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###### Heavenly Wares Are Expensive

{Proof That the Heavenly Trade is the Best Trade

The Nature of Those Things about which Wisdom’s Merchants Deal

Reason Proves That Heavenly Wares Are the Best in Their Own Nature

Heavenly Wares Are Expensive}

Second, heavenly things are the best because they are the most costly. This argument will not hold in all things. People may buy their desired comforts at an excessive price and give more for the world, pleasures, and their particular goods than they are worth. But nobody can be deceived by wisdom’s wares: the glory of God, the salvation of souls, the enjoyment of grace, and spiritual blessings. No price is too high for these. Their price speaks of the greatness of their worth.181 They are real things and excellent in their nature and use.

Heavenly Wares Cost God Dearly

{Proof That the Heavenly Trade is the Best Trade

The Nature of Those Things about which Wisdom’s Merchants Deal

Reason Proves That Heavenly Wares Are the Best in Their Own Nature

Heavenly Wares Are Expensive

Heavenly Wares Cost God Dearly}

If heavenly wares are valuable according to their price, they must be transcendent,182 because the purchase of them cost God dearly. God bore the expense of eternal counsels of the multifaceted wisdom of God, of love whose greatness is unknowable, and of the gift and blood of His own Son, all in order to procure these great things for believers. And it has cost Him mighty power and patience to enable believers to receive them and maintain their enjoyment of them. “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20 NASB). “Knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ” (1 Peter 1:18–19 NASB). He gave Himself a ransom, a sufficient price to purchase believers for Himself, along with grace and glory for them. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16 NASB). Christ paid by His death on the Cross, by unspeakable torments, and all His sufferings to procure these glorious and blessed treasures for believers. What costly wares! What dearly purchased goods! For these, the pearl of price [Christ] was sold and the treasures of Heaven emptied out.183

Heavenly Wares Are Often Costly to the Receivers

{Proof That the Heavenly Trade is the Best Trade

The Nature of Those Things about which Wisdom’s Merchants Deal

Reason Proves That Heavenly Wares Are the Best in Their Own Nature

Heavenly Wares Are Expensive

Heavenly Wares Are Often Costly to the Receivers}

And, just as these cost the purchaser [God] an enormous184 amount, they are costly to the receiver as well. The preparation [life on earth] for a portion of these treasures is frequently expensive to believers. Oh, the wounds, piercings, bleeding, heart-prickings, pangs, and falls into sin that are on the way to this banner of love that redemption grace spreads over saved souls. There are furious storms and bloody skirmishes that precede the believer’s reception of the purchased peace. The terms on which this good bargain is offered are worth infinitely less than these heavenly treasures are worth. But relative to the soul’s capacity the terms are high: no less than throwing all of its former treasures overboard and parting with whatever of its closest-held possessions and dearest comforts stand in the way of the enjoyment of heavenly treasures. It may mean plucking out a right eye or cutting off a right hand (Matthew 5:29–30).185 It means denying (oh, it is a hard saying!) one’s own beloved self (Matthew 16:24).186 It means not only bearing a cross when one is laid on us or taking up the cross of Christ, but bearing one’s own cross as well. It means enduring whatever one’s own sins, the hands of people, or the devil may do. And, in such plights, to not sit down or stand still, but to go on and follow Christ up the hill, through thick and thin, through scorns and thorns, day and night, through every change, in every condition, all the way home [through] the grave. No easier terms are given for the enjoyment of heavenly riches than a hearty consent to these proposals, terms that may expose a person to an actual loss of all earthly things, and undergoing unknown trials, troubles, and duties in the way. This bargain, though it is blessed in itself, is thought by some to be priced too high and they reject it. They think God, grace, and glory too expensive to accept. This demonstrates the costliness of heavenly things: that in light of careful reasoning and deliberation, they cost so much to choose.

181Heavenly things are priceless, but given freely by Christ.

182The gifts are transcendent for God Himself is transcendent, that is, entirely other than and apart from His creation. No part of God (so to speak) is part of this universe, and nothing in this universe is part of God. This is true even though God is everywhere present in this universe and our Lord Jesus Christ took to Himself a true human body (made of created matter) and soul.

183This editor asks the reader to consider what he or she deserves: horrible tormenting fire in Hell, plus other torments of body and soul for all eternity. Now consider all the horrors Christ endured on the last twenty-four hours of His earthly life. They were bad enough, but not as horrible as the horrors some endure in Communist prisons and camps, much less as horrible as eternity in Hell. Since God is perfectly just, this editor concludes that, by means largely unknown to us, Christ endured the equivalent of eternity in Hell. That was the infinite price He paid for His saints. Such is God’s love for us. How worthy then is He of all our thanksgiving, praise, obedience, and devotion to Him, all to His glory.

184Actually, an infinite amount, for God is infinite in all aspects and dimensions.

185“If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell” (Matthew 5:29–30 NKJV). On the basis of this passage, some have even emasculated themselves. However, no part of the human body is a cause of (as opposed to temptation to) sin. Rather, this Scripture is meant to teach emphatically the need to avoid occasions of sin in our lives.

186“Then Jesus said to His disciples, ‘If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me’” (Matthew 16:24 NASB).

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