Should We Hold Fast to What We Know Is True?

Should we hold fast to what we know is true?

Yes, but with a qualification.

Should we hold fast to what we know?  Should we hold fast to what we have proven?  Should we hold fast to what the Church of God has taught for a long time?

What do you mean by "hold fast"?  Does that mean you cannot defend what you know against contrary arguments?  Does that mean your mind is closed to any correction from God's word, the Bible?

Let's look at these questions in a little detail.

Should we hold fast to what we know is true?

Yes, as long as we can honestly defend what we think we know against contrary arguments.  We should understand why we know what we know and be able to defend what we know.  And we must always realize we are fallible - we can make mistakes - and therefore what we think we know may be wrong.

In other words, we must always be willing to examine and test what we think we know against new information and reasoning, information and reasoning that may show that we made a mistake, that what we thought we knew is not, in fact, the truth.

We can make mistakes.  History and experience prove that and the Bible proves that.

"For we know in part and we prophesy in part" (1 Corinthians 13:9).  

We must always be able and willing to correct our errors and learn new knowledge.

"but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ" (2 Peter 3:18).

"Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; Teach a just man, and he will increase in learning" (Proverbs 9:9).

"And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men" (Matthew 15:9).

"But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you" (John 14:26).

"Better a poor and wise youth Than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more" (Ecclesiastes 4:13).   

Mr. Armstrong taught that it is harder to unlearn false knowledge than to learn new knowledge.  It is hard to give up what we believe, even in small points, but we must be willing to do so if God's word, the Bible, requires it.

We must always have an attitude of being willing to let the Bible correct us in our beliefs, no matter how sure we are that we "know" something.

Ultimately, it is the Bible we must hold fast to, not what we are sure we "know".

Put yourself in the shoes of a Catholic, Protestant, Jew, or atheist.  If you are a Catholic or Protestant, you are sure you "know" that Sunday is the Christian day of rest and worship.  If you are a Jew, you are sure that Jesus is not the Messiah.  If you are an atheist, you are sure that you "know" that there is no God.

Why is this important?

These are the people we are trying to reach with the gospel and the Ezekiel warning.  Our message will have no effect if these people are not willing to re-examine what they think they know and be corrected and change.  They cannot respond to us without being willing to give up what they think they know and submit to God's word, the Bible.

We must be the same way.  The ability to make mistakes in our thinking is the same for us as for them.  We are all human.  The inability or unwillingness to admit error may be a sign of pride, vanity, egotism, and conceit.  It may be rooted in a belief that we cannot be wrong about something, that our thinking is so good and accurate that we cannot make a mistake in something we are sure about.

We must always be willing to sacrifice our attachments to what we think we know in order to let the Bible correct us.  We must acknowledge that God knows better than we do.

This is part of submitting to God and letting him rule our lives and our thoughts.  It is part of loving God with all our being.

" 'For all those things My hand has made, And all those things exist,' Says the LORD. 'But on this one will I look: On him who is poor and of a contrite spirit, And who trembles at My word' " (Isaiah 66:2).

"But He answered and said, 'It is written, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God" ' " (Matthew 4:4).

We should hold fast to what we know provided we remain willing to let the Bible correct us in what we know.  I might add that the facts of history and logic can correct us also.  As long as what we think we know holds up to Bible scrutiny and common sense, yes, we should hold onto it.  But as soon as the Bible shows that we may be wrong, we need to re-examine it and go by the Bible.

Should we hold fast to what we have proven?

We can make mistakes in what we have "proven".  We may not have had all the facts or put those facts together in the right way when we have proved something.

I was raised Catholic, and I attended a Catholic high school for four years.  We had religion class every school day.  One of the things we were taught was five proofs that the Catholic Church is the true church.  Perhaps it was some number other than five, I don't remember, and I don't remember what all those "proofs" were.  My point is, they thought they had proof of what they believed and taught.  Yet, now I know that those proofs were wrong.  Yet, they seemed plausible at the time, at least to the people who taught them.

Many people who have false beliefs think they have proved those beliefs, and we are just as human as they.  We can make mistakes.

Should we hold fast to what we have proven?  Yes, provided we are always willing to listen to correction and re-examine what we have proved.  If we have proved something, if it is true, if our proof is sound and accurate, we should be able to prove it again in the light of new information and reasoning.  If we cannot do so, then something is wrong.

I was in Worldwide when Mr. Tkach began making changes in doctrine.  I had been in the Church for several years.  Before coming into the Church of God I had proved the doctrines of the Church very thoroughly.

So how did I react to the changes?  Did I say, "I've already proved these things, so I know the changes must be wrong".  No.  I said, "If the changes are wrong, I should be able to prove once again, even in the light of new information or new arguments, what I believe, and if I cannot do that, then maybe I made a mistake - maybe I am wrong".

So I examined the arguments and new information from Mr. Tkach with an open mind, and I went to the Bible for answers.  And the Bible gave me the proof I needed, and I was able to prove, again, the truth of the doctrines of the Church.

