If you want the Bible’s most complete description of “an overcomer” read Revelation 14, verses 1 through 5. The Jehovah’s Witnesses interpretation of this text has scared many Bible students away from even looking at it I fear. The apostle Paul’s best description of an overcomer is found in the letter to the Ephesians, chapter 4, verses 11 through 16. There Paul calls an overcomer “a perfect (spiritually complete, mature) man” (Greek “person” or “individual” male or female) – someone who measures up to the spiritual stature of the fullness of Christ. In other words, he or she is as Christ-like as a human can become while still in mortal flesh, someone who can say with Paul, “Christ LIVES in me!” Someone who can also say with Paul, “the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (See Galatians 6:14). When Paul writes “it pleased God…to reveal His Son in me” do not assume that is or was God’s desire for Paul alone. It is God’s desire that ALL believers without exception allow Jesus Christ to be fully revealed and expressed in and through them. (See Galatians 1:15-16). The overcomer is also described by Paul in 2 Corinthians 10, verses 4-5. Not only are their actions and speech consistently godly, so are their thoughts.
Many have a horribly warped misinterpretation of what Paul is saying in Romans 7. They think Paul is describing himself as a defeated Christian, carnal, sold under sin, unable to get or maintain the spiritual victory over sin. This text (Romans 7) is one of the classic texts Peter must have had in mind when he warned that Paul wrote some things hard to be understood, things that some readers would “wrest” or twist to their own spiritual destruction. (See 2 Peter 3:15-16). One needs to keep Philippians 1:20 and 21 in mind when reading Romans 7. Also Philippians 3, verses 6 and 17 and Philippians 4:9. Colossians 1:27-29 and especially I Thessalonians 2:10 must be kept in mind when reading Romans 7. It also helps to read Romans 6 (especially verse 19) and Romans 8 when reading Romans 7.
Paul was a true overcomer, meeting to exactness the qualifications of an overcomer as described in his own letters as well as Revelation 14, verses 1 thru 5.. Jesus Christ is returning for a pure bride, resplendent in holiness and purity as well as spiritual understanding, not a bunch of carnal believers bickering and disagreeing with one another even as they are meeting the Lord in the air. How ridiculous!!
Christ’s Faithful Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),
Donald Wiley