Victim or Victor? (Week 1)
Notes
Transcript
Welcome
Welcome
RESURRECTING (SONG)
Thank you for joining us again today. I hope you are awake and excited to worship the Lord with us. Hopefully ‘Steve’ was helpful to get you thinking and moving before our service.
Last week, we celebrated Christ’s death and resurrection. It was not my typical Easter service or even Easter Day, and I would imagine many of you would say the same. There were so many things that were just different this year. The one thing that remains the same through all of this is how worthy, how good, and how great is our God. It is so easy though to not have my focus and attention on who He is, how constant He remains, and get sidelined by the distractions of this life especially during a crisis like we are currently experiencing. Today, I have a message that has been in my heart for months, and I am so excited to share it with you. I believe the Lord wants to encourage us, challenge us, and change us to be who He created us to be, knowing Him with masks removed. Transparent and honest before Him. Would you worship the Lord with me today? Right where you are prepare your heart and mind to make His name famous, to give Him the glory He deserves.
LET’S PRAY
Father, we thank you for the beauty of Your work in our lives. We thank you that even on our darkest night You are brightly shining. You are shining the hope of Your promises, promises that don’t disappoint. Remind us now during our time of worship of Your faithfulness. Let us recount the moments of Your handiwork in our lives, and we will be careful to give you all the credit. It’s Yours to begin with…We declare that You are Good. You are God.
Worship
Worship
Announcements
Announcements
Thank you again for worshipping with us this morning. If you happen to miss one of our services on Sunday morning you can go back and catch those a few different ways.
Those are on the Emmanuel Facebook page (facebook.com/EAGTN) as well as on our YouTube channel. You can search ‘EMMANUEL KNOXVILLE TN’ and should see us there in the top searches. ‘SUBSCRIBE’ to the channel if you want to know when a new service is scheduled. Our website, emmanuelag.com, has our most recent service at the top of our homepage and all previous services are at the bottom of the ‘PODCAST’ page. We are working hard to stay connected to each of you, worshipping together, and grow together in God’s Word.
I love the pictures you guys sent me of your Sunday morning. Those were great! I saw nearly as many pets as I did people. I’m thinking when we get back together we will need a ‘bring your pet to church’ day or something. One of you even sent me a picture as you were listening at work from the cockpit of the plane you were getting ready to fly that day. Keep the pictures coming. It brightens my day to see how we are all worshipping right now and in so many different places.
If you are worshipping with us for the first or second time, meaning you have only connected with us since we have been online, we want to connect with you. Would you email us at mail@emmanuelag.com. We would like to send a note back to you along with a small gift to show how glad we are to have you joining us online. Be sure and email us. We would love to hear how we can be praying with and for you during this time.
Emmanuel family, I want to thank you for how faithful you have been in your giving. We have had a few of our supported ministries reach out with greater needs right now, and we are continuing to rise to the occasion and help meet those needs because of your faithfulness in giving. I received text nearly every week of folks looking for ways to help those in our church and community that may need groceries or other support during this time. I want to thank each and everyone of you for your hearts of compassion. On your screen are a few ways you can continue to give while not physically gathering. Again, thank you for making a difference in our community and around the world.
Sermon
Sermon
I am especially excited to be bringing the Word today. As I mentioned earlier, it has been something that I have been ruminating on for quite some time, but believe today is the day for us to talk about it. Some of you may remember in Fall of 2018, Candi and I co-preached about the Trauma Informed Church. I believe you can dig in our podcast and still find it if you are intersted, but today, I would like to add another layer to that understanding. While we should respond with empathy and compassion towards others who are facing hardships and experiencing tragedy, what our response doesn't allow for is victimization to have the final word. I want to be careful in setting this topic up for us this morning because I know that many of you on the other side of this screen have experienced some real pain. You have experienced some real hurt, some real loss, some real hardships, and I don’t want to minimize how real those were to you and for you. In the same moment, when we experience difficulty, which right now our world is surrounded by, we can so quickly sink into problems or terrible things to determine where we end up. We can so easily slump into the idea that situations and circumstances are our new reality. This is even who I am. I deserved what happened to me or maybe we even think we brought upon ourselves in some way.
I want to bring an end to this line of thinking and let us see a God of the impossible, who still redeems even our biggest messes. Who can turn the worse day, literally His son dead, into the greatest day, His son risen. This is the hope I get from what we just celebrated and remembered.
What we have experienced doesn't dictate, define, or determine our future. We have choices to make and a great God to believe in who does what no man can, and that is to make us a victor instead of a victim.
