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"GREATER VICTORIES!--By Father David July 11, 1978 MO--DFO 727

© August 1978, by The Family of Love, CP 748, 00100 Roma, Italia.

1. LORD JESUS, HELP US! WHEW! WOW!--The sermons I've preached to others I'm gonna need to preach to myself now! You never have a victory without a battle, and there are some battles you have to fight your whole life until your dying day!

2. BUT YOU HAVE TO KEEP GETTING THE VICTORY! Once the Lord humbles you, He has to keep humbling you.--He's gotta keep you humble. You can't just "forsake all" once and for all.

3. YOU'VE GOT TO KEEP "FORSAKING ALL" EVERYDAY! You can't just be a martyr one day, you're a martyr all your life! You have to keep leaving Egypt everyday, or you're going to build up a new Egypt. We're pilgrims & strangers!

4. EVERY PLACE WE MOVE we stack up more junk again and get all settled down, let the roots grow down. Then we've got to tear off again and leave it all behind! It's just something you've got to do everyday. Heb.11:8-10,13-16.

5. LIFE FOR THE LORD IS NOT something about which you just say, "Well, hallelujah! I made that victory! I got over that, now I'm free! I don't have to sacrifice anymore! I don't have to forsake all anymore, I don't have to hurt anymore!

6. "I DON'T HAVE TO SUFFER ANYMORE! I've got the victory! I've won the battle and the war is over, and now I'm going to settle down and be selfish and unsacrificial and enjoy life!" But David said,

7. "I WILL NOT GIVE UNTO THE LORD OF THAT WHICH HATH COST ME NOTHING!" (2Sam. 24:24.) He was saying, "It's got to hurt to be worth something! It's got to be a sacrifice!" What is a sacrifice? It's something you lay on the altar! It's something you kill! But you have got to keep doing it everyday or it raises its ugly head again!

8. JEALOUSY IS LIKE THE SEVEN-HEADED MONSTER--for every head you cut off, he grows another one! It's something you don't just get one final victory over, but there are many battles and you have to get many victories.

9. THE SELF-RIGHTEOUS HOLINESS PEOPLE with their doctrine of "entire sanctification," "eradication," figure once they've had that experience the bad self is done with and gone forever and you never have to battle it anymore--which is a lie!

10. YOU HAVE TO FIGHT THE DEVIL AND YOUR OLD SELF EVERY DAY! You are a new creature, yes!--But boy, how that old self likes to try to pop up again! Paul said, "I've fought a good fight!"--and probably most of it was against his old self! (2Tim.4:7.)

11. IT'S A BATTLE EVERY DAY--especially with your besetting sins--"the weights and the sins that do so easily beset you" (Heb.12:1), like your selfishness and laziness and jealousy.

12. SOME PEOPLE HAVE THE IDEA that you start off your Christian life with your biggest battles, like getting saved and dropping out to serve the Lord. Well, those are just little ones. That's just a starter!

13. ONCE YOU PASS THE LITTLE TESTS, THEN HE STARTS GIVING YOU BIGGER ONES!--And if you think just because you have a one-time victory you've got victory once and for all, you sure are mistaken!

14. (MARIA: AND THE MORE IMPORTANT YOU ARE TO THE LORD'S SERVICE, THE HARDER THE BATTLES ARE!--The greater the Devil fights you!) That's for sure! But the more the Lord finds He can trust you with, the more He lays it on you. If you manage to make one little sacrifice, then He'll see if you are ready to make a little bit bigger one.

15. SOME PEOPLE HAVE THE IDEA THAT ONCE THEY'RE SAVED, THAT'S IT! They've given their heart to the Lord, but they go on living for themselves. They think they've already made their sacrifice, so now they don't have to make any more.

16. THE TRUTH IS THAT YOU KEEP MAKING MORE AND MORE SACRIFICES EVERY DAY, DYING DAILY! The Lord keeps testing you with bigger and tougher and better ones, so that you grow and get stronger with every battle, and you win bigger victories all the time!

17. YOU NEVER STOP BATTLING, YOU NEVER STOP WINNING VICTORIES, you never stop progressing or you'll backslide! You can never stand still. You don't just get the victory once and for all over some besetting sin, you have to keep fighting it. But the more you win, the easier it gets, with His help.--On that one!

18. BUT YOU STILL HAVE A TEMPTATION TO BE JEALOUS, RIGHT? (Maria: Yes, but I got the victory over it having such a grip on me, but I still have battles.) Right! But now you still have to keep getting the victory, every day, every girl. (Maria: Yes, right.) And so do I! Every day, every man!--Or the same man!

19. YOU STILL HAVE TO KEEP SACRIFICING EVERY DAY! You suffer a little more every day, you hurt a little more every day, ache a little bit more every day. (Maria: But the Lord makes you stronger with each victory.) Of course!

20. IT'S SORT OF LIKE INOCULATION: He gives you small doses so you won't catch the disease, so you will constantly gradually build up your resistance to it. Whereas, if you are never tested, never given a small dose, you will never be able to take the big dose.

