| Christian Life and Doctrine | May 1969 |
The Cost of the Truth
THE wise man, Solomon, wrote: “Buy the truth, and sell it not.” (Prov. 23:23) This language implies that the truth is of great value, and that if we desire to possess it we must be willing to pay whatever it costs. It also indicates the possibility of losing possession of the truth after we have purchased it; that it is possible to sell the truth. What is this truth which we are admonished to buy, and not sell? How do we buy it, and how can we sell it?
The “truth” referred to is God’s truth. When Jesus told Pilate that he had come into the world to be a king and to bear witness to the truth, Pilate asked, “What is truth?” Jesus had answered this question the night before when, praying on behalf of his disciples, he said: “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” (John 17:17) God’s “Word” in Jesus’ day consisted of the Old Testament Scriptures. Later, this Word of truth was completed by Jesus’ own teachings and example, and by the writings and sermons of the apostles; and finally by John’s account of the wonderful vision which the Lord gave to him on the Isle of Patmos, which we know as the Book of Revelation.
There is much in the Bible that is historical, much that is prophetic, and a great deal of what we may properly speak of as devotional truths, consisting of God’s precious promises to guide his faithful people and to give them strength to do his will in their every time of need. The Bible’s teachings on the subject of prayer also come within the category of devotional truth.
Much of the prophetic truth of the Bible, particularly in the Old Testament, is of the short-range variety, pertaining largely to the experiences of the nation of Israel. Many of these prophecies were fulfilled within the lifetime of a given generation, and their fulfillment recorded; thus they became a part of the Bible’s history. On the other hand, there are many prophecies of the Bible whose fulfillment would occur hundreds and sometimes thousands of years in the future. These are of the greatest importance to us because they relate to the working out of the great divine plan of the ages.
Then there are the doctrinal truths of the Bible. These are the truths which outline God’s great theme song of redemption and restoration for the human race. The psalmist wrote, “Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance.” (Ps. 89:15) This “joyful sound” is the great messianic theme of the Bible which can be traced from Genesis to Revelation. The individual doctrines which make up this theme, together with the devotional aspects of the Bible, are the great fundamentals of those truths by which we are sanctified, and for which we are dedicated to lay down our lives.
They begin with the creation of our first parents in the Garden of Eden—human, and in the image of God. (Gen. 1:27) In God’s command to multiply and fill the earth we see his design for his human creatures; namely, that the earth was to be their home, and they were to dwell here forever. Later the Lord confirmed this when through the Prophet Isaiah he said that he had established the earth; that he had not created it in vain, but formed it to be inhabited.—Isa. 45:18
Disobedience and Death
Man’s continuing to live depended upon his obedience. We know the story of disobedience. Eve was deceived into partaking of the forbidden fruit; but Adam willfully transgressed the divine command, and brought upon himself the penalty of death which was passed on by heredity to all his progeny. (I Cor. 15:21; Rom. 5:12) When passing sentence upon our first parents the Lord said to “that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan,” (Rev. 20:2) that he (Satan) would bruise the heel of the “seed” of the woman, and that the “seed” of the woman would bruise his head.—Gen. 3:15
This foretold “Seed”—the messianic company of the Scriptures—is made up of Jesus and his loyal followers. In the statement to the “serpent” we have the first indication given us in the Scriptures of a coming deliverance from sin and death for the fallen human race. Later, this prospect became more comprehensive when God said to Abraham that through his “Seed” all families of the earth would be blessed. We speak of this as the Abrahamic Covenant.—Gen. 12:3; 22:16-18
From Abraham’s time onward his descendants looked for this coming seed of blessing. When Jesus was born the angel announced, “I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:10) Later Paul explained that Jesus, and those baptized into him, constitute the Seed promised to Abraham.—Gal. 3:16,27-29
Meanwhile God had entered into a covenant with the natural seed of Abraham, the Jewish nation; a covenant which was based upon the Law given at the hands of Moses at Mt. Sinai. This Law Covenant offered life to those who could live up to its full requirements, but none of the fallen race was capable of doing this. (Rom. 7:10) However, the Law accomplished an important end in the outworking of the divine plan of salvation; it proved that fallen man could not gain life by his own righteousness, and showed that the only way to attain life was through Jesus and the provision made by him through his sacrificial death.
