Pay the Price to Buy the Truth and Stand for the Absoluteness of the Present Truth

We need to buy truth and not sell it; we need to pay the price to buy the truth, be absolute for the truth, stand on the side of the truth, not compromise the truth, and be absolute for the present truth.

Prov. 23:23 tells us that we should buy truth and not sell it. For us to live a godly life, we need to be constituted with the truth and know what is the truth.

We cannot live a godly life without being constituted with the truth and without knowing what is the truth.

For us to live a godly life is not merely for us to be zealous or religious; we need to be governed by the truth.

The truth here doesn’t refer to doctrines or teachings from the Bible; the truth in the New Testament refers to the divine reality.

When Christ came, He came full of grace and reality; He was full of grace and truth. He didn’t come with teachings and doctrines but rather, full of grace and truth. Truth is very much related to our godly living.

The more we know what the truth is, the more we allow this truth to constitute us; this means that we allow the very divine reality to become our human genuineness, our human veracity.

Our Christian living with its godly walk should be a living and a walk in the divine truth.

In 3 John the apostle John said that he has no greater joy than to hear that his children – the believers in Christ – are walking in the truth.

He was not talking about them walking in the doctrines and knowing the teachings of the Lord and of the apostles; he said that he rejoiced for the saints were walking in the divine reality.

Truth is the divine reality, the very Triune God – the Father, the Son, and the Spirit – and His word.

These are the divine realities. Everything else in the universe is vanity – only God, Christ, the Spirit, and His word are reality.

We need to buy truth; our salvation, our eternal salvation, is free, but we need to buy truth. Once we are saved, we are saved eternally; however, for us to gain this divine reality, we need to buy it, that is, we need to pay a price for it.

We should not sell it; we should not treat this truth, this reality, so cheaply. On the other side of this, if people do not buy the truth or desire the truth, they desire to live in their unrighteousness, in their ungodliness (Rom. 1:8-18).

They hold down the truth; they like to live in their ungodliness, unrighteousness, and licentiousness.

They know the truth, but they suppress it and deny it. In today’s world there are many well-known truths, but those who do not seek God suppress them, deny them, and they choose to live in their unrighteousness.

Therefore, they are under God’s condemnation. May we be those who treasure the truth and buy the truth!

We need to pay the Price to Buy the Truth and Stand for the Absoluteness of the Truth

Truth is something that we have to buy; truth has a price, and buying the truth means that we pay a price to buy it.

If we want to please the Lord and stand for the truth, we must pay the price (see Rev. 3:18).

The Lord admonishes the church in Laodicea to buy of Him gold refined by fire, white garments to cover their nakedness, and eyesalve to anoint their eyes for their blindness.

We need to pay the price to buy the divine nature of God; the price we pay is not merely reading the Bible every day or reading a life-study message per day – this is hardly a price.

The price for us to buy truth refers to our soul-life, our self; we need to be willing to deny ourselves so that we can gain God as the divine reality into us.

If our hearts are ready to receive the love of the truth and buy the truth at any price, we will be blessed (2 Thes. 2:10-11; Prov. 23:23).

Some do not receive the love of the truth, so God sends them an operation of error, that they may believe a lie.

Not to have a love for the truth, not to have a readiness to receive the truth, will cause God to send an operation of error to lead them to believe in the lie.

This is the situation around us today, isn’t it? Everywhere we see and meet people who are under an operation of error.

If man continues to hold down the truth, resist the truth, refuse to receive the truth, God will cause an operation of error to operate to cause them to believe in the lie, thinking the lies are truth, and thinkings that lies are true – this is deception. Oh, Lord!

May we be those who pay the price to buy truth and be under the open heaven in the church life, having God’s word, His truth, being presented to us!

We love the Lord and His word! We love to receive the truth, and we want to be spared from this operation of error!

The divine truth is absolute, and we must be absolute for the truth, upholding the absoluteness of the truth (John 14:6; 18:37; 3 John 3-4, 8).

