Is There a True Story to History?

Author: John Stonestreet and Pete Marra

“History,” Henry Ford famously said, “is just one darn thing after another.” Meaning, human history is no more than a random flow of events with no cause, no purpose, and no destination. Similarly, philosopher Thomas Nagel described history as the story of two oblivions, where everything starts with a bang and ends with a bang.

The worldview behind this understanding of history is the dominant one of our age, not only in the academy but at the level of popular culture. It’s behind the pervasive sense of meaninglessness that more people feel. If the only meaning to be found is whatever we imagine and impose, then the weight of the world is placed on our shoulders, and we are unable to bear the weight of the world.

That’s the fundamental confusion at the heart of this cultural moment. Is the world created? Inherent to that question is whether there are “givens” to reality, or is everything socially constructed?

For example, think about the difference between gravity and speed limits. A speed limit is a social construct. When a road is built, a group of people gather, look at the road conditions, and determine a safe limit. If the conditions of the road change, so can the speed limit.

A world that rejects a Creator treats everything—what it means to be male and female, marriage, government, law, even human dignity itself—like a speed limit. Our definitions of morality and identity are constantly changing.

Gravity is not a social construct. We could gather a group of people and democratically decide that gravity should make things go up instead of down, but it will not change anything. To paraphrase Dallas Willard, the next time we step off a roof, we will still hit the ground. That’s the way reality works.

The Bible describes reality in this way. It offers more than a set of disconnected moral principles and spiritually encouraging insights. It describes reality as it actually is. Yes, the Bible contains a number of truth claims, but when we say the Bible is true, we mean that what it tells us is the true history of humanity.

The new Truth Rising: The Study summarizes God’s gameplan for Christians in this cultural moment, summarized in four lessons: hope, truth, identity, and calling.

The Bible tells the truth about reality in four chapters: Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Restoration. These chapters form the biblical timeline, from the creation of the heavens and earth to the new heavens and new earth. As the Truth Rising Study makes clear, these four chapters are not only the best way to understand the story of the Bible, but because they are the story the Bible tells, these four chapters are the only way to rightly understand human history.

The Creation chapter establishes the givens of the universe, such as the moral structures, the created order, and the reality that human beings are made in God’s image as male and female. God pronounced His creation “very good.” Thus, this first chapter of reality grounds human dignity and value in something permanent, not constructed.

The Fall chapter answers one of the most profound questions of the human experience: What went wrong? If we miss this chapter, we will either deny human brokenness or rely on the wrong solution.

At the center of the Redemption chapter is Jesus Christ, who died for the sins of the world. In every other story of the world, humans must rescue themselves. In the True Story of the world, the Creator is the Redeemer.

The biblical account of reality culminates in Restoration. Jesus declared that He is making all things new. God’s good creation will not be abandoned or ultimately destroyed but renewed because of what Christ has accomplished.

If Christians are to be faithful in this cultural moment, we must know what is true. The biblical story cannot be something we only think about; it must become the lens by which we think about everything. History is not just one darn thing after another. It has a beginning, a direction, and a new beginning. It has a Storyteller, a design, and a destination.

For a deeper look at the Truth, as well as Hope, Identity, and Calling, join Truth Rising: The Study. This four-part study is designed for families, churches, and small groups, to move Christians from feeling powerless in the face of civilizational decline to embracing and living their God-given calling in this time and this place. Learn more at colsoncenter.org/study.