06/07/2026
Amen.
Corrupting the Word: And the Word Was God
By A Country Pastor
Of all the things that set human beings apart from the rest of creation, perhaps none is more powerful than words. We build relationships with words. We pass wisdom from one generation to the next with words. We teach, encourage, comfort, inspire, and sometimes wound with words. Long before a law is passed, a war is fought, or a nation is formed, words shape how people understand the world around them. A promise can change a life. A lie can destroy one. Words have the power to create trust, spread fear, reveal truth, or conceal it.
That is why one of the oldest forms of corruption is not stealing money or abusing power. It is corrupting words. Once words lose their meaning, people lose their ability to recognize truth. Once truth becomes difficult to recognize, almost anything becomes possible. When words no longer describe reality, reality itself begins to feel uncertain. People no longer know whom to trust, what to believe, or where to stand.
Christians should understand this better than anyone because our faith begins with a remarkable claim. The Gospel of John does not begin with a king, a law, a miracle, or even a manger. It begins with the Word. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). Before there were governments, political parties, media organizations, nations, or churches, there was the Word. Truth itself was rooted in God. The Word was not merely language. The Word was the very expression of God’s nature.
That is why I find myself increasingly concerned by what is happening in America today. We are not simply arguing about policies, elections, immigration, economics, or religion. We are increasingly fighting over the meaning of words themselves. Truth is being redefined. Freedom is being redefined. Patriotism is being redefined. Justice is being redefined. Even faith is being redefined. The danger is not merely that people disagree. The danger is that the very language we use to understand reality is being manipulated for political, ideological, and religious purposes.
The recent turmoil surrounding 60 Minutes should concern anyone who values truth. The issue is bigger than one television program or one group of journalists. It is about whether facts can still be reported when those facts are inconvenient to people in power. When journalists face pressure for telling the truth, when criticism is treated as disloyalty, and when facts are attacked rather than addressed, something deeper is happening. The goal is no longer to win an argument. The goal becomes controlling the language through which the argument is understood.
History teaches us that authoritarian movements rarely begin by controlling every person. They begin by controlling words. Political observers have spent years examining how Viktor Orbán reshaped Hungary by weakening independent institutions, discrediting critics, and encouraging citizens to trust only approved sources of information. The objective was not always to silence every opposing voice. The objective was to create enough confusion that people no longer knew what was true. A confused people are easier to manipulate than an informed people. A fearful people are easier to control than a confident people.
We have seen similar forces at work in our own nation for decades. Roger Ailes understood the power of shaping language when he helped create Fox News. The same event could be described using different words, different emphasis, and different emotional framing until audiences experienced entirely different realities. Today the problem extends far beyond any single network. Social media, partisan outlets, influencers, politicians, and even foreign actors compete to shape the language through which Americans understand the world. Increasingly, we are not debating facts. We are debating the meaning of the words used to describe the facts.
Yet the deeper danger is not political. It is spiritual.
The corruption of words did not begin in Washington, New York, or on television. It began in the opening pages of Scripture. The serpent’s first weapon was not violence. It was distortion. “Did God really say?” (Genesis 3:1). The first temptation was built around twisting God’s words just enough to create confusion. The attack was not against God’s power. The attack was against God’s truth. Confuse the words and you confuse the people. Distort the truth and people become vulnerable to every deception that follows.
The Bible is filled with examples of people taking God’s words and reshaping them to serve their own interests. Kings used religion to justify power. Religious leaders used Scripture to protect privilege. Entire nations convinced themselves that God approved of what God was actually condemning. By the time Jesus arrived, many people knew the Scriptures by heart while completely missing the heart of God.
Jesus spent much of his ministry confronting those distortions. He challenged leaders who honored God with their lips while their hearts remained far away (Mark 7:6-8). He confronted those who carefully defended traditions while neglecting justice, mercy, and compassion. He exposed the danger of using holy language to justify unholy behavior. Again and again, Jesus called people back to the heart of God’s love.
Yet before we point fingers at politicians, media personalities, preachers, or public figures, we should pause long enough to examine our own hearts. Corrupting words is not something that only happens “out there.” It happens whenever we become more committed to being right than to discovering what is true. It happens whenever we excuse dishonesty because it benefits our side. It happens whenever we condemn lies from our opponents while overlooking the same behavior from our allies. It happens whenever we care more about winning an argument than seeking wisdom.
Many of us are quick to recognize corruption when it comes from the other side. We are less willing to recognize it when it comes from our own side. We notice the falsehoods we dislike while excusing the falsehoods that support our preferred narrative. We criticize propaganda aimed at us while sharing propaganda that benefits our tribe. We condemn those who twist Scripture while quietly twisting it ourselves. That is how corruption spreads. It does not begin with them. It begins when we stop demanding truth from ourselves.
I fear we are seeing this temptation throughout our culture and even within the church. Too many people have become more committed to political narratives than to the teachings of Jesus. We call cruelty strength. We call pride courage. We call fear wisdom. We call exclusion righteousness. We call loyalty to political leaders faithfulness to God. We repeat words so often that we stop examining whether they still reflect the character of Christ.
The prophet Isaiah warned about this long ago. “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20). Notice that Isaiah’s warning begins with language. Evil has not changed. Good has not changed. Darkness has not changed. Light has not changed. What changes is what people choose to call them. The corruption begins when we rename reality.
That is why corrupting words is never a small thing. When truth is corrupted, trust is corrupted. When trust is corrupted, relationships are corrupted. When relationships are corrupted, communities are corrupted. Eventually entire nations become divided, suspicious, fearful, and easily manipulated because they no longer share a common understanding of reality.
The danger is not merely that politicians corrupt words. The danger is that we begin repeating those corrupted words ourselves. We begin defending them. We begin building our identities around them. We begin mistaking propaganda for truth and ideology for faith. We begin confusing the voice of our tribe with the voice of God.
As followers of Jesus, we are called to something better. We are called to follow the One who said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). Jesus did not manipulate truth. Jesus embodied truth. His life challenged the lies of empire, the hypocrisy of religion, and the fears that separate people from God and one another. Wherever Jesus went, truth and love traveled together.
The Gospel tells us that “the Word became flesh and lived among us” (John 1:14). Truth became a person. Truth walked dusty roads. Truth sat with sinners. Truth challenged the powerful. Truth comforted the hurting. Truth exposed hypocrisy. Truth loved without fear.
If the Word was God, then corrupting words is not merely a political problem. It is a spiritual one. In a time when so many are attempting to redefine truth, followers of Jesus are called to speak honestly, listen carefully, seek wisdom humbly, and remember that truth does not belong to political parties, media networks, governments, or churches. Truth belongs to God.
The world does not need more people defending tribes. It does not need more people protecting political brands, media personalities, or religious movements. The world needs people courageous enough to follow truth wherever it leads, even when that truth challenges their own assumptions, their own leaders, and their own side. Followers of Jesus should be the first to do so because our allegiance is not to a tribe. Our allegiance is to the One who said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6).
The question before us is not whether we are conservative or liberal, religious or secular, rural or urban. The question is whether we love truth enough to follow it wherever it leads. In an age when words are constantly manipulated, Christians should be among the first to defend honesty, integrity, humility, and truth. The world does not need more people twisting words. The world needs more people willing to speak truth in love, live truth with courage, and remember that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