We must recognize that the truth is not just something interesting, sweet, and nourishing; the truth is something absolute, just like God Himself.

Truth never changes. People change, we change, circumstances change, our situation changes, but God never changes, and His truth never changes.

Heaven and earth may fade away, but the word of God will never change. We need to recognize the absoluteness of the truth, and we should never expect the truth to adjust to us but rather, we have to adjust ourselves to the truth.

For us to be absolute for the truth means that we should put aside our feelings, ignore our personal relationships, and not stand for the self (Matt. 16:24-25; 1 Pet. 1:22).

Truth demands obedience, and through our obedience to the truth, we have purified our soul. We shouldn’t try to adjust the truth to our situation or to our condition; we shouldn’t lower the truth to our level or to other’s level.

Rather, we need to allow the truth to uplift up to its level; we may be young in the Lord, we may be new in the church life, but we cannot try to twist the truth or adjust it to fit our situation.

Rather, we need to ask God for mercy, praying that the Lord would grow in us so that we can come up to the level of the truth.

Whether we feel good or not so good, the truth is the truth.

Whether we love the church life because all saints are nice to us or we don’t love the church life because the saints don’t seem to be nice to us, the church is the church.

The church is the church of God and, no matter how we feel about it, the church is the Body of Christ.

We need to be careful in our human relationships, not allowing them to come in the way of the truth.

We may be good friends with some brothers and sisters, we may have close relationships with them, and when they are here, we may feel that the church life is wonderful.

But if they move away, we may feel that the church life is not that good.

We should not let our human relationships take the way to affect our receiving the absoluteness of the truth.

The truth is the unique standard; we must stand on the side of the truth to opposes ourselves.

We can uphold the absoluteness of the truth only when we are delivered from ourselves (John 8:32; 2 John 2; 3 John 3-4).

The truth must be our absolute standard; we should honour God’s truth, take the way of the truth, and not compromise the truth in any way (2 Pet. 2:2).

Some follow their licentiousness and cause the way of the truth to be reviled. But we choose to take the way of the truth, and the truth has become our way.

We are not just learning some doctrines and teaching some knowledge of the Bible; we take the truth as our way, we honour the truth of God, and we stand for the absoluteness of the truth.

Lord Jesus, we want to pay the price to buy truth and do not sell it. We want to please You and stand for the truth. May our hearts be ready to receive the love of the truth and buy the truth at any price, so that we may be blessed. Amen, Lord, cause us to see the absoluteness of the truth so that we may be absolute for the truth and uphold it. We put aside our feelings, we ignore our personal relationships, and we do not stand for the self; we choose to be absolute for the truth! Amen, Lord, the truth is our unique standard, and we stand on the side of the truth to oppose ourselves. Deliver us from ourselves, Lord, so that we may uphold the absoluteness of the truth! We honor God’s truth, we take the way of truth, and we do not wish to compromise the truth in any way!

For the Consummation of the Divine Economy, we need to be Absolute for the Present Truth

The truth is absolute, and we uphold the absoluteness of the truth. Furthermore, we need to be absolute for the present truth (2 Pet. 1:12).

The truth that is present with us is the present truth, which is the up-to-date truth. The truth is all in the Bible; all the truths are in the word of God.

However, due to man’s weakness, shortcomings, and failures, many of the truths in the Bible have been hidden and lost.

But praise the Lord, in His mercy in the fullness of the time God allows different truths to be recovered, enlightened and revealed at different stages of time.

Even though all the truths are in the Bible, the revelation of the truth has been progressive.

For example, the truth concerning justification by faith was there from the very beginning, since two thousand years ago; however, it was not recovered, unveiled, until five hundred years ago through Martin Luther.

Since the time of Luther, the Lord has unveiled much of the truth in His word.

Today, thank the Lord, we in His recovery can say boldly that we have the Lord’s present truth with us. We have justification by faith, the inner life, the victorious life, the overcoming of sins, the practical church life meeting in the local churches, and the Body of Christ.

