God promises that no one can snatch His people from His hand. This is not because our perseverance in the faith does not matter, but because He gives the grace for His people to persevere to the end (Jer. 32:40). Christ holds on to His people but their perseverance, by His grace, is absolutely necessary. We fight the spiritual battle and press on in Christ because He is at work within us.

The National Center for Family Integrated Churches presents Perseverance Part 2, The Spirit, a message given by Joel Beekie at the Power of the Gospel Conference. Okay, turn with me please to Hebrews 3, Hebrews 3, 12 and 13, And Hebrews 12, 1 and 2. Hebrews 3, 12 and 13. Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief and departing from the living God, but exhort one another daily, while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin." In Hebrews 12, 1 and 2. Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which thus so easily beset us.

And let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Let's pray. Glorious God, we thank thee so much for having seen last hour that the Holy Spirit, through the three-fold office of Jesus Christ, enables every one of thy children to persevere in the most holy faith to the very end because thou does persevere in us. We pray now that we may look at the as we look at the other side of the coin, that we must persevere with thee, that thou wilt help us to run the race that is set before us, looking into Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Please go with us, Lord, in this hour, and help us to persevere in and through the word, through the means that thou has given, all the way to the end.

Blessed Spirit of God, bless this talk to our souls and to our eternal well-being, but also to our helpfulness as we journey to the celestial city. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Well, this summer, my wife and I commemorated our 25th anniversary. I wanted to do something very special for her. I was going to England and Wales to do some conference work.

And I said, let's go to a country we've never been to before, a country where we don't know of any Reformed churches, where I won't preach at all, one whole week to just do something really, really special. And we've long wanted to go to Scandinavian countries. It's one part of the world we haven't been to. And especially we heard about the beautiful fjords in Norway. And so we arranged a thorough trip, every detail arranged, motels arranged in different places.

The first half of the trip we're gonna take a beautiful train ride through Norway, through all the hills and mountains, glorious scenery. And the second half we're gonna get on a boat and go up the west coast, go into all the fjords. It's going to be absolutely idyllic and wonderful. I'm gonna be the best woman in the world, the best scenery in the world. We're looking forward to it for a long time.

We leave Grand Rapids, we get to Chicago, and that night, we're supposed to fly over, the plane has mechanical problems. You talk about a huge letdown. The plane was fine, but the, whatever that thing is, gangplank, called, gets to the plane, stopped about 10 feet short of the door, the entranceway to the plane. And so my frustration, I wanted to tell that pilot, just back up the plane and move 10 feet over and we'll get on. Done.

No, they couldn't fix it. So we had to be overnighted and we went to a motel after standing in line for three hours, a motel that was 22 miles away, and then had to get up at four o'clock in the morning to go back the next day to get a new ticket. Well, we had another ticket, but that all got messed up the next day. The whole following day, the whole day, we stood in lines at the airport trying to get tickets for that night. And we finally got a ticket, and then we got ready to get on the plane, and there were mechanical problems again.

And so, we ended up getting another flight later that night, very late in the night, and it was just a whole day in the airport of frustration. And my wife's degree of sanctification was much higher than mine. When we got on the plane and the time we're supposed to land, we had to take another route to get to the boat. We already missed the train, First half vacation, gone. To get to the boat on time, we would have to arrive exactly, exactly when we're supposed to, through those different trips and transfers all the way over to Norway, going now through London.

No plane could be late, there could be no more problems, or we'd miss the boat and our whole vacation would be gone. Well, long story short, we made it to the boat 20 minutes before the boat left. The pressure the whole way, the prayers, the fears, is this whole thing going to be destroyed was overwhelming. But we made it and we had a wonderful time And everything turned out just fine. Well, the Christian life is often like that trip.

Christians are on a journey to a long anticipated place. Their journey must cover a great distance, it will be full of difficulties, disappointments, close calls. But by persevering, we will enter into the most beautiful and peaceful place in the universe, the heavenly kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And all the trials and frustrations and pressures and tribulations we must endure to get there will be worth it when we enter into his glory and rest. The saints of God must persevere to the end.

Westminster Confession of Faith 17.1 says this, they whom God has accepted in his beloved, effectually called, sanctified by his spirit, as we saw last hour, can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but shall certainly persevere therein to the end and be eternally saved." You know, I began the last talk by saying that Bunyan has a powerful picture in Pilgrim's Progress of Satan pouring water on fire. And Christians in the house of the interpreter says, what in the world does that mean? And the interpreter says, Satan is always trying to destroy the fire of grace within the believer. But the more he pours water in the fire, the brighter the fire flames, and Christians puzzle, and an interpreter says, I'll explain it to you, he takes him around the corner, back around the backside of the wall, and there stands a man, which is of course symbolic of Jesus Christ, pouring oil, which is the symbolic of the Holy Spirit, onto the fire. And that oil will keep, you see, that oil and that Savior will keep the work.

The Spirit and the Son will keep the work of grace in you to the very end. So it's guaranteed by God's grace. But God works that out by means and that's the subject of this talk you see. Philippians 2 says, work out your own salvation for it is God who worketh in you." Verse 13. And we are confident of this very thing, that he which has begun the good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ.

You see, grace empowers our efforts and guarantees their ultimate success. So here we have yet another example, you'll see, in the doctrine of perseverance, where God's sovereign grace and our responsibility come together. So we are called to put a hand on both, pleading grace and doing our responsibility. So what I want to do with you this morning is just look at two simple thoughts. First, the duty or the why of perseverance, why we need to persevere from our side, and then secondly, the means, that is the how of perseverance, how God gives us means that we may persevere to the end.

So duty and means of perseverance. My goal is to show you that both are in and through and by the Word. Primarily that is God's primary means. Now, Jesus said that perseverance is necessary for our ultimate salvation and glory. He that endure to the end shall be saved.

