Address—W.J. Prost
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I have been particularly impressed in the last little while.
With that word overcomer.
Overcomer.
And I'd like to speak a little bit this afternoon from the Word of God on the subject of overcoming.
Let's turn first to John's Gospel, chapter 16.
John's Gospel chapter 16, and we'll read just the last few verses. John's Gospel chapter 16, verse 31.
Jesus answered them. Do ye now believe?
Behold, the hour cometh. Yeah, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone. And yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me. These things I have spoken unto you, that in me might have peace.
In the world you shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer.
I have overcome the world, you know that word overcome has the sense of gaining a victory.
And I believe we have here in the Word of God the blessed truth that our Lord Jesus Christ has already gained the victory for us.
Satan is a defeated foe, The Lord Jesus. We know when he was tempted of the devil in the early part of his pathway down here, answered the devil with the word of God, and he was from that point powerless against the Lord Jesus. He bound the strongman, as it were.
For then the Lord Jesus we know went to that cross of Calvary, and there we know that through death.
He destroyed him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and delivered them, who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to *******.
And you know, it's very precious to my soul to see that the Lord Jesus in this precious Upper Room ministry just before he went to the cross, gives particular encouragement to his own.
And you know, just to make a little remark here, we find the subject of overcoming spoken of primarily in John's ministry. You don't get it so much in Paul's ministry, although the word is mentioned, but you don't find it so much it's characteristic of John's ministry. And so you have the overcoming mentioned in John's gospel, you haven't mentioned in John's epistle, and you have it mentioned in the book of.
Revelation all three of those broad categories of John's ministry we find overcoming mentioned.
Why is that? Well, I've wondered in my own soul why it is, and I'll just pass this subject or this remark on to you.
Especially to our beloved young people.
And, you know, I don't think our brother Yule Ton, who's sitting here will mind my mentioning this, but he mentioned this dear brother Sammy Razor last night in the prayer meeting in Addison. And he mentioned him as being a young brother. But then he told us how old he was, and he was older than I am. So that made me feel good. So maybe we can all take this subject to heart, because it's not just for the so-called young people in the sense that we usually think of it.
I need it. We all need it. And I say again, I believe it's characteristic of John's ministry for this reason.
That Paul gives us the truth of the church in which everything is displayed.
The purposes of God from eternity to eternity. The Church of God and all God's purposes concerning it.
And everything connected with it. But John speaks more of the family of God. John brings before us more of the family of God. And you know, to be an overcomer, it is not a question of how much truth I hold or how I should I. Let me correct that. It's not a question of how much truth I know.
It's how much I walk in what I do know. And So what we have in John's ministry is the new life.
Encounter distinction to the old nature, the family of God, and contrast distinction to the family of the devil. And I use that word advisedly because if you don't belong to Christ, you're living under the authority of the God and Prince of this world, the devil. And those two are contrasted in John's ministry. So the question of overcoming is more a question of the enjoyment of my position as a child of God and my living in the truth.
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That God has given me not a question of how much I know. I say that because there's sometimes a tendency in those of us who are younger to think that we can't go on in the same way as the older ones. And we sometimes read the ministry and listen to the ministry of those giants in the truth who perhaps are older than we are, and perhaps those who went before us. And we say, my, I could never get a grasp on something like that.
Well, I don't say that you can't, because with God's help, I believe we can.
We may not be able to give it out in that way, but there's no such thing as a gift in taking in the truth of God.
But I say this that overcoming is not connected with how much I know, but with how much I walk in of that which I do know.
Notice here then in John's gospel we find overcoming spoken of, and it seems to me that there are some very precious thoughts here. We're going to go over to John's epistle in a few moments and then to the Book of Revelation and just make a few remarks about overcoming that I have been enjoying lately here. First of all, the Lord Jesus.
Answers the.
Remarks made by his disciples, how that they Well, let's read the verse.
Verse 29 and 30. We probably should have read them to get the connection. His disciples said unto him, Lo now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb.