The Lord’s truth has been progressing, and today in the present time, the Lord has given to us the present truth, the up-to-date truth to meet God’s need at this hour.

We shouldn’t think that our understanding or receiving to the truth is the same throughout time; no, the truth has been progressive.

For us to overemphasize an item of the truth that is not in the present truth can be deceiving and destructive.

For to promote any truth that is not the up-to-date truth of the Lord in today’s environment and in today’s leading of the Spirit is damaging to the Body of Christ.

We shouldn’t mention the miscellaneous truths but rather, focus on the present truth, the Lord’s up-to-date truth.

The miscellaneous truths are truths, they are not wrong, but as the truths are progressive, we should be more concerned for what the Lord is presently speaking to us.

It is more than clear that the Lord’s present speaking to us is that all the churches are parts of the organic Body of Christ, that there is one Body in this universe and only one new man who will be prepared as the bride to consummate the New Jerusalem.

We need to speak these truths, the present truth, and hold the absoluteness of the truth.

The present truth is the truth that is present with the believers, which they have already received and now possess.

The present truth includes the revelation concerning the eternal economy of God (Eph. 1:10; 3:9), the Divine Trinity (2 Cor. 13:14; Rev. 1:4-5), the person and work of the all-inclusive Christ (Col. 2:9, 16-17; 3:11), the consummated life-giving Spirit (John 7:39; 1 Cor. 15:45b; Rev. 22:17), the eternal life of God (John 3:15-16), the church as the Body of Christ (Eph. 1:22-23), and the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:2, 10-11). Amen!

These are the crucial truths which we need to stress, emphasize, and dive into; these truths should become our constitution and our teaching.

The present truth includes the high peak of the divine revelation — the revelation that God became man so that man may become God in life and nature but not in the Godhead — to produce and build up the organic Body of Christ for the fulfilment of God’s economy to close this age and bring Christ back to set up His kingdom (John 1:12-14; 1 John 3:1-2; Rom. 8:3; 1:3-4; 12:4-5; Rev. 11:15).

If we were to just repeat what Martin Luther said five hundred years ago and make it our present truth, we are out of date; it is not wrong, but it is not up-to-date.

We need to know the present truth and uphold the absoluteness of the truth, being absolute for the present truth.

Today God’s present truth has moved on to show us the highest peak in the divine revelation, God becoming a man to make man God in life and nature but not in the Godhead.

We need to know the present truth, repeat it, sound it forth, and speak it to all the saints.

Thank You Lord for revealing to us the present truth, the up-to-date truth of God. We want to be absolute for the present truth by knowing and speaking the present truth. Thank You for recovering and revealing to us all the truths in the Bible. Save us from overemphasizing any truth that is miscellaneous or that is not part of the up-to-date truth. May we buy truth, pay the price to gain the truth, and possess truth. May we have a clear revelation of God’s eternal economy, the Divine Trinity, the person and work of Christ, the Spirit, the life of God, the church as the Body of Christ, and the New Jerusalem. Amen, Lord, bring us to see the high peak of the divine revelation to produce and build up the Body of Christ for the fulfillment of God’s economy to close this age and bring Christ back to set up His kingdom!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by James Lee for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Watchman Nee, vol. 52, “The Character of the Lord’s Worker,” pp. 151-153, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-study of Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes (2020 winter training), week 10, Living a Godly Life.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – In Thee the grace of God subsists, / God we enjoy in Thee; / His truth in Thee is also found, / His full reality. (Hymns #56)
  – The truth should triumph and be king, / And freedom should be queen; / But falsehood, which has rampant run, / Head of the world be seen. / We ask Thee, Truth, to quickly come / And bring Thy light from heav’n; / The foe be crushed and all Thy sons / Into Thy bosom giv’n. (Hymns #960)
  – We limit not the truth of God / To our poor reach of mind, / By notions of our day and sect, / Crude, partial and confined. / Now let a new and better hope / Within our hearts be stirred: / The Lord hath yet more light and truth / To break forth from His Word. (Hymns #817)