Overcoming Life! (Part Three)

Wednesday March 8th is the annual business meeting.

Friday March 13th is our next Dart Exchange from 6-9:00 pm. The cost is $2/person for the pizza and drinks. Sign up sheet in the foyer.

Class sign up sheet for the preparation classes. In light of what happened last week and the travesty in Cookeville and Nashville, we can see that there is a need for being prepared for emergencies!

Tailgate party immediately following the service in the front foyer, in case you forgot to bring something that you signed up for. (AT THIS TIME DRAW TICKETS FOR THE DOOR PRIZES)

Well, for those of you who may not have been here for the last two Sundays, let me quickly fill you in on where we are today, in this mini series of messages, entitled, “Overcoming Life”.

Our lives, yours and mine, are made up of a series of events and circumstances that take place. Within these events and circumstances, there lies heartaches and tragedies, as well as rejoicings and victories.

Some of the things that we will encounter and deal with throughout our lives are the bi-products of our own choices and decisions for our lives and still other things are out of our control.

Some of these things are good and beneficial and others are harmful and damaging.

And how we deal with these things determines whether we OVERCOME them, or we let them OVERCOME us.

The main point that I have stressed over the last two weeks, is that we can CHOOSE to yield to (to give into) the natural barriers and obstacles that are placed in front of us in our lives and that serve to hold us back, or we can choose to OVERCOME these limitations and barriers and move forward with our lives and be victorious.

We don’t have to be defined and limited by the circumstances that occur in our lives.

WE CAN OVERCOME THEM!

I’ve used the Biblical account of the prophet Jeremiah questioning God about about the fairness of life and of God’s timeliness in dealing with life’s “unfair” circumstances in the book of over the past two weeks, as an example of how the little things in our lives serve to keep us weighed down and wearied so that we become ineffective, or unable to fight when the larger attacks of enemy come against us.

And I have stressed over the past two messages, in dealing with our OVERCOMING LIFE, that I am speaking more about our spiritual lives and the obstacles and barriers that we face, versus that of natural/physical lives.

I’ve given examples over the past couple of weeks of different people OVERCOMING large physical barriers in their lives and of how these key people lived in victory over their physical gauntlets, instead of of just laying down and quitting because them.

As a preacher and teacher of the Word of God, it’s my task to take the Bible, as lead by Holy Spirit, and present it to you accurately and in such a way as to strengthen and support your walk in the kingdom of God, both in your natural/physical lives, but even more so, that of your spiritual life.

And all for the

And so, I am speaking again today on the topic of OVERCOMING in our spiritual lives.

In my message last week ,I used the Biblical account of Jesus being driven out into the wilderness, by Holy Spirit, for the purpose of His being tested/tempted by the devil, as we find in .

In talking about this event in the life of Jesus, I specifically used it in my message last week, to point out how Jesus overcame the temptations of the enemy.

It is very important that we all understand that Jesus came and lived and walked this earth, every bit as much of a human as you and I are.

I stress this to you, because some people feel inside of their hearts like Jesus was born with an advantage over us in dealing with temptation and sin, because of who He was and who His Father was.

Kind of like, Jesus was the proverbial baby born with the silver spoon in His mouth and had an unfair advantage over the rest of us!

Know this people, Jesus didn’t come here with an advantage over us, in fact, He freely walked away from His place of authority and power and advantage, to come here as a humble human, just like you and I, and to do what no human had ever been able to do before.

Paul reminds of us this in , where he said,

Philippians 2:5–7 NLT

5 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. 6 Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. 7 Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form,

Philippians 2:5–8 NLT

5 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. 6 Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. 7 Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, 8 he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross.

Jesus lived a completely human life, from birth to death, and had to face every temptation of the enemy, exactly the same as you and I do. That part He was equal to us in.

The part that differentiates Himself from all of the rest of humanity was the fact that He never yielded to the temptations of the enemy and thus, He NEVER sinned!

The

tells us, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

Jesus was able to OVERCOME the enemy and the temptations to sin, because He never took His eyes off of the Father and because He always listened to and followed what God the Father was telling Him to do.

Whenever the enemy would tempt Jesus in the wilderness, Jesus would OVERCOME the enemy by the spoken words of God! Jesus, did exactly as we are instructed to do in .

He wielded the Sword of the Spirit, which is the living Word of God (the Bible), and He never allowed the enemy of God to move Him from out of the will of God. Instead, Jesus used the power of God, through Holy Spirit to STAND firm against the enemy and resist his temptations.

And that is the reason that I used that passage last week, to show you that Jesus was tempted the same as you and I are, yet He NEVER sinned.

And because He NEVER sinned, He was able to offer His perfect blood upon the cross of Calvary as a propitiation for our sins and thus to redeem us back!

You read that word, “propitiation”, in the NT, in several passages, (like in , which says, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”), but do you really know and understand what “propitiation” means?

In the simplest form and for you and I, it means that Jesus’ offering of His perfect shed blood upon the cross, was accepted by God as payment for our sin and thus it took away the WRATH of God against our sin, and turned that wrath into the FAVOR of God for our eternal glory! AMEN?!!!!!!

