Open—R. Thonney
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Like to read a verse in first John 5?
First John, chapter 5.
Verse 4.
Really the.
End of the verse.
This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
Overcoming.
What does it mean?
I'm sure we all have difficulties in our lives.
And everyone's place is different.
What does it mean to overcome?
And when you look at scripture it says quite a bit about overcoming.
I'm thinking especially about.
The seven churches, and in everyone of them.
There is a word to the overcomer.
So what does it mean to overcome? It means the difficulty.
That you have.
You find the way to come out victorious.
And it's by faith, it's not by natural strength.
It's not by good intelligence.
It's by taking God into the picture.
And I like to think of David as a special.
Illustration.
When he comes because his father sent him to take food to his brothers.
And when he gets there, he sees the dilemma that is happening to Israel. Of course he had been anointed king.
In the chapter before chapter 16 I think it is and chapter 17 is when David comes.
And there he is, looking for his brethren to give him what his father had sent.
And they tell him, look at this giant.
And everybody was afraid of him, of course, his size.
And everything about him was so tremendously formidable.
But David said, why isn't there someone to go out and take care of this giant?
David did not look at the conflict as David versus Goliath. He looked at it as God versus Goliath. David had been in the wilderness with the sheep where nobody else was looking, and here comes a lion, here comes a bear, and they take one of the lambs out of the flock.
And David just doesn't say, well, it's just one lamb, let him go. No, he goes after it. That was something that God had given them and.
Says the lion rose up against him.
And it's interesting. It must have been an African lion because it says he caught him by the beard. What other lion has a beard? I don't know.
But he says he caught him by the beard and smote him and killed him. That's pretty amazing to me.
For a shepherd to do that.
But then he comes and he sees this giant.
And there's no one that will go to see to fight with him. And so he gets talking. Then he comes up to Saul, the king. And Saul's is impressed with his valor. And he says, because he says I will fight that giant and, and.
He says no, you can't, you're just a youth and he's a man of war from his youth.
But again, I say David looked at the problem as God versus Goliath.
No problem, no problem.
Everybody else was looking at it as me versus Goliath. You know, that's why we did. That's what happens. And we look at circumstances that we're facing in connection with our own ability and capability to take care of that. That's not faith. Faith brings God into the picture.
00:05:11
And so David goes out to meet Goliath, and I'm just amazed at his courage.
When Goliath sees him, he says, Who am I that you send this youth out here? Come here, I will give your body to the birds of the field, and the appearance of the air and the beasts of the field.
David says confidently. You come to me with a sword and a spear. I come to you in the name of the Lord God of Israel, whose armies you have defied this day. I will take your head off your shoulders and give the hosts of the Philistines. He's talking like he's already king. Even though he wasn't king yet, he was anointed king.
But David runs to the giant. I've often thought it was me, brother, and I would stand back aways and take my shots from there. But not David. He runs. That's the confidence of faith, I think. That's so extremely beautiful, brother.
You got problems in your life. I think everybody does.
It's not a matter of your capabilities, it's a matter of bringing God.
Into the picture. Oh how important this is. I just like to go to Revelation chapter one or chapter 2 in connection with the seven churches just to take up the first church and brief the Church of Ephesus. It was a mentioned.
Earlier in the meetings that.
Here's a church the only complaint that the Lord has toward them.
Is in verse 4 Ephesus. I have somewhat against thee because thou hast left thy first love as mentioned this morning. Doesn't say thou hast lost thy first love, thou hast left it.
Brethren, to me, there's something that really searches my heart. What does it mean to leave your first love? It's not to give the Lord the first place in your life.
And that is so important. It seems like we have lost the sense of making the Lord.
1St in our lives when it comes to the meetings. I got something else. I'm sorry, I'm not going to be able to make it tonight.
Yeah, maybe some other time.
Brethren, is there something that's more important?
Than what the Lord has asked us to do. Is there something that we can say is valid excuse?
When the Lord has asked us to remember Him.
Each time until he comes, it doesn't say until I have a problem. That's too big, brethren. Or is there priorities in your life?