21. LIKE IN THE MIDDLE AGES and olden times, because assassination by poison was so common, kings and important men used to take small doses of poison every day. They'd start off with a very tiny portion, just a few grains, and keep taking a little more each day, until they gradually built up a resistance, so that if somebody gave them a large dose it wouldn't be fatal!

22. IT'S KIND OF LIKE THE LORD DOES WITH US: He gives us a little more each day to test us, to try us, to build up our strength and resistance. He inoculates us with a little more serum of sacrifice and trial and trouble and battle each day.

23. YOU THINK YOU HAVE "FORSAKEN ALL"?--HA! I've never found anybody yet who'd forsaken all forever--until they forsook their life!

24. BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO KEEP FORSAKING EVERY DAY! If you don't keep forsaking every day, you keep accumulating every day. Because stuff is constantly piling up in your life and if you didn't constantly get rid of it, you'd be up to your neck in clutter!

25. IT'S JUST LIKE HAVING A BM EVERYDAY OR GOING TO THE TOILET. You keep eating food everyday, so if you didn't have good elimination every day, think what you would be!--You'd be a human septic tank! You'd soon die, right? To say, "I finally got the victory over forsaking all!" is like saying,

25b. "WELL, I FINALLY GOT THE VICTORY OVER GOING TO THE TOILET! I don't have to get rid of anything anymore. I don't have to forsake anything anymore. I don't have to sacrifice or give up anything anymore!

26. "I DON'T HAVE TO SPEND SO MUCH TIME SITTING ON THE TOILET meditating on the throne anymore. I don't have to keep eliminating anymore--I got the victory over it!"

27. WELL, WITH THAT KIND OF VICTORY, YOU'LL SOON DIE! Like the story about the farmer with his cow: He said he got her off of feed and he'd have got her off of water too if she hadn't died!

28. SOME OF YOU SEEM TO THINK YOU CAN GET THE VICTORY ONCE AND FOR ALL OVER SOMETHING AND YOU'LL NEVER HAVE ANOTHER BATTLE. But, that's where the Devil is apt to test you the most, on the one thing where your weak spot is, your Achilles heel, your greatest weakness, your besetting sin, your greatest temptation. (Maria: Or the one thing that is dearest to you, or the area that is most important to you.) Yes!

29. JUST ABOUT THE TIME I THINK I'VE GOT THE VICTORY and really put you on the altar and sacrificed you and am willing to give you to the Lord and to others, I pick you up again and walk off with you! So the Lord has to run after me and make me come back and do it again, maybe more and more!

30. THAT'S THE TROUBLE WITH MOST CHRISTIANS: They say, "Lord, here it is, here is my dearest Isaac, here is my sacrifice. I'm going to lay it on the altar now. Lord, see, it's all Yours!"--And then they pick it up and walk off with it again!

31. THAT'S THE WAY MOST CHURCH PEOPLE ARE: They come to church on Sunday morning and sing, "Just as I am without one plea! I surrender all!"--and then they get up and walk out with it just like they came in, and they don't "surrender all" at all!

32. LET'S FACE IT: YOU WILL NEVER GET TOTAL VICTORY UNTIL YOU ARE DEAD! You have to keep sacrificing and keep forsaking all and keep battling and keep winning the victory every day--and usually even a bigger battle and a bigger victory this time!--And if you win this one, then the Lord is going to trust you with a bigger one next time.

33. EACH BATTLE GOD GIVES YOU in which you win a victory is followed with a bigger battle, because He knows He can now trust you with more. With each sacrifice comes a bigger sacrifice, with each forsake all another forsake all.

34. FOR EVERY HOME WE HAVE FORSAKEN HE HAS GIVEN US A BIGGER AND A BETTER ONE. But then what did we have to do?--We had to go off and forsake the whole thing every time! He gives you more every day, but you've got to be willing to forsake more every day.

35. HE'S GIVEN ME SO MANY LOVES and so many girls and so many women and so much sex that I have to keep giving them up, leaving them behind, but He still gives me more! (We were sitting out on the terrace watching a thunderstorm, then the sun broke through!:)

36. THE STORM IS OVER!--I braved the storm until it's over, thank the Lord! I didn't want to stay hidden in the house, so I got out here right in the thick of it! I defied the weather, defied the storm as it got worse and worse, like our battles, until it finally gave up--like the Devil!

37. (MARIA: DO YOU THINK WE SHOULD ALLOW OURSELVES TO GET HARDENED TO THE PAIN AND SUFFERING?) IT SAYS IN 2TIMOTHY 3:2: "ENDURE HARDNESS, AS A GOOD SOLDIER," and the more you're a soldier, the tougher and the harder you get! The more you're able to take, the more you're able to give up, the more you're able to forsake, the more you're able to suffer, the more you're able to sacrifice, the more you're able to stand wounds and hurts, and the tougher, stronger and harder soldier you become!

38. YOU CAN'T STAY TOO SOFT AND STAND TOO MUCH SUFFERING. Sometimes you have to get a little hard to it to be able to bear it, like doctors, nurses and soldiers. Sometimes I've had to harden myself to the hurt.