The Ransom
The Apostle Paul wrote, “This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior; who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.” (I Tim. 2:3-6) The Greek word here translated “ransom” means “a price to correspond.” So the perfect man Jesus gave his humanity as a corresponding price for the perfect man Adam who had sinned and forfeited his life. This “ransom” feature of the divine plan is thus seen to be the very hub of the entire divine arrangement to rescue mankind from sin and death.
Many of the prophecies pertaining to the coming of the Messiah foretold his sacrifice for the sins of the world. (Isa. 53) It was foreshadowed by the sacrifice of the bullock on Israel’s day of atonement. The resurrected Jesus, testifying to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, began with Moses, and he pointed out to them from all the prophets that the Christ must suffer and die before entering into his glory.—Luke 24:25-27
The Resurrection of Jesus
Another fundamental feature of the divine plan is the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Paul, writing concerning Jesus, says that he “was delivered [to death] for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.” (Rom. 4:25) To the Athenians on Mars’ hill, Paul explains that God had given assurance unto all men by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.—Acts 17:31
It is important also to realize that Jesus was not restored to life as a human, but as a glorious divine being. He gave his flesh for the life of the world. (John 6:51) The Scriptures clearly teach that while Jesus was put to death in the flesh he was made alive in the Spirit, in the exact image of the invisible God.—Col. 1:15; II Cor. 5:16; I Pet. 3:18
Jesus was present with his disciples for forty days between the time of his resurrection and his ascension; but for only a very small portion of this time were the disciples able to see him. The last of these miraculous appearances was on the Mount of Olives. It was then that he renewed his commission to them to go into all the world and preach the Gospel, and promised that they would shortly receive the Holy Spirit to give them guidance and strength for this great undertaking.
Not to Convert the World
The preaching of the Gospel throughout the world during the Christian era has not been for the purpose of converting the world. At a conference of the apostles in Jerusalem, Peter explained that it was to take out a people for the Lord’s name. While the Jewish nation generally rejected Jesus as their Messiah, some did receive him and became his followers. These became “sons of God,” members of the Lord’s family. But there were too few of these to make up the number called for in the divine plan so the message went to the Gentiles.—John 1:11,12; Acts 15:14
This company, in all a “little flock,” are called to walk in the footsteps of Jesus—to suffer and to die with him, with the promise that if faithful in this they will live and reign with him. (Luke 12:32; II Tim. 2:11,12; Rev. 20:6) Paul speaks of them as running for “the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus,” and as being “partakers of the heavenly calling.” (Phil. 3:14; Heb. 3:1) Jesus promised that these would be with him, and John adds that they will be like him and see him as he is.—John 14:3; I John 3:1-3
Christ Returns
This work of gathering out from Jews and Gentiles “a little flock” to live and reign with Christ was to take an entire age in the plan of God—the Gospel Age. At the end of the age there was to be a harvest, when the “wheat” would be separated from the “tares.” This work was to be supervised by the returned Lord, who was to be invisibly present as the Chief Reaper from the beginning of the harvest.—Matt. 13:24-30,36-43
Jesus was not to return as a human. As we have seen, he gave his human life to redeem the world from death, and in the resurrection was highly exalted to the divine nature. It is as a divine being that he returned, first to supervise the work of harvest in this end of the age, and to establish the long-promised messianic kingdom. While this is not the time and place to set forth the clear scriptural proof of these points, we believe that we are now living in the time of harvest, and that our Lord is present as the Chief Reaper in conducting this work.
One feature of the harvest work is the destruction of the tares—not as people, but as counterfeit Christians. Together, throughout much of the Gospel Age, these have claimed to be the kingdom of Christ, associating themselves with civil governments to obtain authority and power. This arrangement has been known as the union of church and state. Already this system is almost completely destroyed, and throughout the European world millions of its former adherents have become unbelievers—not even claiming to be Christians.
