Did God design Christianity to be comfortable? Are Christianity and the American Dream complimentary or contradictory? Join us in this study of Scripture.

<p>Did God design Christianity to be comfortable? Are Christianity and the American Dream complimentary or contradictory? Join us in this study of Scripture.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Bay City SDA Church

Taylor Hinkle

Why Persistence Matters

Father in heaven, Lord, we thank you so much for the privilege of being able to worship together this morning.

Lord, we're thankful for your word that speaks to our hearts and to our minds, and we know that even though many of us are going through different periods of life and different joys and sorrows, that your word, the same word, can speak to each situation.

And Father, we just pray that your Holy Spirit would please speak to our hearts.

Help us to understand the importance of your word to us.

Well this morning, the title of the message is, Why Persistence Matters?

Or you could ask the question, Does persistence matter for the Christian?

And you hear about the beaver and you would think, Well yeah persistence must matter for the beaver, but what about for the Christian?

Is it something essential for each 1 of us?

Now we want to study through this a little bit and you would probably if someone asked you if it's important to be persistent what would your first answer be?

Well yes, but according to Scripture why is it important?

Well that's where it might take a little bit of study to be able to give a good scriptural answer.

I want to point you to a couple things as we get started in our study this morning.

Revelation chapter 14 is a very interesting chapter for many reasons.

The first reason being because it describes what God's last day people are like, what God's last day message is like, and then the last day of Earth's history, what that will be like when Jesus comes back.

What also makes Revelation chapter 14 very interesting is that it is preceded by Revelation chapter 13.

You say, well that's not all that interesting.

I knew before I got here this morning that 13 came before 14, but what you find interesting housed in Revelation chapter 13 is God explains what the last day final crisis will look like upon the earth.

Revelation chapter 13, you say, well, I'm not acquainted with that.

Well, you know, we have this series of meetings coming up, it's called Jesus on Prophecy.

And you won't wanna miss it, because this, we will walk through what does this crisis look like, not just so we can be full of fear, but because we can be full of hope knowing that Jesus has told us what it would be like and he can tell us how we can make it through that time.

Well, Revelation chapter 13 describes the greatest crisis coming upon the earth that has ever been seen by mankind, but Revelation chapter 14 shows the people of God who are able to withstand that crisis.

How many of you think that if there are a people who are able to withstand the greatest crisis of all time, that you might want to learn what characteristics cause them to stand.

Well if we took the time we could walk through Revelation chapter 14 and we could look at several different points but I want to just point your attention quickly through Revelation chapter 14 verses 1 through 5.

You can look and you see that it's picturing a group standing on Mount Zion with the Lamb.

Well Jesus is always consistently throughout Scripture the Lamb of God which takes away the sins of the world And with Him how many people are standing there?

Now we recognize that many numbers in scripture are symbolic and we're not here to argue this morning is this a literal or symbolic 144, 000.

But you recognize that this group of people are those who are standing with Jesus after coming through the greatest crisis that's ever come upon the earth.

Okay, well what characteristics do they have?

The first thing that we see in verse 2, it says, having the Father's name written on their forehead.

Now let me ask you a question, in the Bible what is a name synonymous with?

Did you ever notice that in Bible characters that their name described their character?

And so when these people are standing on Mount Zion with Jesus in the last days, they have the Father's name written on their forehead.

In other words, God's character is clearly seen in their minds and it's seen by others in their lives.

That God can finally have a people whose characters fully represent the power of Jesus transforming their life.

That's what we see in Revelation chapter 14.

Now it's interesting, well we'll continue on and then we'll pull together for a second.

Verse 3 we see a kind of a prelude happening here, an interlude, but then it continues on and it tells us that these people in verse 4, these are the ones who have not been defiled with women for they are virgins.

Now this is spiritually speaking not defiled with women.

In the sense of a woman in the Bible represents a what?

A church the Bible tells us and so if you're not defiled with a woman you haven't gone to a corrupt doctrinal teaching, a corrupt group that professes something else about God.

These people aren't defiled by false doctrine, they're walking in the truth.

How can people stand in truth when the whole world is filled with error in Revelation chapter 13?

Well these people by the grace of God are standing.

Well then you continue on and notice what the Bible tells us, finishing up verse 4, these are the ones who are not defiled with women, for they are virgins.

These are the ones who followed the what?

In other words, wherever Jesus called them to go, wherever Jesus went, they went.

There was nothing that Jesus called them to do that they were unwilling to do.

Now for the last couple weeks I remember 3 weeks ago I had the opportunity to preach on loving the truth.

And we talked about the only thing to withstand the crisis of the last days with the Antichrist is to love the truth.

That's what 2 Thessalonians 2 verse 10 tells us.

And when you look at these people here, you recognize that do they love the truth?

So much so they love the truth that it's become part of them that their characters are transformed by the truth.

Jesus, they love him so much that they follow him wherever he goes, right?

Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.

The truth is something they love, it's something that they live, it has impacted their lives.

In other words, what we're seeing in Revelation chapter 14 verses 1-5 is that these people love the truth and they live the truth and it causes them to stand in those final days.

You say, well I thought we already preached about that message.

But notice another characteristic the Bible gives us, Revelation chapter 14 verse 12.

What is it that causes these people to stand in the midst of the most difficult crisis upon the face of the earth?

There are several translations that will render this different ways.

So ours have all read here is the patience of the Saints, others will read here is the endurance of the Saints, here is the persistence of the Saints, here is the ability to withstand hardship and keep going of the Saints.

Others will read, here is the endurance of the saints.

Here is the ability to withstand hardship and keep going of the saints.

Here are those that keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus.

My friends, if we love the truth, Jesus says if you love me, you do what?

So that's consistent with everything we've heard from the beginning.

In order to keep the commandments, in order to follow God appropriately, what do we need?

No, we need the faith of Jesus to come into our lives and to transform us.

But it's interesting, the Bible doesn't just say love the truth and live the truth but it tells us that these people in last days have a very clear characteristic that they are people that endure, that they are patient and they persist through difficulty.

Now let me ask you a question this morning, how important do you think it is to have endurance and persistence?

Have any of you ever had a friend in the spiritual life who they get excited about spiritual things real quick but then it dies out?

And then before you know it they're back to where they were?

Persistence, Endurance, perseverance is critically important for the Christian.

This isn't just my own words but this is what the Bible tells us consistently throughout scripture.

Remember Galatians chapter 6 verse 9 it says, and let us not grow what?

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Why Persistence Matters

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