NEVER SURRENDER by G. V. Kilgore

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 28, 1878

NEVER SURRENDER.

By G. V. Kilgore

The title of one of Mr. Moody’s anecdotes is, “We will never Surrender.” It is a story told in the history of the ninth century, of a young man who went out with only five hundred men to attack a king with an army of three thousand men. The king sent a messenger to the young man saying that he need not fear to surrender, for he would treat him kindly; but the young man would not trust good promises from an enemy. He therefore called up one of his soldiers and said to him, “Take this dagger and drive it to your heart;” and the soldier took the dagger and drove it to his heart. The young man called up another of his men, and said, “Leap into yonder chasm;” and the man leaped into the chasm. Then the young commander turned to the king’s messenger, and said: “Go back and tell your king I have five hundred men like these. We will die, but we will never surrender. And tell your king another thing, that I will have

him chained with my dog inside of half an hour.” When the king heard this he was afraid, and his army fled. And the same day the young man had the king chained with his dog.

If this story is true, the young warrior showed the right kind of zeal to be successful. It is the kind of zeal that we want in the cause of God, and that we must have if we would stand through the trying times before us. When we are tempted to yield to earthly powers instead of obeying God, we must be strong enough to say, “We will die, but we will never surrender.” No difference if good promises are made to protect us and treat us kindly. We will have to remember that good promises from our enemy are only to trap us into sin. The devil tried to catch Christ by good promises. He offered the Saviour all the kingdoms of the world, if he would only fall down and worship him; but Christ said, “Get thee behind me, Satan; for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” This is what we want to remember. When the dragon voice of the two-horned beast is heard, we want to be ready to say, “It is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” “We will die, but we will never surrender.” And another thing we can remember then is this: In a short time God will have the dragon, or devil, chained, and cast into a lake of fire with “dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.” G. V. KILGORE.