Dear Friends,
What does the word “faithful” mean? Synonyms are reliable, trustworthy,
dependable, or loyal. Were you to stand before Jesus Christ today, could
He say those words describe you? Today’s attached devotional will help
you answer. God bless you.

Because of Calvary,
John Janney

• Revelation 2:10 (ESV)

  10 Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested, and for ten days you will have tribulation. Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life.

“May I ask you this question? What would you do if to follow Christ were penal according to the laws of the land? If you had to live under perpetual jeopardy of life for reading the Word, would you hide it as the saints of God did, behind the wainscoat or under the floor, and read it down in the cellar or up in the garret at spare moments? Could you come forward in the day of trial as those did in Pliny’s time, and say, ‘I am a Christian’? Do you think that like poor Tomkins, when Bonner held his finger over the candle to let him see what it was like, you could still say you could burn, but you could not turn? Could you stand as some of the martyrs did at the stake, telling those who looked on that if they did not clap their hands at last they might know their religion was not true, and so at the very last, when their poor fingers were all on fire, they would still lift them up, and wave their hands to and fro, and cry out, ‘None but Christ! none but Christ!’ Do you think you would have the grace to suffer for Christ Jesus? You may say, ‘I fear I should not.’ My dear friends, that fear is a very natural one; but mark you, if you can bear the ordinary trials of the day, the constant trials of the world, and take them before God and exhibit Christian patience under them, you may hope that as a believer in Christ you would have more grace given you when the trials became more severe, and so you would be able to pass through them as the saints did of old. But mark you, if the present trials and troubles of the day are too much for you, and you cannot exhibit Christian patience under them, I am compelled to ask you in the language of Jeremiah, ‘If thou hast run with the footmen and they have wearied thee, how wilt thou contend with horses? and if in the land of peace wherein thou trustedst, they wearied thee, then how wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan?’” [Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit XI, (London: Passmore and Alabaster, 1865), p. 537-538]