According to the Whole Counsel of God
According to the Whole Counsel of God
Bro Richard Lim | Restoration Seminar | 31 August 2026 | Acts 20:27
"For I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God." — Acts 20:27 (NKJV)
Owning Your Own Faith
For fifty years of walking as a Christian, one truth stands out above the rest: no one can inherit faith.
Every Christian, from every generation, must make the faith his or her own. The challenges may look different in each generation. The first who came into the Lord's church from outside faced one set of struggles. Those who have grown up inside the church face another. Neither is easier. Neither is lesser. But the day will come for every one of us — young or old, first generation or fifth — when our faith will be tested. And in that moment, only a faith we have truly made our own will stand.
That is why we must know the whole counsel of God. Because when the testing comes, half a foundation is no foundation at all.
What "The Whole Counsel of God" Means
The apostle Paul, standing before the elders of Ephesus for the last time, said:
"For I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God." (Acts 20:27)
What did he mean? Not that he had explained the infinite mind of God — that is impossible. The Scripture is plain:
"The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law." (Deuteronomy 29:29)
There are secret things that belong only to God. But what He has revealed — that is the whole counsel He wants us to declare. It is His redemptive plan. Everything He has given us for salvation. As Peter says:
"…His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue." (2 Peter 1:3)
All that we need to be saved, all that we need to please Him — He has revealed. And every part of it must be taught.
Balanced Teaching — No Cherry-Picking
The whole counsel means balanced preaching and teaching. No pet topics. No favourite subjects while other truths are quietly ignored. Jesus Himself warned the religious leaders about exactly this:
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone." (Matthew 23:23)
Notice — Jesus did not say "forget the small things and do only the big things." He said "do both." That is the whole counsel of God.
We talk about the grace of God — but we must also talk about the justice and judgment of God.
We talk about the blessings — we love the blessings — but we must also talk about the sufferings we go through.
We talk about holiness — but we must also talk about happiness in the Lord.
All of it. Not half. Not the parts that make people comfortable.
The Jefferson Bible — A Cautionary Tale
In the Smithsonian National Museum of American History sits a volume known as the Jefferson Bible. Thomas Jefferson took printed pages of Scripture in English, French, Latin, and Greek, and cut out only the passages he wanted. He removed all the supernatural events. He did not believe in the miracles of Jesus, the virgin birth of Jesus, or the resurrection of Jesus. What he kept was only the moral teaching of Jesus.
That is not the whole counsel of God. That is a man deciding what he thinks is worth believing.
And there are still people today doing exactly what Jefferson did — not always with scissors, but with the same heart. They keep the parts of Scripture that suit them and quietly set the rest aside. This is not Christianity. This is picking and choosing what pleases us.
What "Whole" Really Means
The word "whole" is the Greek word holos — meaning complete, entire, all. It is the same word used when Jesus said:
"So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple." (Luke 14:33)
Not part. All.
"Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is man's all." (Ecclesiastes 12:13)
"All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work." (2 Timothy 3:16–17)
All. Whole. Complete. That is the standard the Lord Himself has set.
Not Just the Easy Parts
The Bible contains sixty-six books. Seventy-five percent of it — thirty-nine books — is the Old Testament. Only twenty-seven books are the New Testament. And it comes to us in many forms — commands, narrative accounts, proverbs, songs, poetry, genealogies.
It ought to frighten us to consider how much of God's counsel we may have missed because we prefer only certain types of scripture. Do not neglect the Old Testament. It contains principles for daily life that the New Testament assumes we already know.
Some books are difficult — Romans, Revelation. Peter himself acknowledged this:
"…in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures." (2 Peter 3:16)
Romans is where the doctrine of "faith alone" comes from — and yet James chapter 2 speaks of faith working with obedience. If you take only Romans, you get one conclusion. If you take the whole counsel of God, you get the truth.
Paul wrote of the whole armor of God — not just a breastplate, not just a sword. The whole armour. (Ephesians 6:11) The Bible is the same. You cannot select one piece and expect it to protect you.
Declaring the Whole Counsel
This is the responsibility Christ Himself commanded:
"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." (Matthew 28:19–20)
All things. And Paul modeled this in his own ministry:
"…how I kept back nothing that was helpful, but proclaimed it to you, and taught you publicly and from house to house." (Acts 20:20)
Publicly and privately. Both are needed.
