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Obtaining the Victory

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 18, 1911

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 88, No. 20.

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Obtaining the Victory

By GEO. B. THOMPSON

GEO. B. THOMPSON
THE Lord designs that his followers shall be victors, and know no defeat. He has assured them that he who dwells in them is greater than he that dwells in the world. To the seventy whom he sent out he said: “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” Luke 10:19. He assures us further that “sin shall not have dominion over you.” We are promised victory over sin, not alone in the world to come, but in this world. Where sin abounds, grace much more abounds. There is more grace than sin, thank God.
What is it to really have victory overthe world, the flesh, and the devil? One writer aptly states it as follows:—
“When you are forgotten or neglected, or purposely set at naught, and you smile inwardly, glorying in the insult or the oversight,—that is victory.”
“When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your taste is offended, your advice is disregarded, your opinions are ridiculed, and you take it all in patient and loving silence,—that is victory.”
“When you are content with any food, any raiment, any climate, any society, any solitude, any interruption,—that is victory.”
“When you can bear with any disorder, any irregularity and unpunctuality, any annoyance,—that is victory.”
“When you can stand face to face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensibility, and endure it all as Jesus endured it,—that is victory.”
“When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation, or to record your own good works, or to yearn after commendation,—when you can truly ‘love to be unknown,’—that is victory.”
This is the attainment of righteousness by faith. “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” 1 John 5:4. Faith is the victory. It is through believing that we overcome. Christ, by means of the Holy Spirit, dwells in the heart through faith. To have the victory is to believe God. It is to say “amen” to what the Lord says. “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” The failures and defeats which have marred our experience are the fruit of our unbelief. Some of us have had a terrible harvest. Shall we not make the words of Paul, tossed on the stormy Adria, our own, “Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer: for I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told me”?
Washington, D. C.