The believers of today must be warned that the resurrection and ascension that will attend the return of the Lord Jesus from Heaven are for the blessed and holy members of the royal priesthood, not for the careless, lukewarm, neglectful, spiritually lazy members of the wealthy churches of today.

The rewards of rulership and closeness to God are for the victorious saints.

The victorious life is the normal Christian life. The overcomer is not a special kind of saint that has risen above the daily problems that most of us experience. All the promises of the New Testament are to the victorious, not to the defeated. God expects us to gain victory, through Christ, over the world, over the sin that dwells in us, and over our self-will and disobedience.

Each day contains a portion of evil we must overcome. The evil of the day may come as a surprise from some unlooked for place, or it may be part of an irritating or painful circumstance that we have endured for a number of years.

The evil is a tool that is permitted to overtake us so we shall be changed into the image of Christ and also pressed into union with Him, learning complete dependence upon Him.

There are several ways in which we can respond to the evil of the day.

We can view the evil as coming from the devil and attempt to drive it away by strong rebukes, using our own adamic faith.

We can become bitter, because the evil often comes at the hand of an individual—our husband or wife, a member of the church, our employer, or some other person. "If only they would not be this way!"

We can evade the evil by breaking God's laws in order to insure our continued happiness.

None of these ways of responding will build up Christ in us or bring us into union with God.

The correct manner to respond to the evil of the day is to go to God in prayer, asking Him what we should do. We always ought to pray that God will remove the evil from us. If we do not we may suffer needlessly.

But as we pray we always are to submit to the Lord's will.

Some are teaching that if we say, "Thy will be done," we will not get an answer. We must attempt to force the answer by "faith."

This concept reveals an ignorance of God and His ways. We always are to pray, "Thy will be done."

As we look to the Lord in fervent prayer He may give us the assurance that the answer is coming speedily. Or He may give us the wisdom and strength to go through the trial.

God always hears and answers even though the answer may not be what we expect.

As we pray the Lord gives us His body and blood, the "hidden manna," so we will possess sufficient virtue to forgive all those who harm us; to cease fretting and always think about that which is pure and lovely; and to overcome every other dark force that would attempt to pull us down from our position in Christ at the right hand of the Father. Christ always helps us as we turn to Him.

To be continued.