And the context in both times Jesus says that is persecution. Jesus gives us a vivid picture of true salvation in the parable of the soils. He says the word of God is scattered like seed upon the ears of people. Some don't respond at all, but are blinded by the devil. Some initially respond with great joy, but it doesn't take root in their hearts, and so when persecution arises, their faith withers.

Others receive the word, but they love this world, and noxious weeds choke out the word. And then there's those who keep the word, who receive it and keep it and bring forth fruit with perseverance. They persevere in faith and obedience to the Word. Perseverance is our duty. It's the duty of those who receive the Word by faith.

Now why? Why is persevering in the word crucial for our ultimate salvation. Just give you three reasons. No doubt there are more. Perseverance is necessary, number one, Because Christianity is union with Christ.

Christianity is union with Christ. See, if we don't persevere, we're not united with Christ, Our salvation will fail, and it will show that we're not Christians after all. Hebrews 3.14 puts it this way. For we are made partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end. Now, you see, this is the stress on man's responsibility here now.

To be partakers of Christ means, as Owen said, our union with Christ, to be one with Him, He our living head, and we members of his redeemed body. And the key word here is of course is this if. If we persevere in faith to the end, then we have been truly joined to Christ. Now Paul uses that same language in Colossians 1, 22, 23. He says that Christ died to, quote, present you holy and unblameable, unreprobable in His sight if ye continue in the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel.

So the remarkable thing about these texts is that the proof of our perseverance is that holding on to our faith to the end is a future reality. The phrase we are made uses the Greek perfect tense denoting a present condition or state generally as a result of some past event. So God's Spirit is telling us that our present state of union with Christ, which is the result of having been saved in the past, is proving by our continued faith in the present and in the future through perseverance to certify our eternal salvation. Jonathan Edwards put it this way, the lack of perseverance is as much an evidence of the lack of true conversion as the lack of conversion is a sign of the lack of election. And Owen said, our perseverance is an evidence of our participation in Christ by which it may be tested whether it be true and genuine.

So the reality of Our union with Christ is demonstrated day by day as we go on persevering, by the grace of the Spirit, but also by using the means of God, in trusting Christ and in obeying the commands of Christ. So when God unites us to Christ, all the powers of our soul get engaged in clinging to Christ. Hebrews 3.14 again, we're made partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence, steadfast to the end. When God saved you and you put your confidence only in Christ, you need to hold on to that even to the end. Three times the author to the Hebrews uses that expression hold on to for describing our perseverance.

We hold on to the Word. Perseverance is an automatic thing. You don't just let go and let God, but you hold on to it. That means it requires effort on your part. Owen goes on to say, perseverance is our utmost endeavor to hold it fast and to keep it firm and steadfast.

Shaken it will be. Opposed it will be. Kept it will not. It cannot be without our utmost diligence and endeavor. So we persevere by the Spirit through the offices of Christ as we saw for a whole hour last talk, but that perseverance, the Spirit works through giving us the energy and the diligence to use the means by which he gives us the grace of perseverance.

So question 79 of the Westminster Larger Catechism says, true believers by reason of their inseparable union with Christ can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. So there's great comfort here, you see, in knowing that we are joined to Christ, but there's also great responsibility there thereby because we must live out that reality from day to day. And since Christ is only made known to us through the scriptures, we must persevere in the word Because we are united with Christ. That's reason number one for this duty of perseverance. Reason number two, perseverance is necessary because Christianity is a war.

The worst thing that can happen to someone is to be at war and not know they're at war. That's what's so common in our country right now. Most Americans don't really realize we're at war with terrorism. The struggle against terrorism is severe worldwide. Well the problem with many self-professed Christians today is they don't realize they're at war within themselves, at war with indwelling sin, at war against the powers of darkness.

Satan and his forces are battling Christ and his saints who keep the commandments of God and hold on to the Gospel. Revelation 11 verse 7. Victory belongs to Christ. He will overcome the devil and this world by dying and by interceding now at the right hand of the Father. But part of that intercession is that his saints might overcome through him and by his spirit.

And so the book of Revelation stresses this theme over and over again. To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the paradise of God. He that overcometh shall not be heard of the second death. He that overcometh shall inherit all things. I will be his God, he shall be my people.

You see, these things led Augustine, the great ancient church father, to say, the promises of God are not to him that fights, but to him that overcomes. Now, to overcome in the book of Revelation does not mean winning every battle against temptation, but it means clinging to the gospel of Christ's sacrificial blood despite Satan's lies, despite my slips and falls, despite persecution. It means refusing to desert Christ's army, refusing to go AWOL by worshiping the idols of this world. Thomas Watson said, a man may lose a single battle in the field, yet win the victory at last. A child of God may be foiled in a single battle against temptation, as Peter was, but he's victorious at last.

Now if a saint be crowned victor, if the world be conquered by him, he must needs persevere. You see, the one who perseveres, who conquers in the end, is promised nothing less than escape from hell, an entrance into everlasting glory. And so this whole life is a war, it's a battle. It's a holy war, as Bunyan called it. William Grenall, the great Puritan who wrote 1, 500 pages on Ephesians 6, 10 through 20 about the battle, said this, he said, the Christian life is like walking between two hedges on a sidewalk.

Behind the hedges, all the way along life, are the archers of Satan. And we must run the race steadily, looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, Hebrews 12, not loitering. Because as soon as we loiter in this race, the archers are going to be able to focus and take aim, and they're going to be able to hit us in the heart. And so we run the race knowing there are enemies behind the hedges all the way along. But we run the race looking to Jesus, getting strength in Him, and we keep on going looking to Jesus, laying aside the sin which so easily besets us.

So you see, this kind of lifestyle is a lifestyle of battle. It's a lifestyle of self-denial. Think of Abraham. He had to go out not knowing where he went. Then he had to raise a knife above his son, Isaac.