While I was doing this, I did not change my practices.  While examining and researching the issues of the weekly Sabbath, and annual holy days, tithing, and clean and unclean meats with an open mind, I continued to keep the Sabbath and holy days, I continued to tithe, I continued to avoid unclean meats, etc.  I resolved to continue these things which I had already proved.  But I proved them a second time.

Look, I left the Catholic Church and came into the Church of God by examining all doctrinal issues with an open mind and believing what God says in the Bible.  If going to the Bible for answers with an open mind was the right approach when coming into the Church, why would it not be the right approach when dealing with the changes taught by Mr. Tkach?  If going to the Bible worked the first time, it should work again.  So that is what I did.

Should we hold fast to what the Church of God has taught for a long time?

We should only hold fast to what we can prove in the Bible.  How long the Church has taught it has nothing to do with it.  The Catholic Church has taught its doctrines for centuries, but that does not make those doctrines true.  The Church of God Seventh Day taught that God's annual holy days do not need to be observed, and they taught that for a long time, but that did not make it true.  Yet, they were part of the true Church of God.

It is the Bible we must hold fast to.


As I think about these things, it occurs to me that there may be three categories of Church members today:

a)  Those who were not raised in the Church but came in from other belief systems or other churches.  They heard Mr. Armstrong or the Church say, don't believe me, don't believe us, don't believe any man or church, believe God, believe your Bible.  They followed that advice, checked their Bibles, submitted to God's word, and gave up their former beliefs - the things they thought they "knew".  They let the Bible correct them, and they were willing to change.  They did not believe Mr. Armstrong or take his word for anything - they checked up as he said they should.  Only after proving the truth in the Bible did they accept and believe it.

b)  Those who were not raised in the Church but came in from other belief systems or other churches.  They heard Mr. Armstrong or the Church say, don't believe me, don't believe us, don't believe any man or church, believe God, believe your Bible.  But they did not do that.  They believed Mr. Armstrong, even though he said they should not do that.  They did not prove what is true in the Bible.  They may have referenced certain scriptures, but they never really proved the truth in a thorough way.  They just took Mr. Armstrong's word for it.  What he said sounded good, so they just accepted it.  They thought they found a shortcut and did not do the hard work of proving what is true in the Bible.  They trusted their "instincts", and their instincts, their feelings, told them Mr. Armstrong was true.  They also came into the Church.

c)  Those who grew up in the Church.  They were taught to prove what they believe in the Bible, and most of them tried and to some extent succeeded.  But how have they been tested?  It is easy to continue in the beliefs you were raised in.  Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and Muslims do it all the time.  That is how religions continue from generation to generation.  And most of these other religions teach their children "proofs" or reasons or evidence for their beliefs.

I have proved the truth of what I believe twice, once coming out of the Catholic Church and into the Church of God, and later in rejecting the changes taught by Mr. Tkach.  I am willing, if challenged, to do it a third and a fourth and a fifth time - to go to the Bible with an open mind and believe what God says.

I have often thought that there are advantages and disadvantages to growing up in the Church.  The disadvantage is the difficulty in really proving the truth in the Bible with an open mind and knowing you have proved it.  The advantage, of course, is living in and learning a right moral outlook and environment and being able to avoid the sins and consequences of sin that people who grow up in bad environments often do not avoid.


We do not always know things as much as we think we know them.  We think we know things, but we can make mistakes, and some of the things we think we know are not really true.  I am speaking of us in the general human sense, and it applies both in and out of the Church.  There is even a saying, "to err is human".

We should hold fast to the Bible more than we hold fast to the things we think we know.  We should let the Bible teach us new things and correct us when we are wrong.  And that process never stops.  We can never say, "I know everything perfectly now, so I don't need to be corrected or learn anything new".

"Better a poor and wise youth Than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more" (Ecclesiastes 4:13).

Should we allow ourselves to be enticed by men with their own ideas that contradict common doctrine in the Church of God?

If "enticed" means tempted to do wrong, no.  But keep in mind that thousands of radio listeners who heard Mr. Armstrong on radio and TV and read his writings could have looked at him as enticing them with his own ideas contrary to their Catholic or Protestant doctrines, doctrines long established in their churches.  But they kept an open mind and checked their Bibles and believed what God said.  If not for those thousands who had an open mind and who were willing to consider someone else's ideas, we would not be here.

The Jews and Gentiles in Paul's day had to learn new things, things which may have seemed very different from what they had believed.  But they set the example of how to deal with it by checking the scriptures.

"Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men" (Acts 17:10-12).

Let's make it part of our character and way of life to always look to the Bible for answers to doctrinal questions and let God teach us continually.  That is what we should hold fast to.

If we do that, we can preach to the public to believe God, believe the Bible, not any man or church or tradition, and to do so without hypocrisy.  Then God can give us a wide-open door for preaching the gospel and the Ezekiel warning with great power and effectiveness.  Then we can get the warning out to hundreds of millions of people who need it.  Then we can glorify God's name by demonstrating His fairness in warning people while they have time to repent and escape.

We will be able to do these things because we will be asking the public to do the same thing we are willing to do - put the Bible first even when it means giving up what we thought we knew.

Let's do it.