Sermon Tone Analysis

Ministry of Circumstances

STRANGE MINISTERS

Ron Dunn

Romans 8

 

        You can have victory over sin, victory over self and victory over Satan, but there is another area in which we must have victory if we are going to live a consistent Christian life.

Unless we come to experience victory in this area, then in all of the other areas (sin, self, Satan) we will not accomplish the life of overcoming that God has intended all of us to experience.

I want to speak to you today on victory over situations, or victory over circumstances.

I want you to remember that phrase victory over circumstances because in a moment I am going to change the wording of this phrase, and it is going to be an essential change.

In the changing of that wording you are going to find the key to being victorious over every circumstance.

There are two kinds of circumstances.

1)  There are those circumstances that we can control and they pose little or no problem.

If there is a circumstance we are not particularly fond of and we can change it, then we change it.

But there are other circumstances that present problems in living in victory.

2) These are circumstances we cannot control.

So there are circumstances we can control, and there are circumstances we cannot control.

There are circumstances we can change, and then there are circumstances that we cannot change—even though we wish we could.

I have an idea there are some of us here today that are dreading to see this conference conclude because we are going to have to return to a situation that we wish we could change but know we are powerless to do so..

This is the circumstance over which we need to have victory.

Unless you and I leave this conference knowing how to experience victory over uncontrollable and unchangeable circumstances, we are not going to live a consistent Christian life.

You see, everywhere you go you are in the midst of circumstances.

Now, I want to change that phrase: victory over circumstances.

Here was an adverse, contrary circumstance I didn't like.

I viewed that circumstance as an Amalek standing in my way before the Promised Land saying, you will not go in.

I would say, Lord, if I am ever to enter into the Promised Land, I must overcome this circumstance.

Somehow  I must change it, go around it or tunnel under it.

Lord, help me to get victory over this circumstance.

I have viewed my contrary, adverse circumstances as obstacles in my path, presenting a barrier to my progress in the Christian life.

The word I want to change is the word over.

I want to change it to the word through.

It is not victory over your circumstances; it is victory through your circumstances.

If you ever change your viewpoint about adverse circumstances from trying to get victory over or around them, to not viewing them as an obstacle standing in your path or blocking your progress, that is the key to victory:  they are the MEANS by which you enter into victory.

That is the key.

Victory through the circumstances gives you victory over the circumstances.

I am really not going to speak to you about victory over your circumstances, I am going to speak to you about victory through your circumstances.

There is a verse I discovered sometime ago.

Well, I didn't really discover it; that's like saying I discovered America!

But I ran across it.

In Isaiah, chapter 49, God is dealing with the people's exodus from captivity and how they are going to get back to the Promised Land.

Along the way, they are going to meet some obstacles.

It is going to be rough terrain as they make their journey from Babylon back to the Promised Land.

They are going to have to go through mountainous terrain.

Notice what he says in verse 11:  And I will make all my mountains a way, and my highways shall be exalted.

Look at that first phrase:  And I will make all my mountains a way.

The New American Standard reads like this:  And I will make all my mountains a road.

The New English Bible reads:  I will make every hill a path.

Notice he does not say that he will make a way over the mountains.

He doesn't say I will make a way through the mountains.

He doesn't say I will make a way around the mountains.

He says the mountains will be the ROAD by which you get back into your land.

The mountains actually become the road.

In other words, he is saying obstacles, circumstances and mountains that stand in your way are not that which block you from entering into victory; they are the means of your entering into victory.

My mountains will be the way.

If the mountains are not there, you can't get there.

If it were not for the mountains, you could not enter in.

It is not victory over your circumstances that you need, it is victory through your circumstances.

That adverse, contrary circumstance is not a barrier or an obstacle; it is the means that God has divinely appointed by which you will pass into victory.

It is the door, or the road.

Now we are ready to read our text in Romans 8, verses 28, 29 and 30:

28And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

29For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

30Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.

I want you to imagine with me this morning the three points of a triangle.

We are going to start with the apex of the triangle.

The first point, the top of the triangle, we are going to label The Purpose of God.

If I am to have victory in every situation of my life, then I must first of all understand the eternal purpose of God.

He says we know that all things right now are working together for good (and that good is not the good of ease and comfort but the good of God's purpose), and all things are working together to accomplish that purpose--to those who are called according to his purpose.

Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to become conformed to the image of his Son.

There is the eternal purpose of God.

What is it that God is trying to accomplish in my life?

What is that good that all things are working together to accomplish?

It is this:  that I might be conformed to the image of his Son.

Williams Translation reads like this:  He marked us off to become like His Son.

The word conformed means that my inner being, my essence and actuality, will become like the Lord Jesus.

It does not refer to my appearing like the Lord Jesus by my actions only.

It means that there is that divine plan and purpose that I will actually in essence become like the Lord Jesus.

That is the eternal purpose of God for every believer.

Salvation is simply God restoring the image that man lost in the fall.

The Bible says that we were created in the image of God.

The image of God is man's capacity to know God, to worship God, and to fellowship with God, and do all three perfectly.

Only man is made in the image of God.

Only man has the capacity to know God, to worship God, and to fellowship with God.

You never saw a dog bowing his head and thanking God for his dog food.

You never saw a cow worshipping.

Only man has a thirst after God.

There is born within every man an insatiable desire for God because man was made in the image of God.

That image was not destroyed by the fall; it was marred by the fall.

It's like a bombed out building.

The shell still stands.

The semblance is still there, but it has been marred and perverted.

There is still in man a semblance of the image of God but it is not as it was originally.

That image, our ability to worship God, our capacity to know God and the fellowship of God has been marred, crippled, almost atrophied.

God is seeking in salvation to restore the image of God to us.

He says that you and I have been predestinated to be conformed to the image of God's son.

That is God's purpose for every person.

The word purpose means to design beforehand.

He is working this out on two levels.

First of all, he is working it out in the future.

You mark it down; there is going to be a day when every person who has ever been saved will be exactly like Jesus.

This is a promise for the future.

That is one level upon which God is working out his purpose.