You see, we must die many deaths now so that worldliness may die in our hearts and we may live to the Lord and persevere to the end. But overcoming the world doesn't only involve self-denial, it involves in this warfare patiently enduring by faith all the criticisms, ridicule, and persecution we may suffer for following God's Word. Those might be small things Like the stinging remarks of classmates in school or coworkers at your job or brothers or sisters at home in homeschooling. Or it might be more severe things. I have a friend in South Africa who's been jailed many times for bringing the gospel behind what he calls the iron curtain of persecution in Muslim countries.

And he's been shot at. He's had all kinds of experiences. I asked him what was the most frightening thing he ever experienced. He said, well, nah, not much. I said, well, tell me, tell me.

Well, he said one time, you know, they put a plastic bag around my head and tied it around my neck, and they lifted me upside down and put my head in a pail of urine with this bag tied around me until I fainted for lack of oxygen, but he said, you know, it's no big deal, it's nothing compared to what Jesus suffered, and you know, I knew they wouldn't kill me in the end because I've got also American citizenship and they won't kill an American, they fear reprisal, so I just endured for his sake, and you know, they'll let me go. I'm like. Pfft. You've gotta be kidding me. Patiently enduring.

Persevering. Because we're at war. Samuel Rutherford said, the devil's war is better than the devil's peace. It's far better to have the devil as a raging enemy and God as your friend, than to have God as your enemy and the devil as your friend. You can't get to heaven without fighting the devil, friends.

You're at war. And thirdly, perseverance is necessary because Christianity is a race. A race that requires endurance. 1 Corinthians 9, 24. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon.

And in some cases, an Iron Man triathlon. The race course is the path defined by God's word. We must keep running on that path until we can say with Paul, I fought a good fight, I finished my course, I've kept the faith, henceforth it was laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day. And not only to me, but to all them who love his appearing." John Bunyan said, friend, it is a sad thing to sit down before we are in heaven and to grow weary before we come to the place of rest. If this should be thy case, I'm sure thou dost not so run as to obtain." Thomas Watson said, "'Tis sweating work all the way to glory." The author of the Hebrews says, let's run with patience, with endurance, with perseverance, the original Greek means.

The race set before us, not passively, not sitting and waiting, but laboring to carry a burden, to finish a difficult task is what the word means. And it was a long race. Paul, or the author to the Hebrews, whoever wrote Hebrews, is picturing a great Greek coliseum. And in that coliseum you see this long, long race, sort of like the French bike-a-thon, It just goes on and on and on and on for days, running, running, running, running, running. And how are you to run?

Well, the author to the Hebrews tells us in Hebrews 12, 1 and 2. He says you're to run negatively by laying aside sin, and you're to run positively by looking to Jesus. And you're to lay aside all sin, all sins that besets you, all sin that trips you up, all sin that hinders you in running the race, All baggage. You know, when the Greek runners would get out on the racetrack, they'd take off all their clothing but the bare essentials, and they'd have no things to carry with them. They'd run the race.

Nearly naked. So they wouldn't be encumbered. And you see, when you run the Christian race, you're to run without the baggage of sin is what the author's saying. Lay aside that sin that so easily besets you. And everyone's sin can be different.

Sins that beset you may be very different from sins that beset me. I once had a man come to me and he said, I've got to besetting sin. He was weeping. He didn't know how to get over it. His besetting sin was that he could not stop listening every day for inordinate amounts of time to country music.

That is not my bosom sin. I barely know what country music is. I never listened to it, never the least bit tempted to listen to it, never listened to one piece of country music in my whole life, but that's his problem. And I had to say to him, you know, you do need to cut this way back in your life because it is destroying your spiritual life. It's destroying your race.

What's destroying your race? What's keeping you from running totally for the Lord? Are you willing to lay it aside? Are you serious about running this race, persevering to the end? Think about it.

Go home with that from this conference and search your conscience and say, Lord, what is it, what is it? Help me to put that sin to death, to put a sword through it. Have mercy on me, O God. Help me to lay aside sin. Sin is no business taking up a place in my soul.

You know, if you're a Christian, you ought to be able to say with Paul, in Romans six, verse 11, I need to reckon myself dead unto sin and alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. I've got no business sinning. I must run the race. Lay the paraphernalia of sin aside. Run the race looking to Jesus.

He's my exponent of faith. He's my model. He's my runner who's run before me. He's my coach. He's my meritor.

He's everything in the race. When I was a young man and ran for track in high school, I remember our coach saying to us all the time, when you run the race, I'll be standing at the end of the race. I want you to be looking to me. Don't look over your shoulders. You come around the last bend.

See where the guys are behind you. You lose half a step. That may cost you the race. You run the race by looking to me. You see, never run the Christian race primarily through the negative, primarily by reacting against sin.

You do do that. That's part of running the race. But primarily, you see, Christianity must be motivated by the positive, by looking to Jesus. The example that he endured, he endured the cross. Can't you endure the cross as well?

If he endured the cross for you and gave his blood for you and gave his life for you, can't you at least live for him? If he ran to the very end, If He set His face as a flint to Jerusalem and endured to the end, can't you endure to the end for His sake? Can't you run behind Him in His shadow, bearing some of His sufferings, not meritoriously, but gratuitously, following behind Him? Be motivated by what He endured. Be motivated by what He rejoiced in.

He rejoiced to run the race because He knew that one day He'd sit down with His saints of all ages and say, Father, here am I with all those whom Thou hast given me. He rejoiced in his homecoming. He rejoiced in being able to bring you, dear believer, to glory, and so he endured the cross for the joy that was set before him. You run the race, remembering the best is yet to be. You're going to be with Jesus forever, married to him in glory.

The best is yet to be. Run the race. And then he ran the race, despising the shame. It was a shameful thing to be dying on the cross. That was a cruel form of persecution, not only a painful form, and a cursed form, but it was also a shameful form.

Mothers would walk by on the street going out of Jerusalem, because they did this on the main highway going into Jerusalem, to shame those who committed treason and murder. They would say to their little children, don't you ever be like those people. But Jesus despised the shame, because he knew he was dying for his people. He lived by the fear of his father, not the fear of man. That's the way to live.

