The Need for Victorious Christian Living
The goal of the Christian disciple who has set himself to be anovercomer, a victorious saint, is to attain the place of abiding in God’stemple to which the Father has called him. It is not always comfortable andeasy (although God’s wisdom and power make it possible and restful) to matchthe upward calling of God with a diligent seeking of His will.
Such diligenceis necessary because only the victorious saints—those who conquer through theHoly Spirit their fleshly nature, the world, and Satan—will receive the fullnessof the inheritance (Revelation 21:7).
The Book of Revelation emphasizes the fact that the fullness of theinheritance goes to the conquerors. The relationship of leading an overcominglife to receiving the inheritance needs to be stressed at this time in the Church of Christ.
There is not enough being said today about the need for living thevictorious Christian discipleship, the life of triumphant faith in the Spirit.Therefore the believers do not always address themselves with knowledge,purpose, and dedication to laying hold on the fullness of the inheritance.
The believers, in many instances, make a few commitments to Christ and then settle back to wait for His coming. This isa most unscriptural attitude (Philippians 3:8-15). It may be recalled that theIsraelites, God’s chosen people, failed to enter their inheritance because oftheir hardness of heart and unbelief (Hebrews, Chapter Three; Jude 1:5).
If we set our hope on becoming a living stone in God’s Temple we must give ourselves wholly toattaining the place of abiding in Christ in which wecome to rest in Him and He comes to rest in us. Every day of our Christianpilgrimage our determination to dwell in the "secret place of the mostHigh" will be tested in one manner or another.
Some days the battle is heavy; other days are quieter. It is a moment bymoment, day by day, pressing into the will of God as He leads us and gives usthe wisdom and strength to overcome every enemy.
Christians who are looking for a worldly life in which some of theirattention can be given to the pursuit of their own desires and some of theirattention can be given to the seeking of Christ, will never be able to attainthe fullness of abiding in God and Christ that they could have obtained byfollowing Christ with singleness of purpose.
The penalty for not giving full attention to God is illustrated by theIsraelites who compromised with the inhabitants of Canaan,the result being that they faced (and still face) continual warfare. They hadto endure seeing their sons and daughters take up the abominable Canaanitereligions. There is little rest for the Christian outside the bosom of theFather (John 1:18).
The Temple of God is in the processof being constructed now. It has been the plan of God from the creation of theworld to make for Himself a habitation composed of human beings who have beentransformed into the image of Christ (Romans 8:28-30).
God will dwell only in Christ—nowhere else.God in Christ will dwell in His fullness only in thebeliever who has been re-created completely—spirit, soul, and body."Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is anew creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are becomenew" (II Corinthians 5:17).
If God is to dwell in us we must "come out from among them, and beye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing" (IICorinthians 6:17). It is not possible that we can find rest in God, or He canfind rest in us, until every particle of our animal nature has been dealt with.
The "wood" must be covered with "gold" (Exodus25:11). We are being made the "Ark of the Covenant," and the"wood" of our personality must be enclosed in the "gold" ofthe Divine Nature.