Rev. Johnson V.
25th April 2010

God addresses the church of Philadelphia in the book of Revelations chapter 3 and verses 7 to 12. The verse that we will focus on, is verse 12, “Him who overcomes, I will make a pillar in the temple of my God...” The verse holds the promise for all of us who overcome, even today. There are many things we must overcome, and amongst them is the very essence of how we live our lives.

Every project begins with plan. The success of a project depends on its plan. Our God is a meticulous planner. In the Old Testament, the plans He gave Noah and Moses to build the ark and the temple, were highly detailed and well-thought through. He has planned each of our lives, even before we were born. He has created us with a purpose. We are not accidents. In His kingdom, things don’t just happen. They are carefully thought through by our Maker. By contrast, blessings are most unexpected, almost an accident in our lives. But our Father wants us to walk into our blessings purposefully.

He cannot use us completely until we catch His vision for our lives. He wants us to understand His plan for our lives and then work it out on the earth. God will not accomplish the task without us. God does not want us to live below the potential He has placed inside each of us. God expects us to purposefully stride into our future and not wander around aimlessly. John C Maxwell says, ‘successful living, is making the right choices early in life and managing these choices later on’.

After we catch His vision, we must put it to work. God strengthens us to accomplish the commission. God will not send us out on our own, rather He will accompany us into the battle and equip us with all that we need. David is a prime example of how God can take the weak and give them victory as long as they listen to Him.

In life we must have a goal and we must play our role. Our role is generally social in nature, or based on relationships (being a friend, a parent, a child, a spouse etc.) or it is secular in nature, such as the job that we have. However our goal is our spiritual life and who we really are. Often we make our role our goal, and that reduces our existence to a mere job designation. We are not human beings in the midst of a spiritual experience, we are primarily spirit beings having a human experience.

Our goal can be found in Romans 12:6-13 and 1 Corinthians 12:28 – 31. We are children of the Most High God and we are called to be more like Him. In our lives on this earth, we must do 2 things 1) follow biblical principles 2) worship Christ. One without the other makes us lopsided and incomplete. Like the two wings of an eagle, worship and following His principles will help us soar high. Following Blibical principles will make us more Christ-like. Our goal must be to be more like Him in all roles that we play. We will never be completely like Him, but our goal should be to keep trying.

And when we have overcome, we will be established forever in His temple.