39. EACH TEST AND BATTLE IS LIKE SOME IRRITANT rubbing you on one sore spot until finally it gets so calloused you hardly feel it anymore. If you keep up the friction, keep up the rub, like a corn on your toe or a callous on your hand or foot, soon it'll harden and toughen until it no longer hurts.

40. IT'S LIKE THOSE STEEL WORKERS AND GLASS-BLOWERS and people who work with real hot stuff. They develop such thick callouses on their hands that they can pick up hot pieces of steel and glass and metals and can't even feel it anymore!

41. WELL, IF YOU'RE GOING TO WORK WITH HOT STUFF LIKE FFing, YOU'VE GOT TO GET SOMEWHAT HARDENED AND CALLOUSED TO IT! Keep a soft heart but a tough spirit! A good soldier must endure hardness. How are you going to endure hardness unless you get a little bit hard?

42. YOU HAVE TO GET HARD IN SOME WAYS TO ENDURE IT!--Not in your heart, but you gotta get a little tough and hardened in spirit. But you must not allow yourself to be too tenderhearted either. A weak, indulgent parent who is too tenderhearted and can't stand to see the child cry will never use the rod and never be firm and never discipline him and will therefore spoil him.

43. IT HURTS THE PARENTS TO DISCIPLINE A CHILD. The old saying is true!: "This hurts me more than it does you!" It hurts! But in a way you've got to steel yourself to it and harden yourself to it, and as the Scripture says, "Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not they soul spare for his crying."--by using the rod! (Prov.19:18.)

44. HOW CAN YOU STAND IT UNLESS YOU HARDEN YOURSELF A LITTLE BIT TO IT? (Maria: But if you get hard to the point that you want to deliberately strike back at somebody in malice or hate, that's not right is it?) No, that's not right of course!

45. THE PROBLEM WITH SO MANY OF US HUSBANDS IS THAT WE'VE MANY TIMES BEEN SO AFRAID TO "FORSAKE" THE ONE WE LOVE. It's not this little one-time FFing or a one-night stand or a couple hours or even a whole night or sometimes a whole week that we've had to let our wives go with somebody.

46. IT'S THE FEAR YOU ARE GOING TO LOSE HER FOREVER! You're afraid she's going to fall in love with somebody else and forsake you and go off with them forever and you'll lose her and never have her again!

47. MOST OF THE TIME JEALOUSY EXAGGERATES THINGS so much that they seem much worse than they really are. That's the Devil's business, to blow things up as big as a mountain and make you feel like, "This is it! She's gone forever! She loves him more than me! She'd rather be with him than with me!" The fear of losing someone--that's jealousy!

48. BUT "FORSAKING ALL" AND SACRIFICING IS NOT ALWAYS JUST A ONE-TIME THING, it's not something you just do once and for all and get it over with and never have to do again. It's something you have to do almost every day--die daily!

49. EVERY DAY HE'LL PROBABLY HAVE YOU SACRIFICE A LITTLE MORE to see if He can trust you with more responsibility, if you can become stronger and tougher and a better fighter. He'll give you more and He'll trust you with more if he finds out you can give up more, if He finds out you won't get so attached to it that you won't give it up.

50. IT'S LIKE THE RICH MAN that had such a big harvest (Luke 12) and so many riches that, instead of deciding to share with others, he decided to build bigger barns to hold more for himself. It wasn't the big crop which God gave him that was his sin.

51. BEING RICH IS NOT A SIN.--It's being unwilling to share and give the poor those riches. It wasn't the barns that were his sin, but that he could have been passing out food from those barns to the poor but didn't. It was the barniness, the selfishness of his own heart that was the sin.

52. GOD ENTRUSTS SOME MEN WITH RICHES IN ORDER THAT THEY MIGHT SHARE THEM with those who need them. There have been some Christian captains of industry who felt a great responsibility for the employment of the poor. If their business failed, thousands of people would be out of work.

53. BUT THEY SHARED THEIR RICHES AND ITS FRUITS, their industry, their factory, their business with others. It gave tremendous employment sometimes to thousands. As long as they were faithful in their responsibility and continued to share and made it possible for others to have their fair share, God even trusted them with more! The more you give, the more He will give you!

54. IT'S TOO-RICH INDUSTRIALISTS AND SELFISH CAPITALISTS WHO COVET IT ALL and want more than their rightful share and withhold from the poor and withhold the hire of the labourers that reap down their fields, they are the ones that God is angry with!

55. IT SAYS THAT THE CANKER OF THEIR GOLD AND THEIR SILVER SHALL BE A WITNESS AGAINST THEM! (James 5.) In other words, the rust of it, the corrosion of it from disuse will testify they didn't use it and share it with others.

56. SOME RICHES GET DULL AND TARNISHED IF YOU DON'T USE OR POLISH THEM, and that's corrosion or oxidation or rust from disuse. The utensil or silver that is used all the time every day keeps a high polish from just being used.

57. BUT SOMETHING YOU PUT AWAY AND YOU DON'T USE very much, like the silver in the drawer of the rich, has to be taken out every month by the maid and polished again because it hasn't been used.

58. IT IS BETTER TO WEAR OUT THAN RUST OUT! Better to wear out from use than rust out from disuse! One way or the other, God is going to see to it that you don't hang on to it!