Now are we sure that thou knowest all things, and needest not that any man should ask thee? By this we believe that thou cameest forth from God. And so there was perhaps, if we might say, a little confidence in the disciples, that they knew the Lord, and that they knew who the Lord was. And I'm thankful as I look around the room, that there are many here who know the Lord and know who the Lord is. And maybe you too, by the grace of God, as you sit in that seat, can say.
Oh, I know who the Lord Jesus is. I know he's the Son of God.
I know He's my savior. I know that God has set him up on high as head over all things.
But with that knowledge alone, keep them.
Know the Lord Jesus has to speak to their consciences, and say, Do ye now believe? Oh, he says, the hour is coming, His end is now come, when ye shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall lead me alone.
O beloved young people, I tell you from personal experience, it's not how much you know up here that keeps you, it's how much you enjoy down here. It's not what I eat which nourishes my body, it's what I digest.
And is made good to me. It's not what I know of the truth that keeps me going on. It's how much I enjoy in my own soul and walk in. And so the Lord Jesus, as it were said, don't don't think that you've arrived if I might use that expression, because shortly you're all going to be scattered. But then he gave them the secret of overcoming. What does he say?
And shall leave me alone, and yet I am not alone, because the Father.
Is with me. Our blessed Savior had to go on his way to the cross alone and we don't need to go over that account again because you all know how that the Lord was forsaken by everyone, literally everyone, even those disciples who were nearest and dearest to them to him.
They forsake him.
But yet he says I am not alone because the Father is with me. You know, if you're going to be an overcomer in this world, you may have to go it alone. And yet you are not alone because first of all, you can say along with the Lord Jesus, the Father is with me. And then you have the blessed promise of that one. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. You will never be alone the way the Lord Jesus was, because He has promised to.
With you, but you may see everyone else on whom you may have depended.
Fall away from you and so it has to be a pathway of individual overcoming.
I'm not sure that overcoming is spoken of in a collective sense. It's spoken of in an individual sense.
And we can be thankful for other overcomers who are an encouragement and help to us.
But never forget, it has come down to the end of a dispensation, when overcoming is characterized by individual faithfulness, not necessarily by collective faithfulness. And so the Lord Jesus could only fall back on that blessed communion with his Father. But yet he says, I am not alone, but the Father is with me.
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Then he goes on to say in verse 33, These things have I spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. Oh, I love that peace. Does he mean the peace that comes as we get it in Romans 5 and one, Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, I'm sure that's included, but I feel that the peace here goes deeper than that.
It's like.
What the Lord says in the 14th chapter, where He says, My peace I give unto you. It was that peace on the one hand that accepted every possible circumstance from His Father, and that in return took every difficulty to the Father, seeking from Him that guidance as the perfect dependent man to walk the pathway down here.
Oh, the Lord Jesus has left you, beloved young people, and me, a legacy of peace.
Isn't that something my peace I leave with you, he says. And here he says that she might have peace. You know, these are days of pressure and hurry.
I don't know how it is with some of you young people, but I know some young people that have a rough time sometimes.
I know the pressures that you run into at school, pressures that I never had to face, pressures of mountains of work, perhaps, that you scarcely know how to cope with, pressures of persecution and difficulty that I never had to encounter in the days, perhaps when there was a little more respect for the name of God and for the question of what was right and proper before the Lord, I never had to encounter some of that.
Peace. The Lord Jesus wants you to have peace in your soul.
He wants you to have peace, but how can you have it?
Oh, in the world ye shall have tribulation, he says.
But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. Isn't that blessed? And so I just suggest to you, if we could perhaps speak of it in this way, these verses bring before US1 aspect of overcoming, and that is the individual enjoyment of Christ and the abiding in His love and in the love of the Father.
Isn't that blessed?
You know what we're never spoken of as being in the Father. The Lord Jesus could say I am in the Father and the Father in me, but we're spoken of as being in Christ and he and us and by our relationship with him. We enjoy that love with the Father. We are complete in him. Oh, what I long for my own soul, as I long for your soul is a deeper enjoyment of all of that blessed.