Why does this matter so much? Because when the whole counsel is not taught, souls are subverted:
"…there are many insubordinate, both idle talkers and deceivers… whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole households, teaching things which they ought not." (Titus 1:10–11)
There are people today who say, "I just want to know about Jesus. I don't want doctrine." But you cannot separate the doctrine from the Man. Jesus Himself said:
"You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." (John 8:32)
"Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed." (John 8:36)
Who sets you free — Jesus, or the truth? Both. They cannot be separated. It is the whole package.
Half-Truths — The Most Dangerous Lies
In a court of law, a witness is asked to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. All three matter. Because we easily recognise it when someone lies outright. We are more discerning when truth is mixed with falsehood. But very few people notice when someone tells only part of the truth — and that is the most misleading form of deception of all.
Just yesterday, a salesperson demonstrated to my wife & I the effect of some "hydrogen water." They took a drop of blood, showed it under a microscope — all clumped and clogged. Then they gave a drink of the “water”, waited ten minutes, took another drop — completely free-flowing. Amazing! We almost bought it. But a quick check using AI reveals the demonstration is misleading — blood cells naturally separate like that after drinking any water. The salesperson did not lie about what we saw. He just did not show us the whole truth. And a half-truth, spoken with confidence, can convince you to hand over money for something that does nothing at all.
Half-truths appear all through Scripture:
King Saul, after failing to destroy the Amalekites, told the prophet Samuel: "I have performed the commandment of the LORD." (1 Samuel 15:13). Did he? Partly. He brought the spoils back — the very thing God forbade. He did not lie. He told half the truth. And God rejected him.
Abraham used a technicality about his wife being his half-sister to avoid trouble. Technically true. But it was misleading — and God was not pleased.
But the classic case of the half-truth — the one that changed everything for the entire human race — happened in the Garden of Eden.
The Classic Case — The Garden of Eden
Look carefully at what God originally said. He said it to Adam alone, before Eve was even created:
"Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." (Genesis 2:16–17)
In the Hebrew, "you may freely eat" is emphatic — "eating, you shall eat." God was extravagantly generous. And the warning was equally certain: you shall surely die.
Now watch how Eve, when speaking to the serpent, subtly altered what God had said:
"We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.'" (Genesis 3:2–3)
Three subtle alterations:
She dropped "freely eat" — weakening the generosity of God.
She added "nor shall you touch it" — making God's rule seem more rigid, more burdensome, more legalistic than it actually was.
She weakened "you shall surely die" to "lest you die" — as if the consequence might be a possibility rather than a certainty.
And into this weakened, altered word of God, the serpent pounced:
"You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:4–5)
Watch what happens here. The serpent mixes truth with lie.
Truth: Their eyes would indeed be opened. They would indeed come to know good and evil.
Lie: "You will not surely die." That was an outright falsehood.
Misleading definition: "You will be like God" — implying divine glory, when in fact it brought shame, fear, hiding, and a corrupted nature.
Yes, their eyes were opened — but not to glory. They gained the knowledge of good by losing the good, and knowledge of evil by committing it. They became "like God" only in the sense of knowing good and evil — but not in holiness, not in righteousness, not in glory.
Half-truth is more dangerous than an outright lie, because it wears the clothing of honesty while it does the work of deception. This is exactly why we need the whole counsel of God — because anything less can be spun into a half-truth by anyone who wants to deceive us.
Itching Ears
Paul warned Timothy of a time coming — and it is here now:
"Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables." (2 Timothy 4:2–4)
Let me ask you this: when your ears are itching, what do you want — a massage, or a message?
People with itching ears want massage. They want to be told everything is fine, that they are doing well, that God's requirements are gentle and few. And so they gather teachers who will soothe them.
Where are the fire-and-brimstone sermons of years past? We hear them rarely. We hear smooth, comforting words instead. But God's word through Isaiah rings just as true today as when it was written:
"…who say to the seers, 'Do not see,' and to the prophets, 'Do not prophesy to us right things; speak to us smooth things, prophesy deceits.'" (Isaiah 30:10)
Faithful Teachers — Men and Women
Paul told Timothy:
"…the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also." (2 Timothy 2:2)
Some read the word "men" here and conclude this responsibility is for men only. But the Greek word is anthropos — meaning mankind or human beings, both men and women. Women also have the responsibility to teach others — not publicly in the assembly, but privately, personally. Just as when Priscilla and Aquila took Apollos aside to correct his teaching, so every Christian carries a share of this work.
Rightly Dividing the Word
"Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." (2 Timothy 2:15)
The Greek phrase for "rightly dividing" is orthotomeó — literally, to cut straight, like a farmer plowing a straight furrow or a craftsman cutting a straight line. It means to handle, interpret, and teach God's message with honesty and exact precision.