59. EITHER YOU GIVE IT OR YOU JUST PLAIN LOSE IT! If I withhold you, just like "The Girl Who Wouldn't," I'm apt to lose you!

60. THIS THING SURE HIT ME HARD THIS MORNING!--Whew! Boy oh boy oh boy! I mean, it preached the sermon right back at me all the way! It was like the gun that kicked back, it really backfired!

61. IF I'M NOT WILLING TO GIVE YOU, THE LORD MIGHT JUST TAKE YOU away from me! If I put up a fuss and get jealous and selfish and withhold, then you get upset and I want to die, you want to die, everybody wants to die, everybody wants to quit and we'd lose it all!

62. IF WE DON'T KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK THAT WE HAVE BEGUN, WE'LL LOSE IT ALL! "He that hath begun a good work in you shall complete it till the end!" (Phil.1:6) We don't mind beginning a good work, but when we see what the end is going to be, sometimes we don't want to complete it.

63. IF WE STOP NOW, WE'VE LOST EVERYTHING WE'VE PUT INTO IT! It's like building a building and investing thousands of dollars, but you get it only half-built and then let it stand there derelict and go to ruin, like we've seen so many buildings, because they didn't have enough money to finish it--lost it all!

64. THE LORD SAID YOU'D BETTER SIT DOWN AND COUNT THE COST FIRST BEFORE YOU START, so that you're either able to finish the building or win the war, or don't start it. (Luke 14:28.)

65. IF YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO FINISH IT, DON'T START IT! Now that we're started, we've got everything to lose by stopping and nothing to gain, and we lose it all, everything we tried to do, by stopping halfway!

66. WE HAVE BEGUN A PROJECT THAT WE HAVE GOT TO FINISH, no matter if it hurts you or me or both of us or all of us or whoever. We have got to go through with it and sacrifice and forsake all and love 100% and go all the way or quit and lose it all!

67. IT'S ALL OR NOTHING AT ALL! I've heard some people say: "But the Lord gave me this house! The Lord gave me this business! I couldn't give it up now! But God gave me all this money! He certainly wouldn't expect me to forsake it now!"

68. THAT'S WHAT HE GAVE IT TO YOU FOR!--SO YOU COULD FORSAKE IT!--For His will, or give it to the poor or let God use it in some way. That morning when Jesus helped the fishermen catch that supernatural miraculous biggest load of fish they had ever caught, and then He said now,

69. "COME, FOLLOW ME, AND I WILL MAKE YOU FISHERS OF MEN!"--What if they had said, "But Lord, You just got through giving us this huge big miraculous catch of fish! You gave it to us! We shouldn't go off and forsake it!" No, "they forsook all and followed Him!" (Luke 5:10,11.)

70. DON'T TRY TO TELL ME, "The Lord gave it to me and therefore I'm supposed to keep it and put it above anything else He wants me to do," when He may have something better He wants you to do, higher, bigger!

71. ABRAHAM COULD HAVE SAID THAT ABOUT ISAAC: "But Lord, You gave him to me! This is the child of promise, this is the one You gave me by a miracle! You don't expect me to give up this child!"--But no, when God said give him back, he obeyed!

72. THAT'S WHAT MY MOTHER COULD HAVE SAID ABOUT ME: "Lord, this is my child of faith, the one born after my salvation and the miracle of my healing, dedicated to You! You wouldn't expect me to give up this child!"--But she had to! But then look what God did!:

73. HE GAVE ISAAC BACK TO ABRAHAM and blessed him and let his seed be "as the starts of the heaven and the sands of the sea!"--And He gave me back to my mother! He knew when she'd need me the most, when I'd work and travel with her for nearly 20 years! But when I was small, she gave me up to go on with the Lord's work, and had to leave me behind lots of times.

74. ONCE WHEN I WAS EIGHT YEARS OLD, we were playing the piano together one evening, something we enjoyed very much. Then she said, "Well Honey, I'm sorry but I've got to go now."--And I was like Davidito is with you sometimes, I began to cry.

75. "NO, MOMMY, PLEASE DON'T GO! We're having so much fun, we're having such a good time, please don't go!" But she said, "I'm sorry, Honey, but I've got an important church business meeting, and I've gotta go. They're expecting me and it's important business for the Lord." But I wept,

76. "OH, MOTHER, PLEASE STAY HOME WITH ME! Why don't you stay home with me like Lamont's mother does with him?" But she said, "Well, I'm sorry Honey, but your mother's got to serve the Lord, and that's it! I've got to go and put God's work first!"

77. AND I CRIED WHEN SHE TUCKED ME INTO BED and told me good night, and she cried too. When she came back late that night, I was sound asleep but my face was still tear-stained. I had apparently cried myself to sleep even after she left.

78. SO MOTHER FELT STUBBORN, REBELLIOUS AND BITTER and went to her room and her bed and told the Lord, "Lord, I know You said to give up houses and lands and husband and wife, mother and father, brother and sister and all that, but You certainly didn't expect us to give up our children!

79. "SURELY YOU DIDN'T EXPECT US TO FORSAKE OUR CHILDREN! It doesn't say anything about children!" But the Lord said, "Get up and look!" So she got up and got her Bible and looked and there it was!: --"Or children!"

