Do you believe there is something in the Christian life that you have not found, or that you do not possess? And do you want that experience? If you can say yes to these questions, then give thanks to God that He has led you by his Grace to take the first step toward Victory.
The first step toward the Victorious Life is for a Christian to recognize the need, to realize that there is an experience that he does not possess. As in the case of an unconverted man who can never understand nor receive the Gospel message till he comes to the place of seeing himself a sinner, so a satisfied and defeated Christian is
in no place to receive the Victorious Life message. The defeated man described in the seventh chapter of Romans cries out, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me out of the body of this death?” The reason some Christians have never tasted the victory of the eighth chapter of Romans is because they have never known anything of the
struggle that is described in the seventh chapter of Romans.
The Two Simple Conditions
1. Surrender
The simplicity of entering into this New Life has been a stumbling block to many. For there are but two conditions for victory, and every Christian has been given grace to meet these two conditions. The first is surrender. For that resurrection life of Jesus can only operate when our self effort ceases. “Yield yourselves unto God” (Rom. 6:13). Or as Weymouth translates it: “Surrender your very selves unto God.” And this was spoken to Christians. This surrender of the Christian to God is positive, not negative. It is not as a surrender of things, nor of an evil self life, but a yielding of self [one’s ego] with all its powers to God, as alive from the dead. With this positive surrender everything contrary to God’s will goes out of the life.
Failure frequently comes in the life of Victory because there has not been a complete surrender. Something has been held back. Or we have been too superficial in our understanding of what crucifixion of the old self life means [Gal. 5:24] …
But, it may be objected, how can a Christian surrender? Does he not already belong to Christ? Ah, that is the sad tragedy of it. Will a man rob God? Yes, the Church of Christ is largely robbing him to-day of the only offering He cares for―ourselves as living sacrifices. We are indeed bought with a price, the precious blood of Christ, we are not our own, we belong to Him. Have you acknowledged this ownership in every detail, not with your lips alone, but with your life, in its every action? That is the first requirement for Victory. And Victory will never be enjoyed until the surrender question is settled…
2. Faith
But more is needed than surrender. There are multitudes of Christians who are truly surrendered, holding nothing back, who do not have Victory. For the surrendered life is not necessarily the Victorious Life. Surrender is our part. The supernatural work of Victory is God’s part. God is doing his part as soon as we yield ourselves, and we get the benefit of it when we believe that fact … holding nothing back from God. Then all the rest is God’s work.
Is He faithful? …“Victory’s final secret,” as Mr. Trumbull has put it, is to believe that
- Christ is doing His part,
- that His Grace is sufficient,
- that we are free from the law of sin,
- that we are under Grace and not under law and
- that therefore sin is not having dominion over us,
- that He is meeting all our needs,
- and we are walking in the Spirit.
This is “letting God.” Will you not “let go, and let God?” Now? If you do, you can say with Paul, not only as a truth of your position in Christ, but as the blessed truth of your experience: “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ
liveth in me” (Gal. 2:20).
An excerpt from Robert C. McQuilkin, Victorious Life Studies (Philadelphia: Christian Life Literature Fund, 1918), ch. 1, “What is The Victorious Life?”