You young people, that's the way to live. If you live by the fear of man, you live by what people think of you, you'll be flipping and flapping in all directions because man is fickle. Man changes. One day this is in style. The next day That's in style.

You can't keep up with it What you need to do is live by the fear of God Esteeming God smiles greater than the smiles of men is steaming God's frowns to be of greater value than the frowns of men. Run the race. Though you face uphill battles, trials, temptations, losses, and crosses, consider that you're running to the end to the glory of King Jesus. That's your duty. You run the race because Christianity is a race.

You persevere to the end because Christianity is a war. And you persevere because you're united with Jesus Christ. That's your duty. But now how do you do it? What are the means?

Well of course God is the primary cause of our perseverance. That's what we saw all last hour. He will keep you. The Father loves you with an everlasting love, dear believer. The Son never lives to make a decision for you.

And the Spirit works perseverance in His saints, preserving them through faith to the end. But God works through means. God is a craftsman who uses tools. And he doesn't just use any means. He can work, of course, apart from means, he's almighty.

But his normal way is to use means to accomplish his purposes, especially that's true in the area of perseverance. So we're not going to give you a self-righteous checklist of which you can say, well, perseverance or godliness, I heard this morning, is a checklist. If I do A through Z and don't do A through Z, I'll persevere to the end. No, that's not what the Bible says. The Bible says, Proverbs 4.23, keep your heart with all diligence, for out of the heart are the issues of life.

John Flavo said in his masterful book, Keeping the Heart, by keeping the heart, I mean understand the diligent and constant use and improvement, the good application that is, of all means and duties, holy means and duties, to preserve the soul from sin and to maintain its sweet and free communion with God. So what means are we talking about? Well, I want to do two things with you. I want to look at general means very quickly, means that you certainly know. And then I want to look at some specific means from Hebrews 3 verses 12 and 13, which I began with this hour.

So general means. God works, says the Westminster Shorter Catechism, by the outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption, and they are especially the word, the sacraments, and prayer, which are made effectual to the elect for their salvation. So here you have the general basic ABCs of the Christian life. So just as the first rule of good health is maintaining the basics of a nutritional diet, sufficient rest, and invigorating exercise, so the first rule of perseverance is to continue practicing the basics of the Christian life. Never, never abandon the basics of the Christian life.

And so predictably, the Shorter Catechism lists the word of God as first among the means of grace. It's only as you stay in the word, love the word, live the word, meditate on the Word, memorize the Word, think the Word, that you will persevere to the end. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. There's no substitute for attending church to hear preaching, there's no substitute for reading the Word daily in your home. There's no substitute for the daily reading of scripture and family worship and talking about the Word.

You must abide in God's Word as the primary means to holiness, to spiritual growth, and to perseverance. I cannot emphasize that enough to you. And an elder in my church, an elder who called me one day, my bags were packed to go to a conference in San Francisco, and the elder said to me, I'm in desperate straits, I need your help right now. I Said oh, man. I'm just leaving what but what's the problem?

He said well God has deserted me. I've deserted God. I'm not sure what it is I'm so confused, but I can't read I can't I can't read the Bible. I can't do anything I'm a terrible mess I Said friend I'm so sorry. I'd love to come and see you right now.

I'll tell you what. I'll come in three days. I'll pray with you now. But in those three days, I want you to spend 30 minutes alone with God, 10 minutes reading the Bible, 10 minutes meditating on what you read, and 10 minutes in prayer." Oh, he said, I could never do that. It would be blasphemy to God.

God would, it would be an abomination in his sight. I said, do it. I said, it's a greater abomination in sight that you don't do it at all. It's a sin on top of your sin. Well, reluctantly, he said he tried, but he wasn't sure.

And I really didn't think he'd do it. Well, I got back three days later, and there was a note on my chair that said, no need to contact so and so. All is well with his soul. The ordinary means. You see, that's why I'm so concerned for many of you, because you're wonderful homeschooling families.

I love this conference. I love being with you. I just love it here. But I know that there's families here that are not engaging in daily family worship. I just spent five years of my life developing a family worship Bible, and some of you families are not even picking it up, I'd give it to you for nothing if you can't afford it.

Because I'm so concerned that you go home and you use that Family Worship Bible, and you take those family worship sections, you read them to your children, you use the ordinary daily means of grace with your family for their eternal salvation and perseverance in the most holy faith. And besides that, I'd throw in free my book on family worship to tell you how to do it. And I mean that. I'm burdened with every family, every Christian family in America, professing Christian family in America. You need to be doing family worship if you want your family to persevere in the most holy faith.

Abiding in God's word is the primary means to holiness, to spiritual growth, and to perseverance. Fathers, are you talking to your family every single day? Do they hear it from your lips about the truths of God's word? Do you realize the value of family worship? That's the most valuable thing I do in my life.

Do you realize that the Puritans, 1647, wrote a document about family worship? In the document, they say this, that if a father were not to do family worship every day with his family. They would put him under discipline if he refused to repent and start doing it. And they forbid him to come into the Lord's Supper because he's denying his family the basic spiritual food they need. It's like a mother not studying food on the table every day.

You wouldn't think of starving your family with no physical food, would you? Why would you starve your family with no spiritual food? And you see, that's why. It's not because we're just a nonprofit organization. We're offering you this special deal where you can all buy these Bibles and have a whole family sit around and use the same Bible at such a ridiculously low price.

That's not why we're doing that. Just because we're nonprofit. We're doing it because we're burdened that families are not faithfully doing family worship, and we know that some fathers struggle with it. So we wrote this Bible so it can help you Do family worship. So read it aloud, and then if you struggle with it, just read what we say there, and then begin gradually, in a week or two weeks or three weeks, read it and then try to talk with your family about it, if you're just beginning.

And you'd be surprised how the Lord can help you. One sentence at a time. It doesn't have to be long. Just do those four things of family worship. Read the Bible.