Is he the one that fills that? To me, it's so important to reevaluate, to think of the King of glory who came into this world.
And the one who made it all, really. And he went to that cross and paid the ultimate price. He gave everything to save my soul. And now I'm going to say there's other things that are more important.
Than doing what he's asked for me to do.
Oh brethren, this is so important for us to think about and to evaluate in the Lord's presence. Have we left our first love? Have we left making Him first in our lives? I think this is so challenging to my own soul and I say I want to present it to you. Do you have time to read His Word daily?
Do you have time to pray? You know you have to make time.
It just doesn't fall into its place automatically. No, you have to make time.
So when it comes to reading his word, I must say I find it a challenge.
I have the in my own life, a time when I after I get up in the morning to take and I on my computer I have a program that reads it to me while I follow in the scripture myself, and even then I find.
00:10:02
Oh, I gotta remember this today. I forgot. I don't want to forget this and my mind's wandering off.
Not really listening.
Is he first in my life? Brethren, this is so important. Priorities.
To overcome. So it is overcoming and each one of the seven churches that are in chapters 2 and three, at the end, there's a word to encourage the overcomer. You know, the churches are directed to the Angel of the church. Then it's been explained to me as those that are responsible.
But when it's the word to the overcomer, it's if any man have ears to hear.
Let him hear. It's not to the merely to the Angel of the church. It's to anyone who has ears to hear.
You have ears to hear. You can be an overcomer.
Because you can have faith. How does faith come? Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
But it doesn't come in a natural way. Brethren, God brings us through circumstances and it's to me is amazing to see. David, you mentioned Jacob, and I want to go back to the book of Genesis a bit to speak about Jacob.
In the 32nd chapter.
The.
When he's coming back from where he had, He'd left Israel and gone to his uncle's house and had married four women and had eleven children by then. And here he is coming back and he hears.
Your brother Esau is coming with 400 men and you can imagine.
What? He thought he had left Esau, and Esau was so mad at Jacob. He says, I'm going to kill him. As soon as our father is gone, I'll kill him. And now he hears it. Esau's coming with 400 men. You can imagine how he felt. He's out of a crisis time. And so it says here in chapter 32.
Verse 24 and Jacob was left.
Alone.
Sometimes God has to bring us to that point. We're alone. It's just between US and God.
There wrestle the man with him until the breaking of day.
And when he, that is the man, I guess, saw that he prevailed not against him he touched the hollow.
Of his thigh, that's Jacob's thigh, and the hall of Jacob's thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with them.
And he, that's the man or the Angel, really, it was.
Said let me go for the day breaketh.
And he that's Jacob said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name? He said Jacob. He said, Thy name shall be called no more, Jacob, but Israel. For as a Prince hast thou power.
With God and with men, and hast prevailed.
I love that.
Jacob.
Prevailing with God.
You said Jacob was a Would you call him David?
Brother David, you call him a scoundrel, a schemer, OK.
He have power with God, this schemer.
How in the world does this schemer have power with God?
By faith.
He couldn't struggle anymore because his thigh was out of joint.
Couldn't do it.
But it was still there and he was wrestling. I like to just read in Hosea chapter 12. I found this so interesting brother, how it talks about it here. Hosea chapter 12 and verse three and four talking about Jacob. Here he took his brother by the heel.
00:15:13
In the womb.
And by his strength.
He had power with God. Who's it talking about?
Jacob this schemer.
He had, yeah, he had power over the Angel and prevailed. He wept and made supplication unto him. He found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us to me this so beautiful brother, and so encouraging. We're living in days of the ruin of the Christian testimony.
Is that a reason to give up? Is that a reason to say it's all over?
No, it's not.
Jacob had to be brought to the point where he couldn't struggle any longer. But how did he prevail then? He just simply said, I will not let you go until you bless me. And to me, that's where Jacob prevailed, and that's what he did by faith.
To me, it's amazingly wonderful. He wrestled with the Angel and prevailed.
Brethren, God wants to make us overcomers. He wants to make us prevailers. We have difficulties, all of us, in different ways.
This is the faith that overcomes even our faith. This is the victory that overcomes.
Even our faith.