Robert McLaughlin Bible Ministries
Pennsylvania Conference 2006. Part 5.
Thursday AM, June 22, 2006
1. Blood – dealt with their sin.
2. Word of God.
3. They did not love their life, no self-preservation even to death.
You can tell when you become or start to become a winner, because you are not afraid of death.
PSA 23:4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for Thou art with me;
1CO 15:55 “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”
Believers who have failed, losers, are always afraid of death, and Satan has the power to give them fear of death, because it is one of his principles inside the cosmic system.
Intensive use – conjunction kai – kaiV = used to continue the thought of overcoming Satan = “in fact.”
Aor-act-ind – egapesan – h*gavphsan + negative ouk – ou*k
= “In fact, they do not love.”
Accusative singular direct object – noun psuchen – yuchVn = the soul.
The possessive genitive – auton – au*tw’n = “not their soul, but their life.”
Improper preposition achri – a!cri + thanatou – qanavtou = death.
“They do not love their life to the point of death.”
The living word, Jesus Christ, and the written word, Bible doctrine, were more important than life itself.
They were strategic winners because they had believed in Christ; they were tactical winners because they had advanced to maturity in a very difficult time.
Two categories of winners in the Christian way of life:
The strategic winner and the tactical winner.
Strategic = that which is important or essential in relation to a plan of action.
It refers to the effective conduct of war and that which is extremely important to an intended objective.
Tactical = relating to combat tactics as involving actions or means of less magnitude or at a shorter distance from a base of operations than those of strategy.
Every Christian is a strategic winner; the one who believes in Christ is a strategic winner in the angelic conflict.
The tactical winner believer is the one who resides, functions, and continues his momentum inside the PPOG.
The fact that every believer is a strategic victor is simply based on the saving work of Christ, and one decision: they made a positive decision to believe in Christ as their Savior.
It is the hundreds, and even thousands of decisions after salvation that produce the tactical winner.
The believer in Christ is a strategic winner with the potential of being a tactical winner in the angelic conflict.
1JO 5:4 For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith.
REV 12:11 Furthermore they overcame him because of the blood of the lamb, the saving work of Christ on the cross,
Winners are described in Rev 2-3 by the present active participle of nikao, REV 2:7,11,17,26; 3:5,12,21.
“Overcometh” = a participle used as a noun; it means to subdue, to conquer, to overcome, to get the victory.
Winners will be able to eat of the Tree of Life in the middle of the Paradise of God, REV 2:7.
In REV 2:11, they shall not be hurt by the Second death because of blessing by association, REV 2:11.
In REV 2:17, they eat of the hidden manna and receive a new name on a white stone; the new knighthood is given to the winner.
In REV 2:26, they are given power and authority to rule nations.
In REV 3:5, they are clothed with the uniform of glory.
In REV 3:12, their names are written in the historical record section of heaven, and he has a coat of arms, REV 3:12, which allows him to enter the new Jerusalem.
In REV 3:21, winners are granted to sit with Christ on His throne.
In REV 21:7, winners inherit fantastic blessings in the eternal state.
To be a double winner means that the believer must make consistently good decisions, positive decisions from a position of strength, and remain inside the PPOG and when they sin rebound as quickly as possible.
Maintain control of his life, resulting in having a personal sense of destiny.
The one shot decision to believe in Christ, which produces eternal life. That one shot decision breaks Satan’s back strategically.
There are two parts to the angelic conflict as it extends into human history:
the strategic side and the tactical side.
The chief witness in all of human history is the humanity of Jesus Christ in hypostatic union. Our Lord is the strategic witness.
Strategic = He came up with a strategy to defeat Satan and executed that plan magnificently and He defeated Satan.
COL 2:14 having cancelled out the certificate of debt which was against us by means of the decrees, and which [certificate of debt] was hostile to us and He [by means of the decrees] has taken it out of the way having nailed it to the cross.
COL 2:15 When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.
The other witnesses are the invisible heroes, those believers who execute the PPOG in the Church-age. These mature believers are classified as tactical witnesses.
ACT 1:8 but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth