The Value of a Soul
Text: Matthew 16:26
Series: Restoration Sermons
Date:
Speaker: Ed Rangel
Location: Waupaca Church of Christ
Bible Version: NASB 1995
Sermon Type: Expository
Learning Objectives
By the close of this lesson the hearer should be able to:
- Explain the triune nature of man from I Thess. 5:23 and explain why the soul's endless existence changes the calculus of how a person should invest their time and energy.
- State the Lord's two questions from Matt. 16:26 and explain why they have never been answered — what would have to be true for a satisfactory answer to be possible.
- Identify the four things people exchange their souls for (wealth, education, comforts, pleasure) and explain what Scripture says about the end of each without God.
- Explain what the immortality of the soul implies about the wisdom of laboring for it — and for others.
- State the four elements of the soul's value as developed in Section IV and explain how the cost of the soul's redemption reveals its worth.
Thesis
The soul is worth more than the whole world — the Lord said so, and his statement has never been answered. The person who would not trade their house for a dollar still trades their soul daily for far less than the whole world. The four sections of this sermon each prove the same thesis from a different angle: the questions Christ asked, the estimate Christ demonstrated, the immortality the soul possesses, and the cost of the salvation that was provided for it.
Burden
People spend more time and energy on the body — which will return to dust (Gen. 3:19) — than on the soul, which will exist forever (Eccl. 12:7). The arithmetic is backwards. The burden is not to produce guilt about the body's needs but to correct the proportion: an endless soul that is traded for temporary wealth, comfort, or pleasure is the worst trade in the history of human commerce.
Introduction
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matt. 16:26 NASB 1995). The Lord asked these questions. They have never been answered — because there is no answer. No profit in the transaction; no price adequate to the exchange. The questions stand as they were asked, two millennia later, still unanswered because they are unanswerable.
Man is a triune being: body, soul, and spirit (I Thess. 5:23 — "Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ"). The body is visible, physical, temporary. The soul and spirit have endless existence. "Then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and the spirit will return to God who gave it" (Eccl. 12:7). Why spend all time on the body — which is returning to dust — and so little on the soul — which is continuing forever?
I. The Savior's Questions Have Never Been Answered
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matt. 16:26).
These questions were asked by the one who knew the soul better than any other. He created it; he came to redeem it; he will judge it at the last day. No one is more qualified to assess its value. And his assessment is absolute: the whole world — all its wealth, all its power, all its pleasure, all its acclaim — is not worth one soul.
No one has answered the question because no one can. To answer "What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?" with a number would require knowing the value of the soul; and the value of the soul, as these questions imply, exceeds any number that could be offered as the whole world's worth. The question is not a riddle — it is a statement in question form: there is no profit in the exchange; the soul cannot be valued in world-currency.
II. This Shows the Estimate Christ Put upon the Soul
The soul's value is demonstrated by what people exchange it for — and by how poor those exchanges are.
It is worth more than the whole world, yet people sell it. For wealth: "Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries which are coming upon you... You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of pleasure; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter" (James 5:1, 5). The rich fool: "And he thought to himself, 'What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?'... But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?'" (Luke 12:17-20). The soul was required; the barns meant nothing.
For education — the intellectual achievement that becomes its own end; the mind that has mastered much of the world's knowledge but has not reckoned with the one who made the mind.
For comforts of home — the accumulation of ease; the life organized around the minimization of discomfort; the person who has arranged everything for bodily comfort and has made no arrangement for the soul.
For pleasure — the outline organized pursuit of enjoyment as the highest goal; the life that asks of every decision "Will I enjoy this?" without asking "What will this do to my soul?"
"What will you give in exchange for it?" The question presses for a specific answer. Someday the wealth will be left. The education will not follow. The comforts will be gone. The pleasures will be over. What was given in exchange for the soul — and was it worth it?
III. Its Immortality Shows Its Greatness
The soul never dies. It continues forever. This is not a point to acknowledge and move past — it is the point around which every other assessment of value must be organized.
If the soul is immortal and the body is not, then the soul has more future than the body by an infinite margin. The body has decades; the soul has eternity. The logic is not complicated: the thing that lasts longer is worth more of the investment that is allocated to duration.
Can we not afford to labor for our own souls? The person who works eight hours a day at a job that produces income for a body that will die — and works almost nothing for a soul that will live forever — has made an extraordinary calculation. The income pays for things that will end; the soul goes on after the income is gone and the things it paid for are forgotten.
And for others? The soul of every person around us is also immortal. The investment of time, energy, and care in the souls of others is an investment in something that will last forever. The investment in their bodies — in comfort, in pleasure, in entertainment — addresses what is temporary. The investment in their souls addresses what is eternal.
IV. The Value of the Soul Is Seen in the Cost of Its Salvation
If one wants to know what something is worth, look at what someone was willing to pay for it.
The price paid for the soul's redemption is the most revealing data point available. "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" (I Pet. 1:18-19). Silver and gold — the currencies of the world — were not sufficient. The price was the blood of the Son of God.