Talk to your children about what you read. Pray and sing. Those are the duties God has required of you in the word of God. Number two, prayer is the echo of God's word from the believing heart. And therefore, prayer, says the Catechism, plays a key role in spiritual life, spiritual growth, and spiritual perseverance.

We should saturate our days with private prayer, praying with our families to offer praises, petitions, thanksgivings, intercessions, like arrows during the day, praying with fellow believers, praying with our spouses. Pray often, said John Bunyan, for prayer is a shield to the soul, a sacrifice to God, and a scourge for Satan. Do you want to persevere in the end? You can't do it without prayer. Bunyan went on to say this, he said, prayer is always the first thing in our lives.

You can do more than pray after you pray, but you can't do more than pray until you prayed. Whenever You have an impulse to pray, whatever you're doing, just pray. Pray with your eyes open, pray with your head on, as the Dutch would say. Pray when that impulse is there, but also have stated times of prayer. Prayer is absolutely critical.

You can't have a relationship with someone without two-way communication. The Bible is God communicating to us. Prayer is the way we communicate back with him. My dad used to always say to me as a boy, if you want friends, you gotta show yourself friendly, the Bible says. Friendship is a two-way street.

If you wanna be a friend of God, you've gotta have communication both ways. You've gotta echo God's word back to God in prayer. And you know, echoing God's word is a very, I mean it literally, the best way to pray is to take God's word and say it back to Him and say, Lord, do as Thou hast said. I have so many prayer books, I've liked to collect them over the years, of great godly men of the past where they wrote down their prayers. When I get discouraged with my own prayers, I take those books, they're right behind me in my study, I open them up, I just read some of them.

And what I notice about all those prayer books is that basically they're just praying scripture back to God. But God loves to read his own handwriting. God is tender of his own handwriting. William Grenell said the best way to pray is to take God's promises, turn them inside out, and retort them back again upon God and say, Lord, do as thou hast said. The way to persevere is to pray God's word back to him.

And then, says the catechism, there are the sacraments. We often minimize those in the Reformed faith, but we shouldn't. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are two great means of grace that we neglect to our peril, for they are visible representations of the Word. Some people have thought these sacraments confer salvation. We don't say that, of course.

Others go to the opposite extreme and see them only as empty rituals or mere memorials. That's wrong as well. Rightly understood, baptism and the Lord's Supper are signs and seals that point us away from ourselves and direct our faith to Christ and his sacrifice on the cross. Robert Bruce, one of the early Puritans, said this. You don't get a different Christ in the sacraments than you get in the Word.

But sometimes you get Christ better. Because in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, for example, the Lord comes so low to us. He engages all five of our senses. We hear the Word as We receive the bread and wine. We smell it.

We taste it. We see it. All of our senses are brought into action. In this wonderful feast we call the Lord's Supper, this remembrance feast in which we remember Christ, This strengthening feast in which our faith gets strengthened so we can persevere. This love feast in which we love Him who first loved us.

This covenanting feast in which we covenant our lives back unto Him who covenanted Himself to us. And this witnessing feast by which we testify, I do not belong to myself, but I find my life and hope outside of myself in Jesus Christ. And so the shorter catechism says, by these general means, by the Word, the Word of God, Prayer and the sacraments. Prayer as an echo of the Word. The sacraments as representations of the Word.

So it's all about the Word. By the word, we persevere to the end. But then Hebrews 3, Hebrews 3 has just this amazing text which gives us some very specific means, some practical guidelines for our daily walk on how to persevere to the end. Let me read those two verses again. Take heed brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief and departing from the living God.

But exhort one another daily while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. I want to give you here before we close six basic means, specific means that God has given us here to fight the good fight to the end. Number one, Watchfulness in the light of the Word. All six are going to be in relationship to the Word. That's what this talk is about.

Persevering in the Word. Watchfulness in the light of the Word. The text says, take heed. Literally, look. Open your eyes.

Watch over yourself. Watch over each other. The Word sheds light upon your life. Watch that light, watch the Word. Watch your own hearts, watch and pray that you enter not into temptation.

The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. John Flavell said, our hearts are at best like delicate musical instruments. They are easily jarred out of tune or go out of tune if merely left alone for a while. We're called to frequently examine the spiritual condition of our hearts by the Word so that they are ready to make the music of holiness. You know, you have a piano in your home.

You leave it alone for a while. It gets out of tune. You've got to get a tuner in to get it back on tune. Well, Flava was saying, we gotta keep tuning our hearts according to the Word. Keep tuning our hearts, be watchful, be watchful.

We must be like sentries guarding a fortress by shining spotlights to reveal what is in the darkness. The Word is also our light against the darkness of sin. And so we have to be watchful and be alert to the sense of the first motions of sin within us. You know the Puritans made a lot of that. They said the first movements of sin within you, be aware of them.

And don't soften your defenses against the enemy. Don't desensitize your consciences. Don't say, well, you can't be righteous over much. Don't excuse sin. Don't leave any window space in your life for sin.

Don't minimize the evil of sin. Don't rationalize it away. Sin is spiritual insanity before God. Every sin, said Thomas Sharnock, as you commit it, at the very moment you commit it, you are acting like a practical atheist. Every sin is a testimony.

God is not. How could you sin against such a good God? How could you sin if you were aware of God's presence at that moment? Be watchful. The duty of a sentry is to sound the alert when the enemy is near.

Be aware of Satan's devices. You know, I once preached a whole sermon on the text that we have to be like conies, little rock rabbits, for their home is in the rocks. I was in Australia once, I saw a whole, came around the corner in a car, I saw a whole group, soon after I preached that sermon, a whole group of rock rabbits standing on these rocks and running around and playing, and there was one century coney. You know, they have a century coney on the top of the rocks and he gives out a little whistle and in a flash of a second all the conies are in the rock. And so we came around the corner.

