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TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks About the Tempter (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 005. How to Win
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How to Win
Will you mark as keenly as you ever marked anything that there must be two factors on the winning side in that fight? There must be a determined will, and there must be alongside the Man who was tempted in all points just as we are, and who never failed, and who never fails. Let it be said very plainly that neither one is enough without the other.
There must be a jaw-locked determination not to yield. With greatest reverence, be it said, the Lord Jesus alone without our wills is not enough. He works through the man's will. He works with us. He can work only through us. He strengthens the will. That will may be very weak. It may be shattered and smashed by indulgence in sin out of all resemblance to a will. But, remember, it is never lost. While there's life, there's a choosing power. However weak it may be it still can choose. And our tempted, victorious Lord Jesus will help it to act, and to act right, no matter how hard it seems. And then He helps it through that act of choice.
He will put new life and strength into one the very moment the determination is decided upon. And so, bit by bit, sometimes in a way that seems slow, but very very surely, the new strength comes into the will. And so through the choice to resist the wrong and do the right, our victorious Fellow-Man breathes new strength in, and gives us the enormous advantage of His victory and of His presence.
But let it be said, just as bluntly and plainly as it can be said, that the will alone is not enough. A man may have a square jaw, a hard fist, a head high at the crown, and in other ways give evidences of a ruggedly strong will. But as surely as he goes alone, he will go down, and he will go down sprawling, and he will carry the scars of his fall clear to the end of the chapter of life.
He may not go down for quite a while, and that itself will greatly increase his confidence in himself, but the fall will come to the man going alone. Going alone means going down before you get through. And the longer the fall-down is deferred, the sharper and harder the fall will be when it does come.
There must be a will, and there must be more—a Saviour too, a Friend, a Helper. Neither one nor the other, but one and the other; a will and a Saviour; a will strengthened and helped by a Saviour; a Saviour tempted in all points, therefore sympathetic; victorious at every point, and therefore strong to help—a Saviour like that working through our wills.
If this wondrous Victor of the Wilderness, and of Calvary, be not allowed to help, there will be a French Waterloo in your life. And the French never talk about their Waterloo. They are a bit busy if that topic is suggested. There is no Waterloo on the famous Napoleon Monument in Paris. The sculptor had a convenient lapse of memory just then. The greatest battle was omitted.
If you will allow this great human Saviour, who was divine too, to come alongside and help, there will be an English Waterloo in your life.
Every temptation is a chance for a Victory. It is a signal to fly the flag of our Victor. It is a chance to make the tempter know anew that he is defeated. It is an opportunity to strike the note for a ringing song of victory. Steady, steady—there's a will within, and a Friend alongside, and a victory just ahead, with the flag high, and the music joyous.
"Hold on, my heart, in thy believing!
The steadfast only wear the crown;
He who, when stormy waves are heaving,
Parts with his anchor, shall go down;
But he whom Jesus holds through all
Shall stand, though earth and heaven fall.
"Hold out! There comes an end to sorrow;
Hope from the dust shall conquering rise;
The storm foretells a sunnier morrow;
The cross points on to Paradise.
The Father reigneth, cease all doubt;
Hold on, my heart, hold on, hold out." (Schmolke.)