And the realizing that he walked the pathway alone and that he's gained the victory already for us.
And that now we have by grace only to follow him in that same pathway.
Turn over now to First John Chapter 5.
Well, we'll read some from chapter two. First of all, because it's connected.
Read from chapter 2 and then from chapter 5.
Chapter 2 of 1 John and verse 12.
I write unto you, little children, or as it should read simply, children, because it's addressed to all the children of God here.
I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake.
I write unto you, fathers, because you have known Him, that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one. There's the word again. I write unto you, little children, and hear. It's correct, little children, because it has the sense of those who are babes in Christ, because ye have known the Father.
But notice the next verse I have written unto you, Fathers, because you have known him, that is from the beginning.
Same thing I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you.
And ye have overcome the wicked one. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.
If any man loved the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world, and the world passeth away in the lust thereof. But he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.
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Isn't that blessed? We'll read in the 5th chapter in a moment or two, but just to comment on this.
First of all, I would just say this, that in John we have him writing.
We have his writing 3 broad categories. We have the Gospel of John. We have the Epistles of John.
And we have the Book of Revelation.
And I might just mention it was a help to me as a young brother to see this and I pass it on.
That we could categorize John's ministry in this way. The Gospel of John is eternal life come down to earth.
In the person of Christ, John's epistles are the blessed consequences for those.
Who accept that Blessed One is Savior and who have that eternal life. The revelation is the awful consequences for those who have rejected him and do not have eternal life. And so here we have in John's epistle something perhaps added to, if we could put it that way, what we have in John's Gospel. In John's gospel, it was the enjoyment of Christ himself.
In all that he is.
On an individual basis, but here we have the overcoming in connection with being strong and the word of God abiding in US. And I think it's particularly noticeable here that three categories are suggested. He writes to the fathers and those I believe are the fathers spiritually, those who have perhaps.
That more mature knowledge and what characterizes them in both cases.
Ye have known the Father. Nothing beyond that, nothing beyond the knowledge of the Father.
But what about the young men? And think of this. And it's not only young men. I believe it's young sisters too. But what characterizes them? Oh, it says you have overcome the wicked one. But then in the second verse that we read, verse 14, it tells how and why. Because ye are strong.
And you have the word of God abiding in you. Isn't that blessed? I think that's a particular voice to you young brothers.
You know, it's not that we can boast and say, well, I'm strong enough. I can overcome the wicked one.
No, we'll sing a hymn at the end which I have in mind, which reads like this. By meekness and defeat He won the Mead and crown, trod all our foes beneath his feet by being trodden down. And it's only in His strength that we can overcome. But if that precious word is abiding in us, then I believe we can count not on our own strength, but on His strength.
You know we have the word of God referred to as the sword of the Spirit.
In Ephesians 6, the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
A brother in our home assembly made a remark once which I have never forgotten. He told how that in a meeting many, many years ago.
There was a brother.
By the name of Mr. Fleck, who sat in that meeting and asked the question, What is the sword of the Spirit?
And someone said it's the word of God and he said.
Yes, you're right, but it's more than that, he said. It's the word of God that you have read.
And made your own and walked in. He said, that's the sword of the Spirit. Beloved young people, you can't have the sword of the Spirit unless you walk in what you read. And so let me get very basic. Let me encourage you to read the Word of God for yourself. Never let anything take the place of reading the Word of God because it is the way that the truth is brought before us and it's the only way that it can enter.
It takes the Spirit of God to do it, but the Spirit can't bring the Word before me if I don't read it.
Oh, but then what do I do? Oh, may I walk in the good of it? I said it before, but I'll say it again. Overcoming and victory in this world is not characterized by how much I know, but by how much I walk and what I do know. But the more I have in the things of God, the more I want. And you know what's the opposite of natural things? Because if I go to the table over here at noon hour and eat the good food that is prepared, I get full and I don't want anymore.