Without the

And it’s because of the FAVOR of God upon us, through the victory of Jesus over the enemy, that we also have the ability to OVERCOME the enemy in this spiritual war that we are in!

All of that said to point to the fact that Jesus OVERCAME our enemy and has given us the means to do the same in our lives! So, let’s move forward in our teaching on the OVERCOMING LIFE!

In , Jesus made the following statement, “I have said these things to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have OVERCOME the world.”

In the NT, when you see this word, “OVERCOME”, as in this verse, it’s the Greek word, “nik-ah'o”, which is from the root word, “nikē (victory)”. The word, “nik-ah'o” has the following definition in the Greek: to subdue, to conquer, to defeat and overcome, prevail against, to get the victory; when one is arraigned or goes to law, to win the case, maintain one's cause (as in, given legal precedence over).

So, in this verse, our Lord is saying to each one those who truly our His followers, “Have courage, cheer up, I am victorious over the world and its system, and because of this, you will be also.”

Jesus was saying that His work here on earth and what He was getting ready to do on the cross, would become a victory for us.

Now, fast forward from this passage in the gospel of John, where Jesus said that He had become victorious over the world, to the epistle of John, where we find a more bold statement for us.

In , we read,

1 John 5:1–5 ESV

1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. 2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. 4 For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

We just read that Jesus said that He had OVERCOME the world and now we are told that if we are truly children of God, then we have already OVERCOME the world!

Now, let’s move forward, to the end of the Bible, in the book of Revelation and once again, the disciple John, as directed by Jesus, makes yet another declaration to each one of us.

In Revelation chapters 2-3, we read of the seven letters that Jesus wrote, through John, to the seven churches of Asia Minor and ultimately to whole church body for all time until His return!

In these seven letters, we find Jesus rebuking five of the seven churches for specific faults and commending the other two, with NO FAULTS found!

And yet, all seven letters end with the same declaration.

Allow me to turn there in Revelation and read to you that declaration as it was given by our Lord to each of the seven churches and to all of us as well. (And please note who is making these declarations to John in the book of Revelation! This is risen and victorious Jesus that John sees and hears. Listen as John describes the one speaking to him in )

READ THE SEVEN “TO THE ONE WHO OVERCOMES” STATEMENTS IN .

Now wait a minute.............Jesus said in , that we should be encouraged, because He has OVERCOME the world.

Then, in , we are told that if we are born of God, then we have OVERCOME the world.

And yet, here, at the closing of the Bible, we are told that we must OVERCOME in this world!

How can this be and which way is it? How can we have already OVERCOME through Christ and yet we still have to OVERCOME for Christ?!!!!

The Bible says in Colossians 2:15, that Jesus disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross.

And it goes on to say, “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

And again, “in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

“But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession...”

Why does the Bible says that we have been given the victory over the enemy through Christ, that we are MORE than conquerors in Christ and that through Christ we have OVERCOME the world, AND YET, it closes by saying to us that we MUST OVERCOME the things of this world?!!!!

Let me try and answer this for you, so that it is clear and makes sense and so that each one of us understands what is expected of us, OK?

I read to you the meaning of the word OVERCOME (nik-ah'o) a couple minutes ago, right?

And in that definition, I said that this word, “nik-ah'o”, tells us that we have been given legal precedence over the enemy!

And this is not just legal precedence, like getting a parking ticket dismissed by the local city court judge.

When we are talking about our victory over the enemy and our OVERCOMING him, through Jesus the Christ, we are talking about supreme authority over the matter!

Like, if you have a legal case that you take to court and then you take it to a higher court and finally to the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, and they rule in your favor, then you have been given legal precedence over every other ruling in the land, that is what is being said here in this matter of our OVERCOMING the world and our enemy!

We have been given legal precedence over this world and over our enemy, from the highest court there is; THE SUPREME COURT..........GOD’S COURTROOM!

And as such we can walk in that legal authority!

BUT, just because you have been given that legal authority, doesn’t mean that you are always walking in it.

Let me try and explain this. So, let’s say for example, that I have a legal document, a legal precedence, that says and declares that I am the owner of my house in Crossville, TN. That’s my house and I have legal authority over it.

Now, if I leave my house and come stay at one your houses, I still have the legal precedence, the legal document, that says that I own and belong over my house, but by my decision, I have walked away from it and am staying somewhere else.

In your house, I don’t have legal authority, you do! You have legal precedence over that house, not me!

I can choose to return to my house at any time, that is, I can choose to go back to the place that I have been given legal authority over and to where I am covered and recognized as the owner.

My being at your place didn’t change or remove, or nullify the legal document that says that I own my house across town. That is, it doesn’t remove the legal precedence that I have been given, over my house, just because I left my house and stayed with you for a while at your house.

The only thing that I did, was choose to leave the place of my legal power and authority and go somewhere else, where I have no legal authority. IT WAS MY CHOICE to walk out from under that legal position.

I still have it, but I have to walk back under it!

Does that make sense to you?

Look here, I have legal documents that say that I was born in Chattanooga, TN and as such, I have documents that declare that I am a citizen of the United States of America.