But this simple verse has been twisted by some. There is a movement called hyperdispensationalism — teachers who claim the church did not begin at Pentecost in Acts 2 but much later, and who invent two gospels: one "gospel of the kingdom" for the Jews, another "gospel of grace" for the Gentiles. They reject water baptism and the Lord's Supper as being "for the Jews only."
Brethren, there is no such thing. The gospel is one gospel preached to different audiences. When the Gentile Cornelius needed to hear the good news, it was Peter — the very apostle they claim was only for the Jews — who preached to him. The church began at Acts 2 on the day of Pentecost. The gospel never split into two.
There is nothing new under the sun (Ecclesiastes 1:9). This error goes back to a Bible teacher in the 1800s named Bullinger. Every so often it resurfaces with new names, but it is the same false teaching. We must not depend on "fluff candy" — the big colourful sweet with nothing solid inside. The Lord's church must preach real doctrine grounded in the whole counsel of God, and be able to refute what is not.
Applying the Principle — The Case of Baptism
The late Bro Steven, whenever he taught on any subject, would say: "You need to look at the scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. Look at it as a whole. The Scripture never contradicts itself. If you understand it and it contradicts, then you are wrong — not the Scripture."
Let us apply this to one of the topics most twisted by half-truths — baptism.
Peter writes plainly:
"…in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. There is also an antitype which now saves us — baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ." (1 Peter 3:20–21)
But many teach that "baptism does not save." They say it is merely "an outward sign of an inward grace," a symbol only. They say the saving is by faith alone in the blood of Christ, and baptism is just a picture.
But Peter says plainly: baptism now saves us. How do we reconcile this?
By taking the whole counsel of God.
Look at Peter's own language. He uses two words: type and antitype. A type is a shadow, a pattern, a symbol pointing forward. An antitype is the reality itself — the true fulfilment.
The blood of bulls and goats was a type; the blood of Christ is the antitype, the reality.
The Passover lamb was a type; the sacrifice of Christ is the antitype.
Peter says Noah's salvation through water was the type — and baptism is the antitype, the reality.
Now think carefully about Noah's salvation. What saved him?
God saved him.
The ark saved him.
The flood water carried him to safety.
Take away any one, and there is no salvation.
If Noah had built the ark but there had been no flood, would he have been delivered? No.
If there had been a flood but no ark, would he have been saved? No.
All three worked together.
No one asks, "Well, which one really saved him?" — because it was the whole package.
The same is true of our salvation:
God saves us.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ saves us.
Baptism is the vehicle that brings us into contact with the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.
Remove any one, and there is no salvation.
Jesus said it plainly:
"He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned." (Mark 16:16)
Peter said it plainly at Pentecost:
"Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins." (Acts 2:38)
Ananias said it plainly to Saul:
"And now why are you waiting? Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord." (Acts 22:16)
Paul said it plainly:
"…buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead." (Colossians 2:12)
The whole counsel of God says we are saved by grace, through faith, in the act of obedient baptism, by the blood of Jesus Christ. It is not one versus another. It is the whole package.
And what does "the answer of a good conscience toward God" mean? It is a legal Greek term — an appeal, a request, an inquiry. Baptism is not the pledge of a conscience that has already been cleansed. It is the appeal of a seeking soul asking God to cleanse it. "What shall I do to remove the guilt of my sin?" And the answer is "Repent and be baptized." It is when we call on the name of the Lord for the cleansing only He can give.
The Word of God Stands Forever
At the beginning, God said:
"You shall surely die."
The serpent said:
"You shall not surely die."
Cross out the one you do not believe.
There is only one that has proved true. The Word of God stands forever.
And today Peter says:
"Baptism now saves us."
Others say:
"Baptism does not now save us."
Cross out the one you do not believe.
There is only one that stands. Because God, through the apostle Peter, singled out baptism and said it saves us. And when we say it does not, we contradict the apostle. We contradict God. We contradict the whole counsel of God.
The Charge
This is what it means to preach and to live according to the whole counsel of God. Not to select the scriptures we like. Not to keep the parts that comfort and drop the parts that convict. Not to make a Jefferson Bible of our own preferences. Not to weaken God's word the way Eve did, nor to inflate it with additions of our own.
But to take the whole word, to believe the whole word, to teach the whole word, and to live by the whole word.
Because half a truth spoken as if it were the whole truth is still a lie. And the Lord Jesus, who is the Truth Himself, has left us the whole of what we need to be saved and to please Him. Let us hold every part of it — the grace and the justice, the blessing and the suffering, the comfort and the command, the promise and the warning — and let none of it fall to the ground.
The whole counsel of God.