Whereas at least this is the way it works with me. Anyway, if I have to miss a meal, I feel like making up for it on the next one. But you know, in the things of God. May I suggest you that it works the opposite way? The more I have, the more I want. And the more I neglect the things of the Lord, the less I want. So that once I start neglecting the things of the Lord, pretty soon what we have in these next few verses starts to take over.
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The world, the things that are in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. And pretty soon I don't seem to want those things of the Lord anymore. Maybe I could be even more practical. And I hope that I may be forgiven if this remark offends anyone. But it shouldn't.
It's wonderful to read the word of God for yourself.
But it's wonderful to be at the assembly meeting where the Word of God is read, because there I get the rough edges knocked off me. There I get the wrong thoughts that I may have had about the passage straightened out. There I get the complete thoughts presented by other brothers that add to what I have so that I get rounded out. I tend to be a little warped if all I do is read on my own and never have the fellowship of my brethren, because no matter how much.
Might read None of us knows it all. I was reading just the other day a remark made by one of our old brothers in the last century.
And he was quoting someone else and this was the remark he made.
Someone said to him, you make a great deal of going to an assembly meeting. His answer was, I cannot make too much of being where my blessed Lord is in the midst. Isn't that blessed? By the grace of God, dear young people, I can stand here and say I have found it so to my own soul. And I know there are many here who would say the same thing. Never let the pressures of work, the pressures of school, and I know what they are. Believe me, I do.
But never let it interfere with what we have here. Otherwise you won't be able to be an overcomer, you won't be able to be strong, you won't be able to meet the enemy. And as someone has said, suddenly you'll need the sword of the Spirit and you find yourself fumbling for it, and you can't find it because you haven't been using it regularly. And so here we have the Word of God brought before us.
But as we said a moment ago, there's a warning here. Oh, there's a world out there that wants to rob us of all of that.
And I suppose, I suppose there never was a tug on our souls and on our hearts more than there is today.
And I want you to know that I stand here not necessarily having learned all that I say to you. I say it to my own heart just as much because the world has at least as much a tug on my heart as it does on yours, and quite possibly even more. There is a world out there that holds out all its attractions for us. And there are opportunities today for young people, perhaps at least in these favored lands that have never existed before.
And if you have any ability at all, at any ambition?
And any, shall we say, get up and go as the world says, oh, there are opportunities out there to go into all of these things. Well, I don't say that the Christian shouldn't work hard. The Scripture tells us to do that. I don't say that the Christian shouldn't necessarily have a good job. The Lord gives you a good job. You can be thankful for it. But where is my heart?
The Lord Jesus could say where your treasure is.
There will your heart be also. He didn't say where your treasure is. There should your heart be? He said where it is, there will your heart be. Is my treasure down here? Is my objective to have things down here? Then that's where my heart is. Is my treasure up there? Then that's where my heart is. How blessed to have that treasure up there.
And you know, we need to take the long range of you.
And perhaps they may speak plainly, because I have seen many not so young either. I don't mean just young people, but I have seen many who have, as we said here a moment ago, neglected the word of God, neglected that personal enjoyment of the Lord, neglected their heavenly portion, and then instead of being an overcomer, they had been overcome by the world.
The Lord Jesus could say I have overcome the world, but oh how many I can think of at this very time.
And I say it with fear and trembling, because my own heart is no better. Who?
Have not been able to overcome who have allowed the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life in some way, shape or form to take hold of their souls. And so the things that are not seen, which are eternal, tend to be forgotten, and the things which are seen that the apostle Paul says are temporal, tend to have first place in their lives. Oh, how solemn, because it says here the world passeth away, or is passing away.
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Might more accurately read, and the lust thereof. But he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.
I can remember several years ago sitting down with a young man.
And he told me a lot about all his ambitions and all the things he wanted to do. He had a good deal of ability. He had a fairly good job for someone who was only in his late teens. And he had all kinds of ideas of where he was going to go and how he would be the youngest manager in that particular company for the whole area and how he expected to go on from there to hire things. And after he finished it all, I addressed him by name and said, you know, that's all very good.