80. "EVERYONE THAT HATH FORSAKEN HOUSES OR BRETHREN, OR SISTER, OR FATHER, OR MOTHER, OR WIFE, OR CHILDREN, or lands for My Name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life!" (Mt. 19:29.) She certainly got back an hundredfold! Thank You Lord!

81. THE NEXT MORNING--remember, I was only eight years of age--I came in as I was on my way to school and kissed my mother goodbye. I was all bright and cheery and smiling as I said, "Mother, I put you on the altar. That's all right, you can serve the Lord. Don't worry about me."

82. THEN IT WAS HER TURN TO CRY!--That a little child could comprehend such a thing! Well, she put me on the altar, too--we each put each other on the altar for another eight years of that sacrifice, until I was 16 years of age!

83. SHE WAS AWAY MOST OF THE TIME either with evangelistic work or busy with her own church and services and business meetings and the Lord's work, gone most of the time.

84. I CAN REMEMBER MOST OF MY SCHOOL LIFE my parents didn't even come home at night until I was already in bed asleep, and I left for school in the morning before they were up!

85. ABOUT THE ONLY TIME I EVER SAW THEM was when all our family and staff got together for dinner in the evening.--And then they were off to church again after dinner and I was back to my homework.

86. SO I CAN REMEMBER BEING A VERY LONELY LITTLE BOY and living a very lonely little life in my lonely little room most of my lonely little time, and those were long lonely years until I was 16 and had a license to drive and could start taking my father's place as her chauffeur and singer while he stayed home to run the church while my mother and I were out in evangelistic work together.

87. THE LORD GAVE ME BACK TO HER THEN FOR NEARLY 20 YEARS to serve her and the Lord and His work. She used to tell that miraculous Bible story about the oxen going up the road to Bethshemesh carrying the Ark (1Sam.6), lowing as they went--in other words, weeping as they went, leaving their bawling unweaned calves behind, which is what she did.

88. I WAS BAWLING AND SHE WAS BAWLING, LIKE THE OXEN AND THEIR CALVES, all bawling for each other. But the oxen went on up the road in God's service and sacrifice. It was an absolute miracle that they would voluntarily leave their unweaned calves behind--supernatural!

89. THEY WERE EVEN SLAUGHTERED WHEN THEY GOT THERE! They never saw their calves again! It wasn't easy. They were crying for their calves, but they were under such supernatural power of God that they went straight on up the road in His service!

90. BUT IN MY MOTHER'S AND MY CASE and lots of cases, when you give up something for the Lord, and then if later it is good for you, the Lord will return it again someday when He can trust you with it.

91. BUT IF YOU ARE STUBBORN AND REBELLIOUS, HE'S APT TO TAKE IT AWAY FROM YOU ENTIRELY AND FOREVER, if you're selfish and won't give it up. If you are not willing to make it a free-will offering to the Lord, then God will take a collection and take it away from you.

92. IF YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO GIVE IT, GOD'S APT TO TAKE IT. So, that's just the battle I have been having recently. I got so convicted by reading my own sermons in "The Girl Who Wouldn't"! I have you most of the time, but have sometimes begrudged even giving you up a little.

93. IT'S THE BATTLE EVERY HUSBAND AND WIFE AND EVERY MATE GOES THROUGH IN FFing. I have you most of the time. Why should I begrudge giving you to the Lord for an hour or two here or there with somebody else?

94. BUT NO, WE WANT IT ALL! We want to be a hog and take everything and not share, when we have more than enough for our own needs. Yet we begrudge even an hour or two of our mate's love for some other poor person who has nothing and nobody! We have each other nearly 24 hours a day, yet we begrudge some other needy soul even an hour or two!--Just His 10%--Lord forgive us!

95. (MARIA: YOU WERE POINTING OUT THERE THAT IF YOU LEAVE JUST ONE AREA IN YOUR LIFE THAT YOU HAVEN'T FORSAKEN, YOU START GOING BACK.) Right! If you withhold anything from the Lord, the Devil will use that as a wedge to get in and try to defeat you and discourage you and keep you from obeying God's will and doing His service.

96. YOU CANNOT STAND STILL!--EITHER YOU ARE MAKING PROGRESS OR YOU ARE BACKSLIDING! Either you are growing or you are dying! It's all or nothing at all! Once you've started on this road, there is no turning back, or you'll turn into a pillar of salt, solidify and die! (Gen.19:26) "Remember Lot's wife!" (Luke 17:32.)

97. YOU GOTTA KEEP GOING, you gotta keep sacrificing, you gotta keep forsaking, gotta keep fighting everyday! So the minute I begin to begrudge you and feel selfish about you and am jealous, I really begin to go back! The Scripture says:

98. "LET US NOT BE WEARY IN WELL DOING, for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not" (Gal.6:9), "lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds" (Heb.12:3).

99. I WAS ALREADY FAINTING IN MY MIND. A lot of people faint on the way to the victory. They get weak and tired of sacrificing and tired of giving, tired of dying daily, tired of fighting, and they give up.

