   One of the questions that Jesus was asked came from the Roman governor Pontius Pilate during Holy Week.  When Jesus told him that he can come into the world to testify to the truth and that "everyone on the side of truth listens" to him," Pilate asks, "What is truth?"
   We are not sure if Pilate was trying to make light of the serious topic, as in "What does truth have to do with anything?"  He may also have been moved by Jesus' succinct and non-political aims. Either way, Pilate does not expect an answer.  In our world today people may wonder about truth but they don't expect to find it.  This is the dilemma of the agnostic.  For those who teach "inquiry" from that worldview, I imagine it must be unsettling at times to appear to be leading students to truth even when one does not believe there is any absolute truth.
   So, even though Jesus does not address Pilate's question directly, we can find 25 special declarations of truth in John's gospel that Jesus introduces with the formula "I tell you the truth" (or as we may remember from the KJV "Verily, verily, I say unto you").  Here is just a sample of things to take particular notice of:

• Before Abraham was born, I am!
• Everyone who sins is a slave to sin.
• Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am my servant also will be.
• The Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
• Whoever hears my words and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.

Something to think about: Why is truth so important?