And you know that I'm glad to see someone who works hard. The word of God tells us that. But I said, where is it all going to go when you sit down before the judgment seat of Christ? He was a believer. He knew the Lord as his Savior. I said, where is it all going to go? And more than that, even before that time, where are the Lord's things and where are his interests going to be in all of what you've.
Saying to me, well, he kind of sat there, he didn't say anything, kind of hung his head a bit and then he changed the subject.
Well, it's very sad. I won't go into the history of that young man, but he's not an overcomer today. He's not an overcomer. He's been overcome. Which is it going to be? Let's turn over to the Book of Revelation now.
Revelation is primarily a book of judgment.
As we said a moment ago, it's the awful consequences for those who reject that eternal life which came down to earth.
But you know, Peter tells us that judgment begins at the House of God. And so we find in Revelation chapters 2:00 and 3:00.
That God, before he takes on the judgment of this world, the Lord Jesus Christ walks in the midst of the candlesticks, and he tells what he sees. And those candlesticks that we have, those seven churches in Revelation 2 and three, as perhaps many of us are aware, were actual assemblies that existed in that day and age. But I believe the Spirit of God has put them together in the particular order in which they occur.
In order to bring before us what we might call a panoramic history of the Church of God down through the ages. And so we have Ephesus, the condition of the church. Shortly after the apostles left the scene where they had left their first love. Everything outwardly OK, but then having left their first love, the Lord addresses them.
But there was no turn around of the state of things.
So then we have Sardis, and there you find a period of persecution in the second and third centuries that occurred under the Roman Empire. Terrible persecution. Why did the Lord allow it? Oh, he allowed it in order to recall the Church to its heavenly calling. Was it effective? Oh, many wonderful tales of faithfulness during that time, things which I commend all of you to read.
But it didn't result in a turn around.
The devil was trying to stamp out Christianity, but he couldn't succeed in that way, so he tried a different tack and it was all too successful. And under Pergamos, which would speak perhaps of the beginning of the era under the Emperor Constantine in the year 330 AD, we find that instead of Christianity being persecuted as a religion, and instead of Christians being hounded to death and thrown to the lions in the.
Coliseum and so on.
We find that here was one who outwardly embraced Christianity, and so it became the religion of the Empire.
By infiltrating and connecting the church with the world where he couldn't succeed. By open and outright persecution.
Well, once again God makes a call to the overcomer, and no doubt there were overcomers in Ephesus and in Sardis and in Pergamos.
But once Pergamos had come to the scene and once there had been no turn around there, then we might say it and say it reverently. God said there's no hope to turn the situation around. I am going to speak only to the overcomer now. I'm not going to expect that the church as a body will turn around and come back to where it was at the beginning. I'm going to speak only to the overcomer because each of those next.
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Churches, all characteristic of certain things, I believe, go on to the end until the Lord comes.
Thyatira.
I'm sorry, I said sorry to secondly, I meant Smyrna. They both begin with an S and I got them mixed up. The second church where the persecution occurred is Smyrna. Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea all go on to the end. And so we're going to read what God says to the overcomer in each one of those because I suggest that there is a voice to each one of us, to your heart and to mine.
Revelation chapter 2, then remember we're finished with Ephesus Smyrna.
And pergamos, they have passed, and now God says, I'm going to speak only to the overcomer. And so that's why the word of encouragement, he that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches, is at the end of the dissertation. It's addressed only to the overcomer.
I ask each one here as an individual to ask, do I want to be an overcomer by the grace of God?
Revelation 2 and verse 25.
But that which ye have already hold fast till I come. And he that overcometh and keepeth my works unto the end, to Him will I give power over the nations. And he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of a Potter shall they be broken to shivers, even as I received of my Father, And I will give him the morning star. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.
Thyatira.
Is the case where the church rules the world? It started up.
Shortly after the era of Pergamos.
Where instead of the Church courting the world as it did in the time of Constantine, it ruled the world.
And for nearly 1000 years, the Church held sway over this world, at least outwardly.
