‘Truth Shall Overcome’
WAYNESBURG – Superior Court Judge Cheryl Allen remembers an instance when she proceeded over juvenile court and had to take children from their father.
According to Allen, the man looked at her and said, “You’re just against me because you don’t like my hair and the way I dress.”
Allen was appalled by the man’s comment.
She responded, “It’s not what’s on your head that concerns me – it’s what’s in your head.”
The same idea rang true during Allen’s presentation on Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Roberts Chapel at Waynesburg University: God is concerned with what is inside of his people, not their appearance.
Allen’s message, “Truth Shall Overcome,” focused on the fact that all people are created equal and that lies have no future.
“No lie can live forever. If you look throughout history, all lies have been perpetrated,” Allen said. “As Christians and as God’s people…lies will not stand.”
During her speech, Allen said that even now, long after Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, we are still in a battle. However, now the battle is not about race or wealth or politics.
“The battle today is between the spirit of truth and the spirit of error, between the truth and a lie,” she said. “I believe in the Bible. I believe that the Bible is the word of God. God is truth, God is wisdom and the Bible sets forth this truth and wisdom.”
Allen said that the secular world denies the existence of an absolute truth; however, people try to create their own truth.
Allen expressed concern over the fact that some people feel that human intellect can be substituted for God’s truth.
“The great lie is that there are human solutions,” she said. “God not only has the solution, he is the solution. He is the wisdom – without truth there can be no wisdom.”
She continued by expressing that truth does exist, just not intellectually. Allen said that truth exists spiritually.
“We know that the truth does exist. It’s not determined by consensus; it’s not determined by popular opinion,” she said. “Truth is God, God is truth and the word of God is truth.”
According to Allen, one of the many lies and deceptions that our society deals with is racism.
“When I speak of racism I am not speaking of the secular world, I am speaking to the church,” she said. “First and foremost, the Bible never talks about race. God is spirit – he’s not a man, he’s not black or white. Those who worship him worship in spirit and truth.”
“God never ever in his word defines people according to physical characteristics,” Allen said. “Man looks at the outside. God looks at the heart.”
Similarly, Martin Luther King judged people by the content of their character, not by the content of their skin, Allen said.
“God created all mankind from one blood and God placed people throughout the earth through his will,” she said.
On the topic of “one blood,” Allen addressed the fact that she was blessed with the universal blood type, O Negative. To this point, she said that we are all created equally and that God does not distinguish between people’s hearts.
“I believe it was Dr. King who said, ‘We are all like a book and when you open it up we all read red,'” she said.
Allen continued by saying that the truth truly does exist because God is the truth.
“You cannot deny the truth. Dr. King made it very, very clear when he quoted William Cullen Bryant saying ‘Truth crushed to earth will rise again,'” she said. “No lie or no man in the wrong can stand up against truth or a man in the right as long as that man in the right keeps coming.”
She finished by encouraging those in attendance to stand firm with their beliefs and said that the truth will overcome.
She quoted Martin Luther King Jr. saying, “If there is not a cause that you are willing to die for, then life is not worth living.”
Allen also presented a lecture Monday evening in Alumni Hall on the university campus titled “Meet the Judge.”