You have heard me say it before, but our culture has given the loudest voice to the victim. You don’t even have to be right, it doesn’t even have to be true anymore, if you can just pose in a victim posture you get the bullhorn. You get the loudest voice. You get the right to NOT only be heard but be in the right. Now, I saw this acknowledging that we need to hear one another, that we need to learn and grow from each other, and we even need to allow those who have been oppressed to have a voice. ABSOLUTELY! That is not at all what I am talking about today. What I am talking about is when you start to play that record over and over of victimization to the point that accepting victory will mean loss to what you can gain as a victim then you have played the wrong hand for the wrong reason. Remaining a victim was never God’s plan for you, but what the enemy meant for evil my God wants to turn for good.
I am saying He wants to turn things around for you. He doesn’t want you to continue to wallow in it. He wants to heal and mend some deep hurts, not allow those wounds to fester into infectious bitterness. God wants to make all things new and sometimes we give into that if that happens then I won’t get to manipulate anymore, I won’t be heard anymore, I won’t have my victim platform anymore, I won’t even know who I am without that victim crutch anymore.
God wants to remove that from us today. He wants to set us free from this toxic cultural way of thinking and bring new life into some deep hurts.
STORY:
When I was working with the middle and high school urban students at KICKO, we had this one girl who joined my program as a freshman in high school. I will never forget her. Her very first week, she came up to me and shared her entire life story. (You know people like this.)
She shared everything that had happened to her, and none of it was pretty, none of it would I want my daughter to experience. Her mom abandoned her as a young girl, but before she abandoned her every boyfriend her mom had was able to have their way with this little girl. Unmentionable things happened to her. Horrific things. She was the victim of some monstrous experiences.
I hurt for her. I prayed with her (multiple times), and watched how she would continue to share her life story of cruel experiences with every new leader that would join us. She would spill her guts. It was as if her past victimization was the name tag she wore. It had become her identity. Without it, I am not sure if she even knew who she was. I had to watch carefully how she would gravitate to our male leaders and even show inappropriate affection. She was starving for something real in her present and longed for better for her future but was stuck in a wicked past.
I will never forget getting in her face one Tuesday evening. We were outside still during ‘hangout’ time while everyone was playing games, talking, and listening to music. In my attempt to ask her about her week, she defaulted to this mode of being a victim of her past. I spoke firmly but lovingly to her. I told her that what she was telling me didn’t change my opinion of her. I told her that her past didn’t have to define her or determine her future, but she had the power to decide how much control it would have over her life. I didn’t claim that this would be an easy process, but that God wanted to write the ending to her story. That He is the best author at taking a really crappy beginning and making it a best-seller.
It took some time but these things began to sink in for her. Over the next few years, I saw more smiles and less tears. I saw more laughter and heard less repeats about her past. She began to fight being the victim and letting Christ finish her story as a victor.
TRANSITION:
Jesus, in one of His last conversations with His disciples, said:
33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
In this imperfect world, Christ has told us that we would experience trouble. What He can give us is the ability to walk through trials, experience hardship, weather life’s storms all with His supernatural peace. Peace comes from acting on the promises of God. We have peace to step out on the stormy waters of life and belief that His Word is more solid a foundation that the reality of the raging seas of our circumstances.
We can’t forget the close relationship between prayer and peace as reflected in Paul’s words to the Philippian church:
6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
We are all destined to have trouble in this world. That doesn’t really sound like that good of news. But I find I find it comforting to know that what the things that happen in the life are not only normal, that we all go through hard things, but that Jesus hasn’t left us to face it alone.
Jesus tells us to take heart because He has overcome the world. There is solid reason for joyful confidence. The world will do its worst to me (Jesus says), yet I will come through victoriously. And the victory that I will win will be yours as well. This is where we build on what we celebrated last week. The story isn’t fiction and neither does it just have an impact on the ending for Christ. No, it changes the story for us all.
Listen to what Paul writes:
20 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
21 For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man.
22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.
23 But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him.
Christ has led the way to victory for us. He has given us the victory. Resurrection power is at work in us who believe, and the darkest of nights in this world that is filled with trouble will be shaken by the power that resurrects the dead through each of us.
Jesus tells his disciples that I have overcome the world. The verb “to overcome” (used only here in John’s gospel) is a military term and denotes victory in warfare. He has forcefully overcome the powers of this world. His kingdom has come, is coming, and will finally one day come in full. AND
When we give our voice to being a victim we minimize the effects of what Christ has done for us. Let me say that AGAIN. When we give our voice to being a victim we minimize the effects of what Christ has done for us. We minimize what He has done for us through the cross, and we continue to minimize what He has done for us through His resurrection. As a victim, we trade a victors crown for a victim’s scare. We declare that our hurt is greater than His healing power. We speak through our actions that Christ’s redemptive power isn’t really far-reaching and can’t right these wrongs.
This couldn’t be further from the truth, but our society and culture have caused us to pause and give more credence to our adverse experiences where in the end only the Adversary wins.
