You Must Persevere

 

by Mihran Kulhanjian

 

 

My dear Friends,

Do not fall away.  Persevere. Receive Jesus and have a new life with Christ living in you. The Holy Spirit is the Comforter and Helper (John 14:16). Jesus promises to send us a Helper to help us along our way in life as a Christian.  We must walk in the Spirit and leave the fresh. A true Christian goes through a period of trials, sorrow of sin, hatred of sin, and a repentance of sin (turning from a sinner to a saint).  All those who forsake sin and follow Jesus are called Saints. God wants all to live saintly and takes no pleasure that people should perish (go to hell because of their sins). The path to becoming a saint is that you acknowledge and have an understanding, of the gravity of sin in your life, that it is understood which leads to following God’s commandments and obeying His word.  Walking every day in Christ is now realized (He is in your thoughts daily—throughout the day). He will abide in you and you in Him. God wants us to take on the character of His Son Jesus Christ, who was perfect, without sin. As in the story by John Bunyan, The Pilgrims Progress, Christians are on a pilgrimage eventually leading to heaven, but they must persevere, they must overcome [sin] as Jesus said. The life of a Christian is perseverance to the end, that is, a steadfast belief in Christ, and faithful service to Christ until the end, death in this world.

 

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:2). Renewing you mind is keeping your mind on things above. Renewing your mind through God's word and fellowship with God daily.

 

 

The Bible is God’s word; it is the inspired word of God, produced by the Holy Spirit by godly men. The act and life of becoming a Christian has everything to do with “prosperity.”  However, prosperity does not mean simply financial riches as preached by many of today’s “prosperity preachers.” And unfortunately “the prosperity gospel” is often the main focus in soft-soap, ministries preaching financial riches and an abundant life of peace and happiness. God’s will is that we prosper in all things, that we are blessed; this includes our finances, our health. physical wellbeing, and spiritual wellbeing. The gospel is about the atoning death of Jesus Christ. It is a message of redemption, reconciliation, and salvation.  It is about knowing God, obeying Him, bringing glory to Him loving Him, and enjoying Him while we are on this earth and grooming our character so that we will be able to have fellowship with God, and to join Him once our life on this earth is over.  However, there are conditions we must meet.  We must believe and have faith in Jesus and what He did for us.  And we must repent of our sins, be born again, be baptized to profess and confess with our mouth our faith of obedience to Christ.  We must not be ashamed of the Gospel, but be witnesses of it.  

 

Heaven is the reward for your acceptance and obedience to God.  We come to God individually--not in a group. You obey God and leave the consequences to Him.  It is by God’s grace that you are saved through faith (Ephesians 2:8. 9). You must have faith and believe in Jesus Christ the only Son of God who was the Lamb of God; He was the atonement for our sins—our sin bearer. This is what will save you from the torments of Hell and eternal separation from God.

 

God does not promise you a problem-free, happy life once you become a Christian.  In fact, He promises you persecution. All true Christians [especially those who publicly evangelize and witness] will be persecuted who follow Christ and proclaim Him at Lord. He does promise an abundant [full] life and a life of peace knowing that we will not perish but have eternal life in Heaven with Him as a believer and that we can call on Him for all of our anxieties with prayer and supplication. His grace is sufficient; for "If God is for us, who can be against us" [Romans 8:31].  The abundant life is a full life, a spiritually full life, but not an easy, heavenly life, because we are not in Heaven yet. Christians are not of this world. Our kingdom is not here, therefore, our peace in this life is in Jesus--He is sufficient. We lean on Him and rely on Him. You cannot love this world and love God.  This world we live in is of the fresh. God’s world is of the spirit.  God is spirit. We must also live in the spirit to have fellowship with God. We cannot communicate with God in the fresh, but only in the spirit.  This is why when we pray, we must pray in the spirit and in truth.  We do not fake prayers. A believer's prayer is a truthful, honest prayer? Not a hypocritical prayer.  We pray God's will. His will is His plans for us regarding a great and complete salvation, prospering in all things. You may not understand all of this now, but I am certain you will understand it in time as you press on, and you will grasp an understanding of what God is, what He did for us and you specifically and what He requires of each of us, individually. Yes, God has a plan for you and only as a true Christian will you know His will for you and your life.

 

God makes many promises in the Bible; He is not one to break His promises. God cannot lie.  God’s peace for you, as a Christian, is based on the fact that all things in your life are working for good. "The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7) . You may not realize it at the time, but as a Christian, God is at work in you. God’s ways are far above our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9).  As long as you accept and understand this, you’ll be alright. Have faith.  We cannot please God without faith.  For, it is by God's grace we are saved by our faith in Him and what He has done for us.