But what was the result? All kinds of evil crept in by that unholy alliance.
And God addresses the overcomer here by saying that would she have already hold fast till I come?
Oh, I say to you again, beloved young people, there is a danger of losing what we have. And how do we lose it? We lose it by not walking in it and when we're surrounded by so much evil.
How easy it is to lose what we have.
And the first passages we were talking about in John 16. And in first John, we find that we were talking about, first of all, the Lord Jesus Christ, and secondly, his word as overcoming the world. But here it's more a deeper thing because the world has become mixed in with the church and the church with the world. And so I suggest here it's a question not merely of overcoming the world, although that is the real.
Bottom line, but it's overcoming that spiritual wickedness, it's overcoming that unholy alliance and all of those things that would drag us down in the religious and spiritual realm as well as in the world. Well, here we have He that overcometh verse 26 and keepeth my works under the end.
Keepeth my works under the end. O how many there are who have started out well and who have not gone unfaithfully to the end. But God gives encouragement here, and he doesn't point us to any recovery in this world. He points us on to the end. Are you misunderstood in this world? There's a day coming when you're going to rule. Are you having to endure a lot of difficulty down here? The Lord Jesus says you will reign with me someday.
And then he mentions the Morning Star for the first time in connection with the seven churches.
The Lord's coming is mentioned, and you can't be an overcomer unless the coming of the Lord is bright before your eyes. And you know, as we get occupied with this world, we tend to lose the sense in our souls of the proper hope of the church, the Lord's coming. That's what went out the window, we might say, first of all, and then the church settled down to enjoy the world. But if the Lord's coming is before us as an ever present hope.
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Then I believe it will give us that sense in our souls that we don't belong here.
And that encouragement to go on in that day when we'll reign with him.
Let's turn over now to Sardis.
Chapter 3, Verse two. Be watchful and strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die.
For I have not found thy works perfect before God. Remember, therefore how thou hast received and heard.
And hold fast and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy.
He that overcometh the same shall be clothed in white raiment. And I will not blot out his name out of the Book of Life, but I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. Oh, this is very searching. Sardis brings before us Protestantism, and we might make this remark that the Reformation was of God.
Protestantism was not.
The Reformation was a work of God, but what arose out of it? Oh, the Lord has to say, and we didn't read it, but in the first verse thou hast to name that thou live a standard dead. And oh, this is a very solemn thing to my own soul, when I think that there may well be those sitting right in this very room who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior. What a solemn thought to be sitting in the place of privilege.
Surrounded by others who are on their way to glory and waiting for the Lord's return. And yet deep down in your heart, perhaps you know and realize that if the Lord were to come right now.
You would not go up to meet him. Oh, how solemn to have a name to live and yet to be dead, dead spiritually dead in trespasses and sins, as it says in Ephesians 2. But oh, here we have.
Be watchful and strengthen the things which remain, which are ready to die.
Oh, there are things which remain, and perhaps they might seem ready to die, but you know, I would encourage your heart to go on. If God has revealed something to you of his precious truth to walk in, oh, may I encourage you to walk in it. I may be perhaps forgiven if I tell a story that concerns my father. I've told it before, but I think it's worth telling again. My father worked for a very wealthy man who has been gone now perhaps 15 or more.
For years, and he was a very wealthy man, he owned a very nice farm not too far outside the city of Hamilton where I live. And as so often happens, as the city grew, it gradually came out and the surrounding farm started to be bought up for building. Well, I don't know how it is down here in the United States, but in our area at least, farming is not as profitable as it used to be, especially fruit farming.
And this man, he only kept the farm basically as a hobby. His income came from other sources. And that farm didn't even pay the expenses that were involved in running it, but he ran it just the same. And he hung on a wood until every other farm surrounding his was bought up and built on. And one day he said to my father as we were sitting eating our lunch there in the summer.
He said. Why do you go to that little meeting where you go?
Why do you be bothered going there? Don't you think it would be just as well to give it up and go in with some larger group?
Or go in with something else. Why do you bother hanging on to that?
