Do you believe there is something in the Christian life that you have
not found, or that you do not possess? And do you want that experience?
If you can say yes to these questions, then give thanks to God that he
has led you by his Grace to take the first step toward Victory.
The first step toward the Victorious Life is for a Christian to
recognize the need, to realize that there is an experience that he
does not possess. As in the case of an unconverted man who can never
understand nor receive the Gospel message till he comes to the place
of seeing himself a sinner, so a satisfied and defeated Christian is
in no place to receive the Victorious Life message. The defeated man
described in the seventh chapter of Romans cries out, “O wretched man
that I am! who shall deliver me out of the body of this death?” The
reason some Christians have never tasted the victory of the eighth
chapter of Romans is because they have never known anything of the
struggle that is described in the seventh chapter of Romans.
A College Student’s “Problem”
A young college student came to a speaker on the Victorious Life for an
interview, but started in by saying that he had no “problems” in his
Christian life.
“Do you have complete victory over sin?”
“Well, it depends on what you mean by sin.”
“Do you ever have angry thoughts and feelings in your heart toward
others?”
“Do you mean get ‘peeved’ at people? Sure I do.”
“Do you ever worry about things?”
“Worry about things! I should say I do. Everybody does.”
“Do you ever have impure thoughts and desires in your heart?”
“Yes, I do.”
“These things are sins, aren’t they?”
“Yes, I suppose they are.”
“These are the things that put the Lord Jesus on the Cross. You have
these things in your life, you do not have victory over them and other
like sins, and yet you tell me you have no ‘problem’ in your Christian
life.”
This young college student was led by the Spirit to see the inner
meaning of sin and to confess that he did indeed need something in his
Christian life that he did not have.
The sin problem is the problem of all problems. If the sin problem
in your life is settled in God’s way, you will have the secret of
solving all other problems in God’s way. Fellowship with God, peace,
joy, freedom from anxiety, power for service, the right enjoyment
and use of Bible study and prayer, all of these things and every gift
of grace will be open to you when you get the sin question settled.
At Victorious Life conferences, Christians come to the leaders and
say that they are not troubled in the matter of getting victory over
sin, but that they do not get results in their Christian service and
they want the Holy Spirit for power in service. In every such case it
is found that the real difficulty is the sin question: there is not
complete, Spirit-given victory over inward sin. When that is settled
the power in service and the results follow.
When God came to choose a name for his Son, some one has pointed out,
he went to the heart of the subject and called his name “Jesus,”
because it is he that shall save his people from their sins. It is
going to the heart of the Christian’s need, then, first to emphasize
victory over sin as the road to all other blessings of the Abundant
Life.
What is God’s way of securing this Victory?
There are two ways of getting money, or any other thing of
value――either working for it, or receiving it as a gift.