And these documents give me legal precedence and afford me the rights and benefits of citizenship to this great nation and access to all of the authority and protection that it offers to me!

And yet, if choose to leave and fly to another country, even though I have a document in my hand called a passport, that tells this other country who I am and to where I belong, it gives me no authority in their country!

If I stay in that other country for a year, I am still a legal citizen of the US, but by my own choice, I have elected to remove myself from my countries’ umbrella of protection and from the place where I have legal precedence and authority and to stay under another place of authority.

You see, Jesus Christ, OVERCAME this world and the god of this world, and because of His victory, you and I (if we have truly belong to Him), have been given the same power and authority (the same legal precedence) over the world and over the enemy, as He has!

That is, as long as we walk under and stay within our legal covering!

When my wife and I bought a car one time, we paid extra for a protection plan, an umbrella plan, that said that as long as we were in that vehicle and if it were to break down or have trouble, we could just call a number and they would provide us with assistance and coverage, anywhere, at any time. WE WERE COVERED!

That is we were covered by that company, as long as we were in that car!

If we were in my car, or in someone else’ car and it broke down somewhere and I called them, they would say to me, “You are out from under the umbrella of our protection. You are not covered by us in that vehicle. you only have legal precedence and coverage as long as you are in the vehicle that we agreed to cover you in!”

So, we could choose to stay under the umbrella of the protection of that vehicle, or we could get out from under it and go without!

Here is my point in all of this. We have been given legal precedence, legal authority over the enemy in our walk with God, as long as we stay within the will of God!

God’s grace and His covering over us, does not extend to our living rogue and living in sin and outside of His will and against His commands for our lives!

Jesus warned His disciples in of what would happen as they walked as His followers and also of what would happen as the time grows closer for His return. (Read )

Matthew 24:3–13 ESV

3 As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” 4 And Jesus answered them, “See that no one leads you astray. 5 For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray. 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are but the beginning of the birth pains. 9 “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. 10 And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. 11 And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. 12 And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. 13 But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

Would you say that there is more or less deception in the world today and within many churches today?

Paul warned Timothy about those who would begin to look for and listen to teachings that were not fully of the gospel, because they wouldn’t want the responsibility and weight of living under God’s will for their lives!

Paul asked the church of Galatia about their being deceived and walking away from the truth of the gospel, when he asked them, “You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?”

And when you pare up this warning that Jesus gave in , with His final warning to the church in , you begin to see what He is saying.

Stay with Me and under my covering and you will be victorious. Endure until the end against the lies and the deception of the enemy through Me and My word.

In this life, as God’s children, we have been given legal precedence and authority to OVERCOME any and every attack and hindrance and roadblock that our enemy throws at us! As long as we remain within our jurisdiction and under the umbrella of God’s protection.

WE MUST REMAIN WITH HIM, if we are to OVERCOME until the end!

It’s not how you start the race, it’s how you finish!

If our remaining with Him until the end and thus OVERCOMING this world was not so important, then why do you think that Jesus closes His message to the churches with such a strong warning and emphasis?!

And as to the enemy and his trying to deceive us and overtake us by coming to us and trying to look all big and bad, Jesus has already disarmed him, just as I mentioned awhile ago, “He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.”

The enemy is like someone walking up to me in a dark alley and having his hand in his pocket and saying that he has a gun and that if I don’t do what he says, he will kill me! In reality, he only has his finger in his pocket and that is all that he can do, is bluff! THAT IS, AS LONG AS I AM REMAINING UNDER GOD’S WILL FOR ME! If I go at it alone, then the devil has the power to hurt and destroy me!

Our ability to OVERCOME this world is with us, as children of God, by Holy Spirit living actively in our lives!

The problem that too many of us choose to go at it alone and out of that legal covering that we are supposed to have, because we are either prideful, or deceived or ignorant of what the Bible says to us!

In 1863, Abraham Lincoln made the Emancipation Proclamation, that declared that the slaves were free. However, there were slaves in Texas, who had never heard this news, until two years later, on June 19, 1865, they received the news that they had legally been set free for two years and never knew it! This day is known as Juneteenth and it reminds us of the those who were legally free, but still bound in slavery because of their lack of knowledge of what the law said.

We are legally free from the enemy and we are to OVERCOME everything that he throws at us, in serving our great God and Savior. The only reason that we do not OVERCOME, or cannot OVERCOME until the end, is if we walk back into slavery again, or if we never learned of the truth of who and what we are!

We are called to OVERCOME and we are told that we will share in His glorious kingdom with Him one day, IF we hold true and OVERCOME. , “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”

How are you living your life today my friend? Are you living in and under the legal covering and authority that Jesus has given to those who walk with Him and in the will of His Father? Are you OVERCOMING this world and the trials and temptations of this world and growing stronger in your faith in God? Are you ready to stand before your Lord and Savior and hear what He has to say to you, about the life that you have been living for Him?

Paul tells us in that,

Philippians 2:9–11 NLT

9 Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

You will either enter His presence as one who has obeyed and OVERCOME and longed for His appearing, or you will enter His presence in fear because of a life that you chose.

Either way, we all join in saying, “All Hail, King Jesus”!