Conquering the New Year

Text: “37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” (Romans 8:37 )

There are a lot of different assessments of the past year. Which events were the most important? Which will have the most significant impact on our world moving forward? Which people were the most significant? Again, who had the most significant impact on the direction of history, either for good or for ill?

There are even more predictions for the year that’s about to begin. If past experience is any indication, even the predictions that are correct will be overshadowed by people and events that seem to come out of nowhere.

Let me offer you a slightly different take on both this afternoon. Whether we’re assessing this past year or predicting the coming year, it’s all summed up nicely in our text: In all these things you are more than conquerors through Him who loved you.

You’ve seen tribulation and distress. You’ve seen financial hardship, not to mention famine around the world. You’ve seen violence of various kinds. There is certainly more of all of it on the horizon— 2022 is an election year, after all. In the middle of it all, the Church appears to be weaker and weaker. Some even claim that she is dying. You and I are, in fact, regarded as little better than sheep to be slaughtered. We are already at the point that those who mock and deride you believe that they are doing a great service to God or the universe or whatever higher power they imagine (John 16:2). And yet you are— and remain!— more than conquerors.

Paul didn’t write the words of Romans 8 to people who were immune from tribulation, persecution, famine, and sword. He was writing to people who faced the agonizing decision between fleeing Rome, for example, in order to escape persecution, or remaining there in their home city in order to help so many people there who were suffering. Paul didn’t offer easy answers. What he did— under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit— was to assure them that they were more than conquerors. As they fled for their lives, they were more than conquerors. As they stayed and threw in their lot with those who were sick and starving, they were more than conquerors. As they were thrown into the coliseum to be torn apart by wild animals like sheep to be slaughtered, they were more than conquerors.

You are— and remain!— more than conquerors. Not because of the prospects for the next election; not in the expectation that you and I can reclaim a place of influence in our society and help direct the course of nations once again; not in the hope that these difficult days will pass. You are more than conquerors through Him who loved you.

Although He was the eternal Son of God, above angels and rulers, ruling over things present and things to come, filling every height and depth and everything else in all creation, He conquered by stepping down from His throne and becoming a servant. In the form of a servant, He allowed Himself to be seized by the powers of that day— both the earthly powers of human rulers and the demonic powers that had sought to destroy His creation from the outset. They did everything within their considerable powers to bring His work to nothing by nailing Him to a cross to die. But, from that cross, He conquered them all, declaring from that cross, “It is finished,” before descending into the deepest depths of hell in order to proclaim His victory, then ascending back to the Father to the praise and adulation of angels and archangels and all the host of heaven and “[siting] down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, 4 having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs” (Hebrews 1:3b-4). There, to this very day, “3 he upholds the universe by the word of his power,” — no longer in the humble guise of a servant, but in “the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature” (Heb. 1:3a).

And all of it was motivated purely by His love for you. The world may regard you as sheep to be slaughtered. But, out of love for you, He allowed Himself to be led like a lamb to the slaughter. And, death or life, angels or rulers, things present or things to come, height or depth, anything else in all creation none of it will be any more successful in conquering you than it was in conquering Him because He has united you to Himself in His death and resurrection and given you the power of His indestructible life. “9 Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him” (Romans 6:9). You have died with Christ, so you also live with Him (Rom. 6:8). That gift is not just eternal life after death but, even now, you are dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rom. 6:11).

In 2021, in 2022, for however long your Heavenly Father chooses to allow this creation to go on, you are more than conquerors. Not just over the powers and principalities arrayed against you, but even over sin and death. “12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. 13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness” (Romans 6:12-13). Sin no longer has dominion over you. You are more than conquerors.

In fact, while the world regards you as sheep to be slaughtered, you, along with the rest of the One, Holy, Christian Church, keep watch in this world.

As one of our hymns puts it beautifully,

2 We thank Thee that Thy church, unsleeping While earth rolls onward into light, Through all the world her watch is keeping, And never rests by day or night. 3 As o’er each continent and island The dawn leads on another day, The voice of prayer is never silent, Nor dies the strain of praise away. 4 The sun, that bids us rest, is waking Thy saints beneath the western skies, And hour by hour, as day is breaking, Fresh hymns of thankful praise arise. (LSB #886)

What a perfect picture. At any given moment, somewhere on earth, God’s Church is busy at prayer and praise, interceding for one another and for all people for the sake of Jesus Christ. That is your calling from now until your Lord returns.

I’ll leave it to smarter people than me to tell you how good, bad, or indifferent this past year has been and to predict how good, bad, or indifferent this coming year will be. But tonight the voice of the Holy Spirit rings out: You are more than conquerors through Him who loves you. Happy New Year.