I saw these rock rabbits. I said, oh that's great, I'm going to take a picture. I lifted up my camera and went to click and they were all gone. They're in the rock. And you see that's what we should be like.

When the enemies come, when we like rock, you know, the rock rabbit says they move away from the rock, a hawk can come down and get them in a moment. We should be always alert to all the dangers around us and flee to the rock of our salvation, Jesus Christ, again and again and again, right away. Be like the Conies, flee to the rocks, be watchful. Watson said, take heed of presuming fear begets prayer, prayer begets strength, Strength begets steadfastness. A lack of watchfulness lulls us into spiritual lethargy and sleep so that we are surprised by Satan's attacks.

It's such a shame. But, you know, so much of the modern media is nothing but a bunch of sin. And as young people, as children, but also as parents, we allow ourselves to watch far too much of that junk. It destroys our souls. It desensitizes our consciences.

Failure to keep watch is what led to Peter's tragic fall and denial of our Lord, and so it is for us as well. Be watchful, take heed. Presumption can lead to falls from which nominally professing Christians may never recover. Remember that tragic story of The man in the Iron Cage says, I left off to watch. I stopped watching and to be sober.

I laid the reins upon the neck of my lus. And he destroyed himself. You go the pathway of sin, you will destroy yourself. Drifting into sin is the opposite of perseverance, and it's extremely dangerous to the soul, so don't even begin flirting with it. There was a man, a hermit, who lived on top of a mountain.

And he had a little niece who lost both of her parents in a tragic accident. And the will said that the little girl, who was six years old, had to go live with the hermit on top of the mountain. So she did. And the hermit didn't know how to educate her. He wanted to send her to the school in the valley, but he didn't have a vehicle to get there.

So he put an ad in the newspaper for a driver to take the little girl down to school, down the mountain, down the winding curves every day. And he had three applicants. He interviewed them all. He said to the first one, how close can you come to the edge of the road and not go over? All the guys said, I'm just an incredibly good driver.

I've got 40 years of experience. I can come within a foot of the edge and your niece will be safe. Next guy claimed he could come within six inches. Third guy said, sir, I'm not quite sure because I'll be hugging the other side of the road. You know who got the job.

You see, it's a very sad thing when Christians today say, how close can I come to sin without sinning? You know, last night, I was interviewed here by NCFIC in the back room, and one of the things they asked me about was in parenting, how do you say no to your kids when they're doing something that, or they wanna do something that's a bit risque and flirting with sin. I said, you know, What I like to do is I like to say to them, first of all, what do you think? What do you think, teenager? You think this is good for your soul?

Can you get down and pray to God, ask God's blessing on this movie you're about to watch? If you can't ask God's blessing on it, don't do it. Walk with a tender conscience. Be watchful. Be watchful.

Secondly, exercise of faith in the Word. Exercise of faith in the Word. The central element in perseverance is faith and the challenge is overcoming unbelief. Hebrews 3, 12, take heed brethren lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief. Seven verses later, it speaks of Israel in the wilderness outside the land of Canaan, so we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

And then verse two of the next chapter, for unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto them, but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that hurt it. The root of all our backsliding, all our apostasy, lies in unbelief, said John Owen. You know, I told you about that man that was 101 in my church that I buried a few weeks ago. Well, he came to great liberty the last 20 years of his life. But before that, when I first came to Grand Rapids, Michigan, he was caught in bondage.

I think the Lord was really working in him, but he just said, one time he sat on my couch and he just cried with tears coming down his face. He said, oh my cursed, my cursed, my cursed unbelief, I wish I could kill it. Well I'm not so afraid of people that see unbelief as that kind of enemy. I'm more afraid of people that live a lifestyle of unbelief and aren't worried about it. You see, when we face a painful trial, an enticement to sin, a doubt about God's goodness, we must fly by faith to the Lord Jesus Christ and cling to his promises.

That's the way to persevere. We may not view faith as an insurance policy, file away in a safety deposit box to be used once in a while. Faith is a daily exercise. Faith is the muscle that we must exercise or it will atrophy. Faith is the shield that extinguishes the fiery darts of the devil.

Faith is the eye by which we look to Christ as the answer to our needs. Faith is the hand by which we receive Christ. Faith is the mouth by which we take Christ into ourselves. Faith is the feet that carry us to God through our great high priest. If you want to persevere in faith, you must exercise your faith.

Number three, Fear of majesty. Fear of God's majesty revealed in His Word. Look at the end of verse 12, Hebrews 3. Departing from the living God. The living God.

Do you feel the majesty in that word? Jeremiah 10 says, but the Lord is the true God, He's the living God, an everlasting King, and His wrath the earth shall tremble. Hebrews 10, 31 says it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. When you persevere by faith, you have a heartfelt consciousness of God's presence and you desire to constantly live in that presence. When I was a boy, my parents always handed me this little book called, Thou, God Seest Me.

It was a wonderful story about a boy who stole some oranges and came to realize that God's eye was upon him and repented and returned to God. There was a story too in that book about two little girls who took some cookies to their grandma, boys and girls. Their mother said, take these cookies to grandma and make sure on the way that you don't take any of those cookies. And so the two girls took the cookies to grandma, and they're walking along, and the one girl says, you know, my stomach's kinda hungry. And the other girl says, yeah, I am too.

So the first girl sets the cookies down on the ground. She looks around. She said, there's no one here to see us. We could just take one. Grandma will never know.

OK, the other girl said. And they reach into the box. And suddenly the second girl says, wait a minute sister. And she takes her by the arm and she said, there is someone here. And the first girl says, what do you mean?

She quickly scoops up the cookies and she looks around and I don't see anyone. Second girl says, but God is here. God is here. And you see, the way to persevere in the Christian life, whether you're a boy or a girl, a teenager, whether you're an aged saint, is to live in the consciousness of the presence of the living God. He's always here.

To use the title of Francis Schaeffer's book, The God Who's Always Here. Every falling into sin is connected with the loss of the consciousness of the presence of God. Number four, mutual encouragement through the word. Look at verse 13 now. But exhort one another daily.