Well, Dad said, why do you hang on to this farm? Why do you hang on to it when every other farm around you is being built up upon and you're left like an island here in the middle? Why do you hang on to the place when it doesn't even pay expenses? Why didn't you sell out long ago? Oh, well, he said. You know very well that as all the other farms surrounding me are bought up and built on, the value of mine goes up.
And when I do sell it, eventually I can command the highest price for it.
Because it's surrounded by all the others that have been built up all, Dad said. It's the same with the truth of God.
It's the same with the truth of God. If it weren't the truth of God, I would have given it up long ago. But if it is the truth of God, if anything, let me hang on to it all the tighter as I see it being given up by others around.
That's that's what characterizes an overcomer. It's not one necessarily who goes out and boasts of great things know.
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Nor was someone else has said how inappropriate in this day and age to boast of Greek things when the light from God's precious Word has revealed how little we have done. But by the on the other hand, individual faithfulness and what God has given us, I believe the Lord will reward in a coming day as we have here to walk in white before Him. What a blessed hope.
All our time is nearly gone. Let's turn to Philadelphia verse 8.
I know thy works. Behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it.
For thou hast a little strength, and has kept my word, and has not denied my name. Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not but to lie. Behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee, because thou hast kept the word of my patience. I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation. That's the tribulation.
Which shall come upon all the world to try them that dwell upon the earth. Behold, I come quickly, hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out. And I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is near Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God. And I will write upon him my new name.
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. Oh, I wish we had more time to dwell on this, because I suggest to your heart and mind that there is no greater encouragement in the whole Bible than what we get here, no greater encouragement in the whole Bible than what we get in the address to Philadelphia. Oh, there's nothing to boast of, only a little strength.
Despised and rejected, I believe that characterizes the recovery of the truth in the last century.
And by the grace of God, I believe there will be a Philadelphia till the Lord comes.
I wouldn't want to say that I was connected with it. I hope I am. But I do say that there will be a Philadelphia because each of the last four go on till the Lord comes.
May it be the exercise of your heart and mind to want to be connected with it. I covet this place because it has the Lord's approval. And what characterizes them is what we've already had before us, kept His word and not denied His name. Oh, those two things never fail. And the Lord Jesus in John's gospel connected us with himself, and in John's epistle with His precious word. May we ever have those two things before.
And so it says here.
Behold, I come quickly. Oh, he doesn't just say I will give him the morning Star. The morning star he was going to give them. But now he says I come quickly. Oh, the time is getting closer and closer. But he says, hold that fast which thou hast that No man take thy crown. What does that mean? Take thy crown? How can someone take my crown? Oh, I suggest to you that it means this.
That God is going to have those who are connected with Philadelphia when he comes.
But if you and I will not be overcomers, if you and I succumb to the pressures around us, if you and I do not, by the grace of God, lay hold on.
What God has given us, and if His precious truth does not lay hold of us, then God, as it were, is going to raise up someone else to do it. But you and I will be the losers. Oh, how solemn to think and how touching to think that in that coming day I may see someone else receiving a crown.
That I might have received and hear my Savior say at the judgment seat of Christ.
Bill, you could have. You could have had that crown too. You could have had that crown.
But you didn't overcome.
And now I'm giving it to someone else.
Well, I say that very humbly. Here we have hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. And then the word of encouragement, Oh, I say again, there's no more better word of encouragement in the whole Bible. Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God. I may not stand out as a pillar in this world. I may not stand out as a pillar in the religious world or in the Christian world. But if I'm part of this.
I'm going to be a pillar in a coming day, the name of my God, the name of the city of my God, which is New Jerusalem.
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That cometh down out of heaven from my God. Oh, if you turn to Revelation chapter 21, you'll find that New Jerusalem described. And what is it? Oh, it's the bride of Christ. The bride of Christ. Oh, what a blessed thing it is to be part of the bride of Christ. And every Christian saved in this dispensation will be part of that bride. But oh, I believe there will be a special joy for those who have kept His word and have not.
