The Road to Reward

From James MacDonald weekly email, it definitely caught my attention, because it's exactly how I'm feeling and so I thought i'd share it with you:

"The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." - Revelation 3:5-6

If you are a mom or dad, you say some things to your kids over and over. I'm sure there are warnings you give them every day, right? We are all stubborn sheep (Isaiah 53:6), so we don't learn quickly. Important stuff has to be repeated. The letters Jesus wrote to the churches in Revelation were specific, but each church saw all the letters. The repetitions show us His crucial themes.

Revelation 2:7 says, "To the one who conquers." Conquers means"overcomes, doesn’t give up, endures to the end." Similar phrases show up in Revelation 2:10-11, 17, 26 and 3:5.

You and I have got to conquer. Jesus said, "The one who endures to the end will be saved" (Mark 13:13). People who aren't really saved give up and quit. The truth is, we will all experience tough seasons in our lives. We will experience hard weeks or even a rough month or year. But we get moving again. Endurance doesn't save us, but it does prove our salvation. We have to finish strong. We have to pick up the pace as we get older. A real Christian says, "I love Him more and more. 'I press on' (Philippians 3:14) to be sanctified day after day, growing in Christ." That's the life of a believer - one who conquers. Conquerors get the rewards. Rewards will not go to the quitter. They will not go to the "I-tried-it-and-couldn't-do-it" type of people, nor to the "faith-was-just-a-phase-I-went-through" kind of people. All those people? Not conquerors.

"The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life." The book of life is the volume containing the names of all the people alive on the face of the earth. If they die outside of the Gospel, without receiving the gift of eternal life that is found in Christ - their names are blotted out of the book. They're not going to live forever.

Jesus said about the conqueror, "I will never blot his name out of the book of life." That promise is awesome. Your name's going to be forever in that book, and you will live in eternity with Christ, if you just endure.

"I will confess his name before my Father." Imagine Jesus saying, "She's one of Ours. Yeah, he's with Us for sure." Conquering means an eternal reward with Christ.

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I am a conquerer. I am persevering. I can't give up. That's all I can say right now. I know that a life with Christ is better than a life without Christ, although that's not what I feel most times. I can't rely on my feelings, I have to rely on truth and the promise in God's Word.

Following Christ is something I will not quit. I wake up and devote that day to the Lord, but most days find myself stumbling and failing daily. But I wake up the next morning and try again. Some days Jesus may seem farther away than others, but I will not give up, I will persevere...I have to.

And I hope you will to.