When the harvest work is complete, Jesus explained, those represented by the “wheat” will “shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” (Matt. 13:43) This calls for their participation in the “first resurrection,” and all those who are found worthy will “live and reign with him [Christ] a thousand years.”—Rev. 20:6
The Kingdom Work
Then will quickly follow the outpouring of the foretold blessings of health and life to all the families of the earth as promised to Abraham. Peter spoke of the period in the divine plan when this will be accomplished as “times of restitution of all things,” and declared that it had been spoken by God through his holy prophets from the beginning of the world. What a glorious climax to the divine plan this will be, for it will mean the end of sickness and of death, and all the other evils which have afflicted mankind since the fall in Eden to the present time!—I Cor. 15:25,26; Rev. 21:4
The “times of restitution” will be a period of enlightenment, so that the people will no longer be ignorant of God and of his laws as they are today. Because they will be enlightened they will be expected to obey, and the penalty for disobedience then will be the same as it was for Adam and his race; namely, death. Peter declared that those who do not obey will be “destroyed from among the people.” (Acts 3:23) Today the whole world—the righteous and the unrighteous, the believers and the unbelievers, are dying. But in the times of restitution only those who refuse to believe and who disobey the laws of the kingdom will die. This is described in the Bible as “the second death.”—Rev. 20:14,15
When our first parents transgressed divine law, they not only lost life, but they became estranged from God. During the thousand years of Christ’s reign the whole world of mankind will be reconciled to God. This is described in Jeremiah 31:31-34 as entering into a covenant with God, the foretold “New Covenant.” In that covenant of reconciliation the people will have the law of God written in their hearts. They will be restored to the full divine image possessed by Adam before he sinned. Surely this is a glorious prospect for the sin-cursed and dying race!
How to “Buy” the Truth
We have presented but a brief outline of the main features of the “joyful sound” of the Gospel of Christ, the truth of the divine plan, every point of which can be clearly established by a “thus saith the Lord.” How can we “buy” this precious treasure of knowledge which is stored up so abundantly in the Word of God?
We buy the truth by making it our own. It is like a jewel we may see on display. We admire the jewel, but realize that in order to own it there is a price to pay. Using this as an illustration, we might think of the Bible as a display case in which, through reading, we see and admire the many and varied facets of the truth. Many “see” the truth in this way, and up to a point admire it, but do not truly make it their own.
The truth reveals the glorious character of God, and if it is received into good and honest hearts it has a drawing power, causing us to love and want to serve God. If we receive our first knowledge of the truth in the proper spirit we will be led to make a full consecration of ourselves to do our Heavenly Father’s will. The full dedication of ourselves to God and to his cause is the basic price of the truth.
As we have seen, the very center of the divine plan for the salvation of the world is Jesus and his work of redemption. Paul outlined what the result of the knowledge of Jesus and his place in God’s plan should be to those who see it displayed through the Word. We quote: “For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, … that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.”—II Cor. 5:14,15
Not Momentary
The giving of ourselves to the Lord is not a momentary act. It began, of course, with a definite surrender of ourselves to the Lord to do his will, but this original presentation, this agreement or covenant, would be of little value should we fail to follow through by obediently laying down our lives in divine service day by day, year by year, until we have been faithful even unto death. This is the cost of the truth, if we are to really make it our own, and have its mighty power continue to transform our lives to make us suitable to participate in the first resurrection to live and reign with Christ.
Not only is the glorious plan of the ages itself revealed throughout the Bible, but the will of God for his dedicated people is also to be found there; and one of the great tests of the sincerity of our consecration is maintaining our loyalty to the Lord’s instructions. All of the Lord’s people are imperfect according to the flesh. One evidence of this is in the fact that we often find ourselves preferring some aspects of the divine will above others; or perhaps by giving undue emphasis to one or two doctrines of the truth while ignoring others.
For example, the Lord wants his people to look to him in prayer for guidance and comfort. This is a part of the Lord’s will for all his people. But this does not mean that we should permit prayer to occupy so much of our time that we ignore other aspects of the divine plan. The Lord wants us to love one another, and Paul wrote an entire chapter on love. (I Cor. 13) But this does not mean that love should displace other fruits of the spirit and Christian activity. Jesus, quoting Moses, said, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”—Matt. 4:4
Without Reproach
Basically, the Christian life is one of service; the “ministry of reconciliation.” (II Cor. 5:18) However, if our service is to be acceptable, it is essential that we be guided by the Word of God with respect to the message we give out to the people, and also adhere to the standards of righteousness which the Lord has set up for us—“giving no offence in anything, that the ministry be not blamed: but in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings; by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.”—II Cor. 6:3-10
In this quotation from the Apostle Paul we have a comprehensive summary of the Christian’s life of devotion to God, and what it means to be faithful to the terms of our covenant with the Lord. This is the background of an approved ministry of the truth. It demands love, and patience, and purity, and a proper use of the Word of God. It calls for the emptying of self, that we may be filled with the Holy Spirit. It calls for sacrifice of self, that by this means we may make others rich in the things of God. It calls for putting on the whole armor of God, that as good soldiers of Jesus Christ we may resist the onslaughts of Satan, who goes about as a roaring lion, “seeking whom he may devour.”