That won’t be my story. I won’t let it. Will it be yours? Will you let the enemy keep you stuck in your misery? Or will you declare with me today, that enough is enough! That our God still reigns.
Listen to this:
4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.
5 Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
Our faith in the risen Lord provides for us the victory that has overcome the world. We don’t do anything to attain this victory on our own, instead, we enact invisible measures using our faith in a greater reality that what this world has to offer. We put our faith in the reality that God’s Son, Jesus, is who He really says He is. That He is our peace, that He is our way, that He is our life, that He is our provider, that He is just, that He is holy, that He is faithful, that He is the way maker, that He is the way, that He makes the impossible-possible, that He still forgives, still heals, still sets free. I believe this is who He is. I put my faith in Him.
TRANSITION:
From this vantage point of faith in the One who has overcome, we are now able to not only move from victim to victor, but we can get off of the defensive line and into an offensive position against the enemy. The Adversary who seeks to devour us is on the offensive trying to lock us down in a defensive position. This was never intended to be your posture as a son and daughter of God.
12 From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence, and violent people have been raiding it.
There is a force within us by the Spirit of God that is actively seeking to establish an order, a kingdom, that is not of this world. This kingdom has ways that are contrary this world’s. It is contrary in ways of thinking, in ways of reacting, in ways of loving. And the Kingdom People are actively seeking to see God’s ways made supreme even in this fallen world full of trouble. We are seeking to establish peace where there is turmoil while causing a spiritual turmoil that will be second only to the Cross. The dominion of Christ will be little by little as we seek to push back thoughts that are paralyzing us and keeping us bound. As well as habits and behaviors that are only taking us back to a worldly way.
Paul says this to the church in Corinth:
3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does.
4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.
5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
We don’t fight like the world does. We don’t use the same strategies. This faith we place in Christ is how we fight our battles. We fight by placing our hope in someone so much greater than ourselves. We destroy every argument and thoughts that would seek to elevate themself above Christ. We seek to actively make every thought obedient to Christ and His will.
STORY:
In the midst of COVID-19, I have been reminded that we really aren’t in control. While this can seem so unsettling if I am trusting the government or health officials or the economy, it can be so reassuring when I find myself at a place of full and complete dependence upon God. No one has control over what they once thought they did. This is why models are always changing. This is why the ways we interpret data right now is so varied. No one known the outcomes of what we are facing right now.
This makes me concerned when I am trusting myself to figure it out or have control of my future. What I finally take comfort in right now is that this is what God has wanted all along. He has wanted all of my trust, all of my faith. And He wants all of your’s as well.
Peter says that we should be vigilant in our walk of faith. He says...
8 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.
There is a real enemy, and he is seeking to devour us. If we aren’t aware and take our thoughts captive, resisting him by standing with unwavered faith in the One whose got us, whose got this…then we will be most vulnerable to a destruction in our faith and a casualty to spiritual warfare.
But from a posture of faith in Christ, from a place of rest and peace because I am not in control (and thank the Lord none of us are)…and so right now we all being reminded, our nation, the world is being reminded that YOU really aren’t in control. So, come to me all you who are weary of trying to figure it out. Come to me who need rest, and I will give it you. This is the Good News. This is the Gospel. He gives VICTORY. We don’t have to continue to play the victim anymore. We don’t have to be heard only through the lens of woe is me. Because He lives I can face tomorrow. Because Jesus purchased victory for me, I will not discount the price He paid by wallowing in misery any longer. I will stand in faith and declare, HE HAS THE VICTORY. Will you do that with me right now? Right where you are will you begin to declare God’s victory over areas of you life that you thought you would always see defeat. Maybe it is over some broken relationships. Maybe it is over some financial choices or hardships you are facing. Maybe you need to declare victory over an addiction. Maybe you need to declare victory where you have declared your are victim for far too long.
Let’s do that right now.
Prayer
Prayer
God, I declare that you have the victory. I declare that you are the reason that I live and breathe and have my being. Without you I am nothing. And right now, I am declaring that You have won the victory for me. I will not discount the price You paid by finding my place and identity in my hurt, in my pain. That ends today. I thank you for shaking me, for waking me up, for not leaving me alone. I declare that misery will be alone in my life; it will not have my company anymore. We will starve the ways of the flesh, and ask You God to help me feed the ways of Your Spirit in my life. I need Your peace; my soul needs Your rest. I need You Lord today like never before. Help me to fully trust You. That You’ve got this, you’ve got me. I love you Lord, and thank you for Your love for me. Amen and amen.
Wrap-up
Wrap-up
Thank God for the victory He gives and brings into our lives. Amen?!?
Would you stay on with us for a few minutes and chat with us on the side? Let us know how you are doing, and how we can be praying for you. We love you guys and look forward to when we will gather again!