Daily Devotionals
Devotional: October 17th
“Buy the truth, and sell it not.”
There is often a price to be paid in obtaining the truth of God, and we should be willing to pay the price, whatever it may be. Once having obtained the truth, we should not give it up.
The verse is not to be taken with such strict literalness that we would buy Bibles and Christian literature, but would not sell them under any circumstances. Buying the truth here means making great sacrifices to achieve the knowledge of divine principles. It may mean hostility from one’s family, loss of employment, separation from religious ties, financial loss, or even physical abuse.
To sell the truth means to compromise it or abandon it altogether. We should never be willing to do that.
In his book Church in the House, Arnot wrote: “It is a general law of human nature that what comes lightly, goes lightly. What we gain by a hard struggle, we retain with a firmer grasp, whether it be our fortune or our faith. Those men who have obtained great wealth without any trouble or toil of their own, often scatter it and die in poverty. It is seldom that the man who gains a fortune by gigantic labor wastes the wealth he has won. In like manner, give me the Christian who has fought his way to his Christianity. If it is through fire and water that he has reached the wealthy place, he will not lightly leave his rich inheritance.”
Saints of all ages have turned their back on family, fame and fortune in order to enter the strait gate and walk the narrow way. Like the Apostle Paul, they have counted all else but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus the Lord. Like Rahab they have renounced the idols of paganism and acknowledged Jehovah as the only true God, even if it seemed like betrayal of their own people. Like Daniel, they have refused to sell the truth, even if it meant being thrown into a den of bloodthirsty lions.
We live in a day when the spirit of the martyrs is largely gone. Men would rather compromise their faith than suffer for it. The voice of the prophet is missing. Faith is flabby. Convictions concerning the truth are condemned as dogmatism. In order to achieve a show of unity, men are willing to sacrifice fundamental doctrines. They sell the truth and buy it not.
But God will always have those choice souls who so value the hidden treasure of truth that they are willing to sell all that they have to buy it, and having bought it, they are unwilling to sell it at any price.
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