The Lord refers to Himself as "Him who is the First and the Last, who died and came to life again." These words will not mean much to you until you are going through a hard place with the Lord. Then you will understand why it is so utterly important that Christ is the Last as well as the First; the one who came to life again as well as the one who died.

When we are going through our hour of darkness we can remember vaguely what it was like before our trial. But now all is changed. There is much darkness whereas before there was much light. What we need to know is: "Can Christ bring me successfully through this nightmare? Will He finish in me what He began?"

The purpose of such blackness and death is that every aspect of our first personality may indeed die with Christ on the cross, not just in our faith but in our actual experience. It is not that we are attempting to kill ourselves. It is that we recognize we have died and have risen and are experiencing the reality of it.

When we through the Spirit put to death the deeds of our body we merely are recognizing as a fact that which God and we declared to be true when we were baptized in water. It is of great importance that we realize we are not dying by inches. We have died with Christ and have risen with Him. That is established for eternity (unless we can be pulled down from our high place in God). The daily dying we do is a recognition of what already has been accomplished.

There are two ways in which we can be defeated in our pursuit of the crown of life. One is by looking to God to do more than He is willing to do. The other is by trying to do that which only God can accomplish. Either extreme will bring us to defeat. We must keep the two in balance.

When teachers emphasize "Jesus did it all" our experience becomes stagnant. We cease obeying the commandments of Christ and His Apostles.

When we adopt a religious spirit and try to control our worldliness, our lusts, and our self-willed nature by our own determination, we soon become discouraged and angry with people and God because of our lack of joy.

The right way to fight the good fight of faith is to:

Count ourselves crucified with Christ.

Count ourselves risen with Christ.

Look always to the Lord Jesus in all we do, every decision we make.

Follow the Holy Spirit as He guides us in putting to death the deeds of our flesh.

Obey the commandments of Christ and His Apostles.

We absolutely must take up our personal cross and follow the Master at all times.

Jesus is the First and the Last. What He began in us He will finish. We must have a deep appreciation for the faithfulness of Christ if we are to survive the program of reconciliation to God, the process of salvation that works as God judges and removes the evil of our personality and plants Christ in us.

To be continued.