His name. And then it says I will write upon him my new name, Although that, that that goes beyond my mind.
The only thing I can say about it is this, and that is that I wonder, I say it in that way, I wonder if his new name is the name of Son of Man. Because the Lord Jesus is the Son of God, and we all know that he was always the Son of God, but he is Son of man, and the Son of man is perfect man and perfect God. He is there risen and at the Father's right hand, and he's going to be a man for all eternity that he might enjoy your.
In mind and God is going to write his new name upon us. Well, I just suggest the thought. We don't know, but I wonder if that's the new name that is referred to here.
Our time is nearly gone.
Laodicea verse 17 or verse 15 perhaps?
I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would though Wert cold or hot. So then because thou art Luke warm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth, because thou sayest I am rich and increased with goods, and have need of nothing, and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable, and poor, and blind and naked.
I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear.
And anoint thine eyes will I serve, that thou mayest see as many as I love I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come into him, and will Sup with him, and he with me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am sat down with my Father in his throne.
Oh, you know, the worst state of all that a Christian can be in is to be.
In a state where we don't realize what we really are.
It's one thing to feel our weakness and to own it before the Lord. And no matter how weak we are, if we own our true state before the Lord, the Lord delights to come in and blessing, and He blesses according to our need. But if we pretend to be what we're not, oh, then the Lord has to occupy us with our failure before he can bless us and fill us with Christ. And yet that is what is characteristic of the last state of the church.
A saying I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing.
Beloved brethren, that tendency is in my own heart, and it's in all of our hearts if we're not careful.
The tendency to think we're doing fine and then the Lord perhaps has to speak to us. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten.
Oh, brethren, young people, the Lord is speaking to us in many ways.
In ways that he perhaps has not done before in the same way.
Serious ways, the Lord wants our ear. Is it because there is a Laodicean state that he is speaking about? I don't know.
I know what my own heart is like though, and I know that God did not write these things merely for us to read and say, Well thank God that's not me. Oh no, Oh no, no. I believe there is a tendency here. And so he says, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Well, we know that could never happen to a true believer in Christ. I believe that that properly speaks of the false church that will be here after the true church.
Home but I do suggest that the state of things that is spoken of here is equally abhorrent to God and not realizing our true state and are pretending to be what we're not. And if the Lord in his wondrous love to us rebukes and chastens. May we hear the word, may we listen to what he says to us. May we not say well have to go on these things happen, you know.
Didn't happen to me. Oh no. As many as I love and rebuke and I rebuke and chase and be zealous therefore, and repent.
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And oh, how blessed if any man hear my voice. Oh, it comes down to the individual. And by the grace of God, beloved young people, I've said this before, but I'll say it again. There is no reason why you, in these last years of the Church's history, cannot enjoy the Lord just as much in your own soul as the Apostle Paul and the Apostle John and others did right at the beginning of the dispensation.
The collective testimony may be in ruins. We know it is.
And we may all like the Apostle Paul on the voyage to my leader. The church may get to the glory to the shore just like his shipwreck. Someone boards and someone broken pieces of the ship, and so on. It may be a mess, but there's no reason why you can't enjoy the Lord individually just as much as anyone did at the beginning of the dispensation. God and the Word of His grace have not changed.
And then there's the blessed encouragement. He that overcometh.
Will I give to sit with me in my throne? Oh, you may be despised and rejected down here. You may be misunderstood by other young people, other Christians even. Never mind. There will come a day when it will be all worthwhile.
Our time is gone, I said. We turn to one verse in one John 5, and I'd just like to read it.
I, John. Chapter 5.
And verse 41, John five and four. For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world.
And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
Or may we have faith to lay hold on these things in order that each one of us might be an overcomer. Don't say I can't be an overcomer. I've heard more than one say that I can't do it. I can't do that. I can't be like this one or that one. Don't try and be like this one or that one. Try to be like that blessed one in the glory. He has walked the pathway for you. He has gained the victory. You have only to draw on His strength. It's all there for each one of us.
Even in these difficult days.