Pieces of Truth

The news of the passing of football great Reggie White came as a great shock to many. I heard so many say what a great man he was. Those comments were often backed by stories of his Christian life and the fact that he was a Pastor. I want to be a bit cautious here because I don't seek to take anything away from White but his final years are very revealing for all those who think they have it all figured out.

Reggie White was held up as a Christian hero. He was a well know celebrity that drew the spotlight to the Christian faith. Looking back on his life you can begin to see the struggle for truth that he longed for, and sadly could never completely find within his circle of faith. He continually partnered with those who claimed to be men of God, but they all eventually failed in their masquerade. White blindly adhered to things he was told before he really knew what he was being taught. He was a minster at age 17, long before he was old enough even understand so many things.

In 1996, the Inner City Church in Knoxville, TN burned to the ground. Reggie along with his friend and top officer in the church Jerry Upton raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to rebuild the church. Three years later Upton pleaded guilty cocaine possession with intent to distribute. The money for the church was gone.

White also led a group who planned to put Jim Baker back in the pulpit after Baker was charged with bilking his followers out of $158 Million in 1986. Baker served time for bankruptcy fraud, left his wife and remarried. He never returned to his former ministry.

After watching the money he raised go to church leaders and glamorous buildlings instead of people who needed it, in 2000 White stopped preaching. He questioned organized religion and knew something was lacking. The crowds that came to hear him preach were there to see a football player, not hear the Word of God. He also began to see he had been relying on what fallible men said about Christ and truth. Everyone one of them had been wrong. They, at best, only possessed pieces of truth.

Reggie White went to Israel to study Hebrew. He believed if he could read the Scripture in Hebrew he could decide for himself what they meant. He would then need to learn Greek, the language of the New Testament and depend upon his own perfect understanding of Scripture. Once again White had begun a quest that was bound to fail, for we are all faillible.

If only we all had the desire for truth that Reggie White had. If only we know what to do with that desire. There are over 2000 years of understanding truth just waiting for anyone who chooses to seek it. Sadly, Reggie White never found that truth. He spent so much of his his 43 years in this world accepting the false beliefs that were handed to him by flawed teachers. I'm sure he thought he had plenty of time left. Do you?