The soul's redemption reveals its destiny. The God who paid that price for the soul must believe the soul is capable of the destiny he intends for it. What he paid indicates what he thinks the soul is worth; what he plans for the soul indicates what it was made to be.
The cost of preparing a home for the soul shows its value. "In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also" (John 14:1-3). The preparation of a place by the Son of God — the one through whom all things were made — for the souls of those who come to him: the place reflects the value of the ones for whom it is prepared.
A lost soul is the greatest wreck; a saved soul is the greatest accomplishment. Not the greatest political achievement, or the greatest intellectual achievement, or the greatest economic achievement — the greatest accomplishment in the universe is the soul that, having been given the choice and the means, chose the path that leads to the prepared place.
Application
The four arguments from this sermon together press a single decision: invest in what is worth more. The questions have not been answered; the estimate has been demonstrated by the price paid; the immortality ensures that the investment in the soul has the longest return of any investment available; and the cost of redemption establishes that Someone else considered the soul worth everything.
The immediate application is not primarily financial — it is allocative. How much time is given to the body and how much to the soul? How much energy is directed toward temporary comfort and how much toward eternal preparation? Not as guilt but as arithmetic: the body will end; the soul will not. The proportion should reflect that.
Conclusion
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matt. 16:26). The questions are still open. The whole world has not answered them, because the whole world is not enough to answer them. The soul is worth more than the whole world — the price paid for it proves it.
Invitation
The soul that is worth more than the whole world can be saved. The price has been paid; the conditions are specified; the door is open. Believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Repent of the trades that were bad trades. Confess his name. Be baptized for the remission of your sins (Acts 2:38). Do not exchange the soul for anything less than what it is worth.
Word Study
| English Term | Greek Term | Basic Meaning | Usage in This Sermon | Sermon Significance | Key Texts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Soul / Life | psychē | The inner life, the self, the person in their essential existence — the word used in Matt. 16:26. | Used in the Lord's two questions: "forfeits his psychē"; "give in exchange for his psychē." | The NASB translates psychē as "soul" in Matt. 16:26 — the essential self, the life that continues beyond the body. The value of the psychē is what the two questions are asserting: it exceeds the whole world. | Matt. 16:26; I Pet. 1:18-19 |
| Profit / Gain | ōphelēthēsetai | Future passive: "will he be benefited, helped, made better off." | Used in the first question: "what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world?" | The word is commercial but also medical — it was used for what a physician does for a patient. The question asks: what health does the soul have if the world is gained and the soul is lost? The answer is none. | Matt. 16:26 |
| Immortality | athanasia | Deathlessness — a- (negation) + thanatos (death). | Used conceptually in Section III for the quality of the soul that makes its value exceed the body's value. | The soul's endless existence is what makes the calculus of Matt. 16:26 permanent: the forfeiture of the soul is not temporary; it continues forever. The investment in the soul is the only investment with an infinite return horizon. | I Cor. 15:53-54; I Thess. 5:23 |
| Redeemed | elytrōthēte | You were ransomed — the aorist passive of lytroō, to release by payment of a ransom price. | Used in I Pet. 1:18 for what happened to the soul through Christ's blood: a ransom was paid. | The word is commercial: a price was paid; something was released. The price that was paid (the blood of Christ) is the measure of the soul's value in the economy of redemption. Silver and gold were insufficient; the blood of the unblemished Lamb was the required price. | I Pet. 1:18-19 |
Scripture Interlock Table
| Theme | Boles' Outline | Supporting Scripture |
|---|---|---|
| Man as body, soul, and spirit | Intro. | I Thess. 5:23 |
| "The dust returns to earth; the spirit returns to God" | Intro. | Eccl. 12:7 |
| "What profit to gain the world and forfeit the soul?" | I | Matt. 16:26 |
| Rich fool: "your soul is required of you" | II.1 | Luke 12:17-20 |
| "Come now, you rich, weep and howl" | II.1 | James 5:1, 5 |
| "I go to prepare a place for you" | IV.3 | John 14:1-3 |
| "Redeemed with precious blood of Christ" — cost reveals value | IV.1 | I Pet. 1:18-19 |
| Baptism for remission — taking the path that leads to the prepared place | Invit. | Acts 2:38 |
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Converted from H. Leo Boles, Outline 161. Primary text: Matt. 16:26 (stated by Boles). OCR corrections: "INTRODUCT1ON" → "INTRODUCTION"; "ya)uc" → "value"; "lll." → "III."; "JNTRODUCTlON" → "INTRODUCTION". Doctrinal audit: the soul's immortality developed from I Thess. 5:23 and Eccl. 12:7 — no gnostic dualism (body as evil); the four exchanges (wealth, education, comfort, pleasure) developed from James 5 and Luke 12 without condemning any of these as inherently evil but as insufficient exchanges for the soul; the cost of redemption (I Pet. 1:18-19) developed to establish the soul's value by the price paid — this is not a merit argument; invitation retains full obedient response (Acts 2:38).