You see, we must not be watchful merely over ourselves, but over others, especially our brethren in the church. Perseverance is a corporate endeavor, not just the work of individuals. We run as spiritual athletes, I said, but we run, Hebrews 12 verse one said, and we read that already, surrounded by a cloud of witnesses Consisting of the ancient saints of Israel all that we have to modern Christians. You see, what the author of the Hebrews was saying to the Christians, you're going to give up, you're going to stop persevering, you're going to abandon the faith, you're going to fall into sin and destroy your witness. When you've got all these other Old Testament saints, Hebrews 11, by faith Enoch, by faith Abel, by faith Abraham, by faith Joseph, by faith Rahab, they all walked by faith, they all persevered to the end, they all lived out of the promises of God, and they hadn't even seen the cross of Christ.

And you are on the other side of the cross and you know what He's done. He's given His lifeblood for you and you're not going to live for His glory? You are running the race. You're out on the racetrack and all these Old Testament saints, figuratively, of course not literally, They're around on the stands and they're cheering you on. They're saying, we made it to the end.

You can make it to the end too. But you see, you and I, we live in some ways, you know, it's the worst of times and we live in the best of times because we have more people in our stands than ever before. We've got all the New Testament saints. I mean, haven't the Old Testament saints encouraged you? Enoch, he walked with God.

I remember a 17-year-old, when I was 17 years old, I read that text as I never read it before. Enoch walked with God. I said, Lord, I wanna do that. Enoch encouraged me to run the race. Tell me what it is, Lord, to walk with God.

But hasn't Abraham encouraged you? Hasn't David encouraged you? Martin Luther said, if David hasn't encouraged you in the Psalms, If David isn't one of your best friends, though he's long dead, I doubt if you're even a Christian. How can you read the Psalms and not identify with David? But the New Testament, Paul, James, John, don't you love these men Because of what they've recorded for you.

They help you run the race. They're in your stands, they're cheering you on by their very writings. Luther said, most of my best friends are long dead because they're in the books. See, we got 2, 000 years of church history too. I've studied church history all my life, so I've got thousands and thousands of forefathers in my stance.

Wonderful, Samuel Rutherford's there, women are there too, Mary Winslow, Ruth Bryan, great female writers. Martin Luther, of course, is there. Herman Boving is there, well, Hamasab Braco, oh man, there's so many of them. Who's in your stands? But you see, then we've got other people in our stands as well.

People, relatives who've gone before us. My dad is in my stands. I'm constantly thinking about things he said to me, even as I'm preaching. When he gathered us all around him near his deathbed, he's going into serious surgery, he wanted the last word with all of us, he turns to me and says, son, he says, keep preaching Christ, you can't preach him enough. I'll never forget that.

He's in my stance. He's helping me Persevere. And then there's the living people. There's church. There's a thousand, 200 people right here now.

We're all in each other's stands, aren't we? And we're all here to encourage each other. Run the race, run the race, run the race to the end. Persevere. If I were to fall right now, I could just cry at the thought of falling.

How much damage I would do, how many people I would disappoint. Not just here, but my own church. People have read my books and there's so many people in my stands. Oh, God, help me to run the race to the end, you see. Mutual encouragement through the Word.

And you should encourage each other in your own family too. You know, I've said this often, but my wife is such an encouragement to me. Sometimes I feel like I can't preach. I get so full of anxiety, and sometimes the devil just harasses me. I'm driving to church, and I'm just clinging to the wheel, and I'm quiet, and everything is tense in the car.

Everybody knows what I'm going through, and my wife looks at me, and she says, you've got it again, don't you? And I just go, yeah. And she leans forward, she puts her hand on my arm and she says, it's okay, he'll help you one more time. Oh, One more time. One more time.

One more time. Lord, help me one more time. Help me to persevere one more time. Give me grace one more time. Mutual encouragement through the word by the company of witnesses of saints all around you.

Help each other fight the fight and run the race. Hebrews 10 23, let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering, and let us consider one another to provoke each other unto love and to good works, not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the day approaching. What are you doing to stimulate your fellow family members, your fellow church members, your fellow work associates, your fellow students, to serve the Lord in spirit and in truth. Number five, awareness of heart depravity, Awareness of heart depravity exposed by the Word. Hebrews 3, 13 closes with these solemn words, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

Sin is so deceitful. The heart is deceitful. Jeremiah 17, nine, above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it? You see, by nature we lie to ourselves so that we can cling to our sins. And we don't allow God's word then to expose us for what we truly are.

Proverbs 28 puts it this way, he that covers his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesses and forsaketh them shall have mercy. Happy is the man that fears always, but he that hardens his heart shall fall into mischief. Be quick to confess, quick to repent of sin, instead of hardening your heart against fearing the Lord. John Flabo said, our hearts should be like our eyes when we get something in them. They will not stop blinking and watering until it has been wept out, so the upright heart cannot be at rest till it have wept out its troubles and repentance in deep humiliation for hard evils and disorders of sin.

And so the way to persevere is to keep one eye on our sins, said another Puritan, and the other eye on our Savior. Be aware of your sinfulness, your tendency to lie, to exaggerate, to distort, and let that cultivate humility in you. Let it make you fly to Jesus. Thomas Watson again, the lower the tree roots itself in the earth, the firmer it is, so the more the soul is rooted in humility, The more established it is, and the less it is in danger of falling away. Beware of light views of your sin and a dim sense of your need of Christ, for those are the first slips toward a great fall.

If you drink Sin Light, you'll drink Christ Light, and it will destroy your soul. Get a great view of sin that you may have a great view of Christ. And then finally, number six, urgency. Urgency based on the coming kingdom. Be motivated to persevere by this specific urgency.

Verse 13 says, while it is called today, do these things. Today means this present age, not tomorrow. Tomorrow is simply today's unbelief. Today we're called to exhort each other. Today we're to live to Jesus Christ.