100. THE DEVIL ONLY WINS BECAUSE YOU SURRENDER! But he can never win as long as you keep fighting. "Resist the Devil and he will flee from you!" (Ja.4:7.) As long as you keep resisting, he'll keep fleeing. But if you stop resisting, he uses his lies and temptations and persuasions to win. If you stop fighting and surrender, he wins.

101. WELL BEGUN IS HALF DONE, BUT IF YOU DON'T FINISH IT, NOTHING WAS DONE! You might as well not have begun it at all as to leave it unfinished, right? Dying is something you have to do every day--you'll never get it done until you're dead!

102. BUILDING THE LORD'S WORK IS SOMETHING YOU NEVER GET DONE, 'TIL YOU DIE! Building a life, you never get done 'til you die! There is always more to do. (Maria: Well, what's the end purpose that the Lord's trying to bring about by making you sacrifice more and more every day? What's that supposed to do?)

103. IT COMES DOWN TO THIS WHOLE THING OF LIFE: IT IS TO PREPARE YOU FOR THE NEXT LIFE, when in the Millennium you are going to have to learn how to run the whole world over a bunch of wicked, stubborn, rebellious people!

104. A LITTLE CHILD LEARNS SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY. What's that supposed to do for him? How come he has to keep eating every day? How come he has to keep exercising every day, running and playing and working, huh?--to grow! God's Word even says of Jesus that, "He grew in stature and in wisdom and in favour with God and man." (Lk.2:52.)

105. WE'RE JUST LIKE CHILDREN SPIRITUALLY. Every day a child has to eat a little more. Yesterday's food is not enough for today. Yesterday's exercise and play and work is not enough for today.

106. YOU CAN'T KEEP ON COASTING ON YESTERDAY'S VICTORIES and yesterday's accomplishments, right? You can't just rest on yesterday's laurels. "Oh but Lord, look what I did for You yesterday!" He'll probably reply, "But what have you done for Me today? My Mother used to say,

107. "THERE IS NO DISCHARGE IN THIS WAR!" You fight it until the day you die in it, and die for the cause! But He's trying to make you stronger every day and make you able to give a little more, sacrifice a little more, suffer a little more, fight a little more, grow a little more!

108. HE WANTS YOU TO GROW INTO THE FULL STATURE OF A FULL-GROWN MATURE CHRISTIAN that is a real fighter for the Lord and a real soldier and able to really stand a lot of responsibility, a lot of suffering, a lot of sacrifice, a lot of giving, and can do a big job, not just little ones.

109. JESUS "LEARNED OBEDIENCE THROUGH THE THINGS WHICH HE SUFFERED!" (Heb.5:8.) Every day we learn some new obedience, just like a little child. Every day he learns something new, right?

110. THEY SAY BY THE TIME YOU ARE FIVE YOU HAVE LEARNED MORE THAN YOU WILL LEARN IN ALL THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!--About 80% of all you are going to learn! Probably it's because most adults quit trying to learn, they think they know it all by that time.

111. A LOT OF CHRISTIANS STOP GROWING WHEN THEY ARE ONLY A FEW YEARS OLD TOO, AND THEY NEVER GROW UP, NEVER MATURE! They're retarded children, monstrosities, handicapped children, because they didn't grow any further than a few years old! They thought that was enough, that they'd learned so much by that time, they didn't have to learn any more.

112. YOU CANNOT BEGIN A JOB FOR THE LORD UNLESS YOU FINISH IT, or the whole thing was a failure! It would have been better if you had never started! Like it says about the man, it was better that he never heard than to have heard and gone back against the will of God. (2Pet.2:21.)

113. LIKE THE MAN WHOSE HOUSE WAS SWEPT CLEAN and garnished after the evil spirit was cast out: He didn't keep progressing from there, he didn't fill it up with the Holy Spirit and something better and do good works for the Lord, so the evil spirit brought back more evil spirits worse than himself and they entered into the man again because he was empty and not filled with the Lord and the Lord's work.--So "his last state was worse than the first." (Mat.12:45.)

114. IF YOU DON'T FINISH THE JOB, YOU MAY HAVE DONE MORE DAMAGE THAN GOOD, as in FFing. He said, "For My sake and the Gospel's."--You have to be willing to forsake all until the job is done. Then maybe you can have your husband or wife or children back again!

115. WE HAVE ONE PERSON ON OUR STAFF RIGHT NOW WHO'S TEMPORARILY HAVING TO FORSAKE HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN for the Lord's work. Is that going to be forever?--Probably no. God's testing him to see if he's worthy and willing to forsake all, to give it all up to put God first. God says, "I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, and I will have no other gods before Me!" (Exodus 20:3,5.)

116. GOD WILL NOT TAKE SECOND PLACE! He wants to make sure you are going to put Him first, and He tests you to find out! Many a girl has had to give up her husband and children for a while in order to land her fish. But when the job is done and he is in, then she may go back to her normal living a while!

117. YOU'RE JUST LIKE A SOLDIER that has to leave home and mate and children to go out and fight a battle! You can't always take them all to the battlefront! You often have to forsake home and loved ones to go forth to the battle until it is won! Then maybe you can come back to them. That is just the way war goes!

