WE PASS FROM the all-encompassing passage on security while remaining in the love of God in Christ Jesus, and go to the next passage in Romans—a passage which tells of outgoingness while remaining in Christ: “I am speaking the truth in Christ, . . . my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit” (9:1). Someone has said: “In Christ don’t wrestle; just nestle.” There is a truth in nestling in Christ, but only a half-truth. The word “nestle” has the word “nest” in it, and a nest is not for comfort, but for creation—something hatches. In Christ something is always hatching, you are always creative. You now, having accepted the truth, begin to speak the truth.
There are three stages in speaking the truth: (1) You simply speak the truth—the bare truth. (2) You speak the truth in love—higher than bare truth. (3) You speak the truth in Christ—higher than bare truth and higher than speaking the truth in love.
You may speak the truth—the bare truth and verbally correct, but it may be a lie for it may deceive. A lie is an attempt to deceive, and you can attempt to deceive while telling the truth, for you leave out here and you leave out there, and the truth, being less than the whole truth, becomes a lie—an attempt to deceive. You may speak the truth in love, but the love may be an eros love—a possessive love and not an agape love—a self-giving love, a divine love. If you speak the truth in Christ, however, then it is more than the bare truth, more than eros love and more than agape love, for it is agape love with the content of Christ in that agape love—it is His kind of agape love. His agape love is summed up in the prayer: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). Speaking the truth in Christ is the highest speaking and the highest truth. It is the high watermark—nothing higher.
O Christ, my Lord, Thou art Truth, and to speak in Thee is to speak in truth. We become so truthful, so identified with it, that we become truth. Not “Truth,” for Thou alone art Truth. But our truth echoes Thy Truth. Help me this day to speak the truth in Thee. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: To be in Christ is to be related in love to everybody who is in Christ.