Today we are to persevere by faith. My dear friend, Jesus is coming back. Could be today, could be tomorrow, we don't know. Watch therefore, for you know not the hour your Lord does come. So we must be like the young women who waited for the bridegroom to come and the wedding feast to begin, always keeping oil in our lamps so that we would be ready even if he arrives at midnight.

That's the way to live, is specific means of perseverance. So don't give up. Use the general means, word, prayer, sacraments. Use the specific means, watchfulness, faith, fear of God, fellowship, hope in Christ's return, remembering the sin in your own hearts, and press on and keep fighting the enemy to the end. "'He that will be Christ's soldier, ' said William Gurnau, "'must persevere to the end of his life in this war with Satan.

Not he that takes the field, but he that keeps the field. Not he that sets out but he that holds out in this holy war deserves the name of a saint. So go out, leave this conference, put on the whole armor of God, use all the weapons of righteousness God has given you, stand firm with the army of the Lord. Defend fellow soldiers of faith. You cannot put down your weapons till the war is done.

Until you enter the celestial city, then you can rest. He once walked up a long, long hill. Some people call it a mountain in Scotland. We call it a high hill. But it was long.

It was curvy. We got very tired and just kept on going. But we were determined to make it to the top. And we got all the way to the top, and we expected great things up there, and all there was was a little tiny sign, but it just said, rest and be thankful. Well, one day, you see, when we come out of the warfare, it won't just be a little tiny thing, but we will rest and be thankful in the Lord Jesus Christ, in his glorious kingdom forever.

So press on. You've got the captain you need. He's already won the victory. You've got the Holy Spirit within you that you need. He's an almighty God, he's stronger than Satan.

You've got all the equipment you need, you've got the word of God, you've got the general means, you've got the specific means. Run the long distance race, looking to the Lord. Stay focused on the Lord in the midst of all your trials. Persevere, press on, run the race. And do remember in all your running that the heart of Christianity is Christ himself.

So cling to him, don't let him go. Say with Jacob, I will not let you go unless you bless me also. Walk by faith, walk with Him by faith. At times you can't walk, cling to Him by faith. At times you can't cling, pray to Him by faith.

No matter how weak you feel, look to Christ. If your sight grows dim, call out to Him. Just don't let Christ go. He will never disappoint you. You have his word on that.

So even when he seems to come out against you as your greatest enemy, cling to him as your greatest friend. Save with Job, though he slay me, Yet will I trust in him. Now some of you, let me close with this, some of you are not on the racetrack at all. That's true of some of you children, some of you young people, some of you adults. You're not in the word.

You're not persevering by the word. Perhaps you're in the stands. Perhaps you're judging people who are on the racetrack. That's possible. But if you're not on the racetrack, you're on your way to hell.

There's only two ways, friends. There's not a third. And I urge you, I urge you, don't settle, don't settle for this poor, perishing world as your portion. You live with this world, you'll die with this world. You live on the broad road of destruction.

Despite your outward piety, you will go to the hell of hells because you've heard the gospel with clarity and you've refused to believe in the Son of God for salvation. And you'll destroy yourself forever. Perhaps I told you this story before, but it's a wonderful story to close with. There was a man named Roland Hill, a friend of Charles Spurgeon, and he was very depressed that there wasn't much fruit on his preaching. One day, a pig farmer walked by his house, and the pigs were following right behind him.

He walked straight into the slaughterhouse and the pigs walked straight into the slaughterhouse behind him. When the man came out without his pigs, Roland Hill was there to meet him. He said, tell me how you do it. He said, I can't get people to follow me freely to life eternal. He says, and you can get pigs to follow you to their death.

How do you do it? Well, the man said, didn't you see as I was walking along, I just had a little pig's food in my pocket. I just let out a couple crumbs here and there. And for a few crumbs, these stupid pigs will follow me to their death. My dear friend, don't you be like the prodigal son, don't you be like these pigs, Don't follow this world for the pig's food of this world.

Follow the Lord Jesus Christ and your soul will live forever. And that savior is willing to be your savior as well, even though you've disowned him, even though you've torn yourself loose from him. Listen to me, boys and girls. There was once a little boy named Tom, and he made a very special boat, a sailboat. And he took that boat with him to the river, And he had a string on that boat.

And he would run along the bank of the river. And he would sail his boat. And his boat was his pride and his joy. And one day, a gust of wind came along. And it tore the string out of his hand.

And the boat went on its own way and sailed away and sent. Tom began to cry, but he could do nothing about it. And two days later, he's walking by a store and he sees his boat in the window. And he goes into the store owner. He says, give me my boat back.

Well, the store owner says, it's my boat, I paid for it. You've gotta pay for it. Tom says, how much? The boat owner says, $10. Tom goes home, he empties out every penny he has.

He scrapes together $10. He goes back, he buys the boat. He walks out of the store and he says, now boat, he starts talking to his boat. He says, twice I've owned you, once I made you, and now I bought you, and I love you. And you see, boys and girls, that's what the gospel is like.

Once God made you, He made you perfect. He made you as His pride and joy, as the masterpiece of His creation. But You cut yourself loose from him by your sin. But he comes back and he's willing to buy you. He's willing to buy you with his blood.

Repent of your sin and receive him that you may belong to him, that he may be able to look at you and say, I made that boy, I made that girl, but now I've bought them with my own blood and they are mine. Run the race. Get on the racetrack and run it to the end. Amen. Let's pray.

Great God of heaven, we thank thee so much for the precious doctrine of perseverance of the saints, both for thy role in it, the primary ultimate role, the role of guarantee and assurance by thy spirit through thy offices as prophet, priest, and king, as we heard in the former hour. And we thank thee for supplying the means, general means, specific means, and persuadiness of our duty from our end to persevere in the most holy faith. Help us to obey thee, help us to follow thee, help us to run the race to the very end, laying aside sin and looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

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