118. BUT FOR GOD'S SAKE, DON'T START A WAR UNLESS YOU ARE WILLING TO FINISH IT! Don't start a building unless you are willing to finish it! The latter end of your deserted job is apt to be worse than the first, and you've made yourself a fool because you weren't able to finish what you started. (Lk.14:26-33.)

119. IT'S BETTER NEVER TO HAVE PUT YOUR HAND TO THE PLOUGH THAN TO PUT YOUR HAND TO THE PLOUGH AND TURN BACK! (Lk.9:62.) It has to hurt for a little while, just like bearing a baby--it hurts a little while, but afterwards there is rejoicing because a man is born! (John 16:21.)

120. IT'S FAR BETTER FOR YOU TO FINISH THE JOB and have it hurt a little while until the baby is off to a good start, than it is to quit now and let him go back to where he was before!

121. LIKE SOME OF OUR GIRLS WHO ARE FFing and have fish on the line, but have slacked off and given up. You've come this far, "who hath bewitched you?" "Ye did run well," who got you sidetracked? (Gal.3:1 & 5:7.) Why did you quit? You've worked hard to wean him away from the world and put God and His work first.

122. YOU'VE WORKED THIS LONG AND MADE THIS MUCH SACRIFICE and done this much suffering and this much dying and this much hurting and had this much pain--but you've come to the birth and then not been able to bring him forth! It can even kill the mother if she can't finish the job! Oh, no!:

123. NOBODY ELSE IS GOING TO BE ABLE TO DO YOUR JOB. Somebody else might be able to do their job, but God has given you this job. Somebody else can bear their baby, but you've gotta bear this one!

124. WHY DON'T WE JUST THROW HIM BACK now into the pond where we got him?--Throw him back to his wife and children and the old stomping grounds and all of its old familiar faces and places!

125. WHAT GOOD DO YOU THINK THAT'LL DO? Do you think that's going to help him make progress? Well, I wouldn't be surprised if he wound up backsliding, got discouraged and quit!

126. IF HE IS GOING TO PUT HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN OR LOVER FIRST, HE'LL NEVER SUCCEED WITH THE LORD'S WORK!--He'll keep on putting them first. If he can't make the break now, if you don't finish, it's almost better if you'd never started and left him where he was!

127. IF YOU JUST THROW A FISH BACK IN WHEN HE'S WOUNDED and his mouth is torn by the hook, he is worse off than he was in the beginning! You've got to land him and clean him and finish the job, or it's better not to hook him at all!

128. WE HAVE TO BE WILLING TO SACRIFICE EACH OTHER. The cozy private selfish relationship which we once had is no more, because we have progressed beyond that to where we are willing to include others in our circle, as we have already done.

129. IT USED TO BE JUST NOBODY BUT YOU AND ME, SELFISHLY LIVING ALONE, and we didn't have to worry about anybody else personally, at least not in our immediate presence.--But then we got Davidito!--Here came this little stranger horning in on our privacy, who changed and transformed our entire lives!

130. NOW WE HAVE TO LIVE WITH HIM AND A WHOLE BUNCH OF PEOPLE AND SACRIFICE AND SHARE A WHOLE LOT MORE! The more we do it, the more God gives us. But we still have to sacrifice privacy and I have to share you more. (Maria: And I have to share you more!) Right!--Exactly!

131. WE GIVE MORE AND WE SHARE MORE, BUT GOD IN TURN GIVES US MORE. He gives me more women and you more men. Reading that Letter, "The Girl Who Wouldn't," was a very great discomfort! My mother used to say,

132. "THE WORST PLACE IN THE WORLD FOR A CHRISTIAN IS A COMFORTABLE PLACE!" That Letter discomforted me, it troubled me, it preached right at me! The gun kicked back, it backfired! It preached the same thing at me that I was preaching to her, because I was guilty of the same thing, unwilling to really give all.

133. IT'S GOTTA HURT A LITTLE BIT OR IT'S NO SACRIFICE!--Right? What makes a mother's love for her baby so marvellous?--Because it's so totally sacrificial! She gives her all! She suffers for that baby! She gives up herself and her time and her strength and her sleep and it costs something, it's a sacrifice!

134. THEY WANTED BUSY DR. D.L. MOODY TO SPEAK AT A LUNCHEON ONCE. They said, "Well, Dr. Moody, you only have to talk about ten minutes--it won't take much out of you." He replied, "Well, then I'll have to refuse, because if it won't take much out of me, it's not worth going!"

135. THINGS THAT ARE REALLY WORTHWHILE COST SOMETHING! This isn't a bargain-counter religion! It's not something you get cut-prices on and a shortcut to Heaven! You've got to go the hard way and the rough way and take the knocks and make the sacrifices and die daily and suffer, and it costs something!

136. NOT ONLY DO YOU HAVE TO DIE DAILY BUT YOU HAVE TO FORSAKE ALL DAILY and love daily and sacrifice daily and pay the price daily. It costs something! It even hurts daily! But the greater the battle, the greater the victory, right? Praise the Lord!