And all of this is essential to our retaining the truth and its spirit as the inspirational power in our life of sacrifice. Thus, while recognizing the marvelous beauty of the truth, it is costly to “buy” and difficult to retain throughout all the days of our earthly pilgrimage. It might well cost us the scorn of our friends, and persecution by those who prefer darkness to light.
When the psalmist spoke of the blessedness of those who “know the joyful sound” of truth, he said that such walk in the light of the Lord’s countenance. (Ps. 89:15) This makes the truth worth all and more than it costs, because those found worthy to possess it have the assurance of God’s favor. And how wonderful that is, for, as Paul wrote, “If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Rom. 8:31) It indicates as Paul also wrote, that since we love God and are called according to his purpose, all things are working together for our good as new creatures in Christ Jesus.
“Sell It Not”
Solomon admonished us not only to buy the truth, but to hold on to it—“sell it not.” How could we sell the truth? In a word, this could be done by failure to live up to our vows of consecration. Paul wrote, “We ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip.” (Heb. 2:1) And again, “Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.”—Heb. 4:1
Every precious promise of God to his people has conditions attached to it. Meeting these conditions faithfully and joyfully is part of the price of truth. We can sell the truth by failure to meet the conditions surrounding the promises of God. The “things which we have heard,” mentioned by Paul, are the great truths of the Word of God. Taking heed to these things implies loyalty of the Word of God as the supreme authority in our lives.
We could “sell” the truth by giving heed to other voices than that of the Good Shepherd, whose voice of truth has reached us through the Bible. If we give heed to tradition rather than the Word of God, we are selling the truth. A simple example of this is what the Bible says concerning the penalty of sin. The Bible declares it to be death, but tradition says it is eternal torture. But this is merely an example. There are many traditions which run counter to the Word of God, and our loyalty to the Word as against the traditions and opinions of men is part of the price of truth. We could also sell the truth by letting it be crowded out or exchanged for the things of the world.
The Bible makes it clear that the Lord has provided human teachers to help us understand more clearly his inspired Word. We should appreciate these, and profit from the help we receive from them. But with many, perhaps nearly all of the Lord’s people, there is a tendency at times to lean too heavily upon the helpers, to the neglect of the Word of God. The value of the helpers provided by the Lord is measured by their faithfulness in serving merely as an index finger to point to the Word of God.
Even the inspired Apostle Paul, one of the outstanding teachers in the church, complimented the Bereans of old, saying that they were more noble than those of Thessalonica in that they searched the Scriptures daily to prove whether or not the things he taught them were true. (Acts 17:11) If one who was an inspired servant of the Lord rejoiced to note the desire of his pupils to prove all things by the Word of God, should it not be so with us? Surely any lessening of this determination would indicate a degree of unfaithfulness which could, if not corrected, lead to a selling of the truth.
And in this connection, how greatly we appreciate the ministry of “that faithful and wise servant” who served the Lord and us so faithfully in bringing forth from the Bible, storehouse of truth, the precious doctrines of the divine plan. Time and time again he admonished the brethren not to accept anything just because he said so, but rather to insist on a “thus saith the Lord” for every item of their faith. Undoubtedly this is one reason he was characterized as faithful and wise.
Are we maintaining our “first love” for the truth—that glorious truth of the divine plan, that simple Gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation? (Rom. 1:16) Does the Gospel of the grace of God continue to inspire us to lay down our lives in its proclamation, and in building up our brethren in this most holy faith? Do we accept the opportunities of sacrifice in the Lord’s cause with the same degree of enthusiasm as when we first dedicated ourselves to the doing of the Lord’s will? If so, we are demonstrating that we are willing that the truth should continue to cost us our all.
If we maintain this attitude, it means that we are not in danger of selling the truth but are determined to be faithful to it, and to all its precepts, even unto death. Such faithfulness will, in God’s due time, lead to glory, and honor, and immortality, which Paul wrote could be attained through patient continuance in well-doing. And if our zeal for the Lord, for the truth, and for the brethren be maintained, even unto death, we have the assurance that we shall receive the crown of life.
But let no one suppose this means that we can buy our way to glory. No, it all depends upon the grace of God through Christ. All we can do by our own faithful endeavor is to demonstrate our appreciation of divine love in permitting us to see and serve the truth. We recognize that the truth reveals the will of God for us, and if we are faithful in doing his will, even unto death, we will indeed receive the crown of life.