Publishing companies release editions of the New Testament "with the words of our Lord while upon earth in red." My personal Bible is this type, and I prefer it, but there is a feeling and faith with some that the "words in red," being the words of Jesus, are of more authority than other Scriptures of the New Testament. However, the apostles' doctrine cannot be separated from the Lord's as to veracity, validity, or divine authority.

Jesus said that the apostles would speak what he had spoken, that they would be guided by the Holy Spirit into all truth. The Holy Spirit directed them into all truth by bringing them into remembrance of Jesus' words and by further instructing them (Jn. 14:26; 16:12, 13). When Christ spoke, God spoke; when the apostles spoke, Christ spoke (Lk. 10:16). The Lord Jesus did not encourage emphasis to his words to the disparagement of the apostles' doctrine. Indeed, He introduced and instructed them that as He had taught, so would they teach. One who upholds Christ's particular pronouncements over the apostles' does not obtain the idea from Christ.

Where, then? It assuredly did not originate with the apostles. "For I have received of the Lord Jesus that which also I delivered unto you" (1 Cor. 11:23). "But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man, neither was I taught it, but by revelation of Jesus Christ" (Gal. 1:11, 12). "If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord" (1 Cor. 14:37). ". . . when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God" (1 Thess. 2:13). Peter said that the apostles "preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven" (1 Pet. 1:12).

In Ephesians 2:17 it is expressly stated that Christ "came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh." He personally did not do so, but the passage says he did. How and when did Christ come and preach peace to Jew and Gentile? He did so the same way he baptized. "Jesus . . . baptized more disciples than John, (Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples,)" (Jn. 4:1, 2). He charged the apostles to preach what he had commanded, thus, when they were clothed with power from on high and began to speak as the Spirit gave them utterance, Jesus preached peace to them "which were afar off, and to them that were nigh." When his disciples baptized, he baptized. When they preached peace, he preached peace. That comes nearer to prompting an all red letter New Testament than it does to setting the Lord's specific words above the others.

There are dangers in ascribing Jesus' specific words more prominence than the rest of the New Testament.

1. Discredits the Holy Spirit: Believing that the Holy Spirit guided and instructed the apostles into "secondary" truth discredits the purpose and person of the Spirit of God and of Christ. It was He, the Holy Spirit, who spoke in the apostles (Mt. 10:20). If their words are relegated to a lower rung on the ladder of divine decree, then so is He. To reject the word of Christ is to reject Christ (Jn. 12:48). Conversely, the slighting of the Spirit's word is the slighting of the Spirit.

2. Discredits the Apostles' Doctrine: The general reliability and credibility of the apostles as teachers is undermined when their writings are debased. What they taught, it is inferred, need not be accredited and accepted as the word of God in its fullest, strictest sense. The tendency is to wave aside their teaching and to ignore its injunctions. "After all, the Lord did not say it." The effect of this view is blasphemy. The result is apostasy.

In rebuttal, Paul said, "Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle" (2 Thess. 2:15). "Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me" (2 Tim. 1:13). Frequently, Paul stresses that his teaching is "a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation" (1 Tim. 1:15).

Peter regarded Paul's writings as "scripture" (2 Pet. 11517). He referred to Paul's written wisdom and paralleled it to "other scriptures." Note the word "other." It underscores the writings of the apostles as Scripture. Let us so regard and esteem them.

John says that the determining factor as to whether one is "of God" is whether or not he hears the writings of men guided and taught by the Spirit. "We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error" (1 Jn. 4:6). Language could not be plainer. One who holds that any words in the New Testament are somehow inferior (1) knows not God, (2) is not of God, and (3) is the teacher of error.

Truth Magazine, XVIII:10, pp. 9-10
January 17, 1974