137. THE GREATER THE SACRIFICE, THE GREATER THE REWARD! We may have enough victory for today, but then comes tomorrow and we'll have greater battles and greater victories--if we keep faithfully fighting!

138. THE ONLY REASON YOU SOMETIMES HAVE TO GO BACK AND DO THE SAME GRADE THIS YEAR IS BECAUSE YOU FLUNKED IT LAST YEAR! My God, I don't want to have to go through some of these things again! I don't want to have to take the same grade over again!

139. I WANT TO GO ON TO THE NEXT GRADE. "Ever learning," sooner or later we oughtta "come to a knowledge," and not have to keep learning the same lesson over and over and over again! (2Tim.3:7.)

140. THE GRADES GET TOUGHER ALL THE TIME, but you're more ready for it each time because you've just won the last one. But you don't jump from 1st grade to 7th grade, or you'll be knocked out! Each grade you progress a little and get greater victories.

141. "GREATER THINGS THAN THESE SHALL YE DO!" (John 14:12.) To get greater victories you have to keep fighting greater battles, and for greater rewards you have to keep making greater sacrifices, and for greater joys, you have to keep suffering greater pains.

142. TO GET BACK MORE YOU GOTTA KEEP GIVING UP MORE, FORSAKING MORE. If you're going to keep forsaking more every day, the Lord is going to keep giving you back more. We thought we were giving up a lot when we gave up our dear little camper, but look where we are now!

143. EVERY HOME GOD HAS GIVEN US, WE HAVE HAD TO GIVE UP! But for every home we've given up He's given us a better one! The Lord is constantly improving things all the time.

144. IT'S FUNNY HOW I LOVE YOU MORE AND MORE! It keeps getting harder and harder to give you up, but in some ways I'm getting bigger victories too, and as a result we can accomplish more by sharing more and helping others more. Thank You Lord!

145. (MARIA: BUT YOUR FEARS EXAGGERATE THINGS SO MUCH, so that they seem worse than they really are!) That's the Devil's business, to exaggerate things and blow'm up as big as a mountain and make a mountain out of a molehill!

146. I HOPE WE DON'T HAVE TO LEARN THE SAME LESSON OVER AGAIN TOMORROW! I hope we can turn the page and go to the next page and the next lesson, which will probably be a little harder:

147. BUT WHERE YOU'RE REALLY LOSING GROUND IS IF YOU'RE HAVING TO GO OVER THE SAME LESSON EVERY DAY, and you still don't learn it and never get the victory! That's what He meant about "ever learning and never coming to a knowledge." You sit there studying the same old lesson, every day, every day, every day, and you never get the victory. (2Tim.3:7)

148. FOR GOD'S SAKE, LET'S LEARN OUR LESSON TODAY and get it down pat so we don't have to learn this one over again tomorrow! Amen? Praise the Lord!

149. BUT DON'T GET ME WRONG! Some things do get easier! You don't usually have to fight the same battles over again if you get the victory! Otherwise it would be too hard and a losing game!

150. I LEARNED SOME OF MY LESSONS LONG AGO, and haven't had to learn those over again!--Like tests of faith on smaller things--constant change and moving, constant forsaking of things and old friends and family and familiar faces and places, genuine physical hardships and handicaps and difficult privations!

151. PIONEERING (40 YEARS), CAMPING (20 YEARS), little or poor food, few comforts, bitter battles with personal enemies. School was hell!--I was the good studious little preacher's kid who was always getting beat up by big tough fiendish bullies!--Real violent persecution!

152. THANK GOD MOST OF OUR KIDS DON'T HAVE TO GO TO GODLESS, DEVILISH, ANTI-CHRIST, ANTI-BIBLE U.S.A. SCHOOLS!--They are Hell on Earth! But I survived, and I guess it helped me to learn how to take the hard knocks, roll with the punches and become a tough fighter myself! PTL!

153. I LOST A LOT OF PHYSICAL BATTLES, BUT IT HELPED ME WIN SPIRITUAL ONES, like taking it on the chin and how to be a good loser--more than conquerors!" (Rom.8:37)

154. NOW THE LORD HAS RELIEVED ME OF SOME OF THOSE PRIMARY LOCAL GRADES and I'm taking graduate courses on a world scale!--And still winning! PTL!

155. ONE OF THESE DAYS I'LL GRADUATE--TO THE SPIRIT WORLD! Hallelujah! So although some things get harder, others do get easier--like growing up!--And that's what it's all about!--Amen?

156. GOD BLESS YOU AND HELP YOU GAIN GREATER VICTORIES EVERY DAY! It's really thrilling to look back and see your own progress!--To look back down that rugged mountain road you've just come over and to see you're really getting somewhere!

157. BUT IT'S EVEN MORE EXCITING TO LOOK FORWARD AND UP to heights you're soon to attain and views you're soon to thrill to if you keep fighting, climbing, winning and don't quit!

158. GOD HELP YOU TO KEEP ON winning battles and greater victories, until you win the greatest and last of all!

159. --DEATH!--THAT GRADUATION to the Heavenly world of the hereafter with a crown of glorious eternal life with Him and the Family forever! HALLELUJAH!--Amen?--Life and love forever!--Dad.

Copyright (c) 1997 by The Family