 

A true Christian turns from all self-righteousness, self-centered conceit, and pride. A true Christian stops living for himself and lives for Christ.  A Christian serves, and becomes last so he will be exalted to first.  A true Christian is unselfish. He obeys the commands of Jesus, the Lord or Lords and King of kings (Revelation 17:14) and lives not for himself, but for Christ till the end of his days.  We must persevere to the end.  A Christian examines himself daily to ensure he is walking in the word (Spirit), he is obeying God and living as God commands.  “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).  A true follower of Christ walks in the spirit.  His life is conducted now in the spirit of Christ.  Let us all be a living sacrifice that all will take notice and say:  "I want what he has."  And what do you have?  You have Jesus and the knowledge that the Holy Spirit has given you.  You have love, peace, joy, gentleness, kindness, faithfulness, longsuffering, goodness and self-control.

 

Becoming a Christian and remaining a true Christian is a life-long endeavor of selflessness with a focus on Jesus.  When you believe and follow Jesus you are called a child of God. If you are in sin, living in sin, not obeying God, rebelling against Him, you are called a child of your father the devil because you are doing the devil’s work not God’s work.  The wicked are also called the “children of wrath” because they do not obey God. There is only one true God and He has a Son, Jesus.  And Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, but through Him” (John 14:6). Jesus is our advocate, He is the Advocate with God with all authority given to Him in heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18), given to Him by Father God.  God, the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are not created persons; they have always existed and are eternal.

 

Do remember this:  Gods ways are not our ways.  His thoughts are not our thoughts, and that we must love what God loves and hate what God hates. God hates sin.  Sin is lawlessness, a transgression of the law. This is the Moral Law God revealed to Moses (Exodus 20) to give to the Israelites.  To become a Christian we must hate sin in all of its forms and we must obey God, because when we obey Him we show our love, our respect, our fear of Him.  The fear of God is a healthy fear. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil and align ourselves with Him.

 

To persevere take the advice of David in Psalm 37:4-5:

Delight yourself also in the Lord,
And He shall give you the desires of your heart.

Commit  your way to the Lord,
Trust also in Him,
And He shall bring it to pass.

What is it to delight yourself in the Lord?  To delight in the Lord is to do His will, to agree and live as He prescribes. Bringing glory to Him is to delight in the Lord.  And what are the desires of the heart which God will give you? What are the desires He will give you?  The desires of your heart is everything God promises to the faithful.  These are the blessings God offers to His children.

 

"The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance" (2 Peter 3:9).

 

 It shows that we know God commands all to repent of sin. We cannot have fellowship with God when we know God, His love, His power, His goodness, faithfulness and wrath on the disobedient. God is love and God loves love.  Jesus said love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.  That is, bring no harm to others--love them, care for them, protect them and tell them the truth about God and the truth about real salvation based on God's grace and our faith in the work, the sacrifice Jesus made for us, sinners who could not save ourselves from the eternal fire.  Jesus is the truth. Know the truth and believe on Jesus.

 

The first and greatest commandment Jesus said was to love God with all of our heart, mind and soul and second to love our neighbors as ourselves (Mark 12:30-31). If we love God, we will keep His commandments and not sin.  We must realize and believe that our sins were crucified on the cross with Jesus. Our sins were put to death. Realize now that you do not have to sin willfully. The children of God can life in holiness. This is a choice. You can make this choice. It is not by keeping rules; it is realizing and believing in faith that your sinful nature is overcome by the death of Jesus. Believe that you can be as holy as you want to be. It's true.  God is faithful and He created us to be holy.

 

When we give ourselves to God and intentionally sin, we are telling God that “the truth is not in us” and we do not truly love God. Do not be a hypocrite. Pray to our Father that the Holy Spirit helps us to stop all sinning.  Temptation is not a sin, but acting on the temptation is. God will not send you anything that you cannot handle. When you are tempted to sin, pray to God to clear the temptation from your mind.

 

God is sovereign.  He is in control of everything.  A Christian is faithful.  As Ephesians 2:8-9 says:  “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”  We are saved by the grace of God.  You cannot earn your way to Heaven by bribing God with good deeds.  It is only by the grace of God that we are saved.  After you have made Jesus Christ your Lord and Savior, the Holy Spirit (our Comforter and Helper given to us by Jesus) will direct us to do good things to help others as true Christians. Fervent prayer will bring us to glorify God and will give us fellowship with Him on an intimate level. A Christian prays. 

 

Becoming a Christian may be confusing at first with endless rules, unanswered questions and concerns; this is why we have God’s instruction manual, the Holy Bible. 

 

There are many lukewarm Christians who do not read or study the Bible. They profess to be Christians, but do not obey God’s commands.  A true Christian is more exclusive than what many people believe.  Jesus said in Matthew 7:21-23:

 

 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.”