No individual will rule with Christ until he or she has lived as a victorious saint. The average churchgoer in America has no hope of attaining the first resurrection or ruling with Christ. Not because God does not love him but because he is still a spiritual baby.

What can you do about this? Go to God right now. Ask Him to lift from you the spirit of blindness that abides on the Evangelical churches. Ask Him to open the New Testament to you. Ask God to show you what He wants you to do. Flee from those who are claiming "Jesus did it all" and your only task is to believe and wait for the unscriptural "rapture."

Read the Bible and let the Holy Spirit speak to you. Begin to obey what the Bible says. When it tells you to present your body as a living sacrifice to God, then do just that. When it tells you to endure hardness as a soldier of Jesus Christ, then do just that. When the Bible tells you to remain faithful in the prison in which you have been placed, denying yourself, faithfully performing duties for which you have no heart, then do just that. Always pray that God will give you what you want, but wait for God to do it. Don't wrench yourself out of your miserable circumstances before God's time, injuring and betraying other people in your mad rush to make your own paradise out of this cursed earth.

Call on God with all your might. Recognize that many American churches are backslidden, lukewarm travesties of what God expects. Do not compare yourself with any believer you know. Compare yourself with Paul's attitude in the third chapter of the Book of Philippians.

God wants the standard raised in America today. Because of false teaching in the Evangelical churches, the doctrine that we do not have to keep the commandments of Christ and His Apostles because we are saved by grace, and the extension of imputation far, far past its designated bounds, because of this erroneous teaching the moral light of the churches has been nearly extinguished. Consequently our nation is practicing abortion and sexual perversions. People are worshiping money. Crime, violence, drunkenness, and taking drugs are common. Sexual lust is a tremendous debilitating sickness affecting many age groups.

A return to morality in our country depends entirely on the willingness of American Christians to repent of their sins and return to the original Gospel of the Kingdom. The secular realm will never recover until the Christian churches lead the way.

Do we really want to rule with Christ? Then we will have to lose our life in Jesus Christ. Only then will we have developed in us the rod of iron, the scepter of the Kingdom.

The rod of iron can be created in the human personality only as we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. We must patiently accept the fiery trials He sends to transform us from rebellious, lustful souls to life-giving spirits who are able to govern God's creation in love, righteousness, peace, and joy. (from Suffering and Rulership)