Victim to Victor
Hope for Deep Wounds • Sermon • Submitted
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The last few weeks have been very heavy sermons.
This morning I want to build off of the last two weeks with a message the Lord has been building in my heart for quite some time.
If you have not been here the last two weeks then let me encourage you to go listen to the last two weeks on Hope for Deep Wounds.
We looked at what are the deep wounds in our lives and spent some time revealing that many have deep wounds that exist in our lives.
We then looked at the steps of repentance and focused on step 5. In order for us to show mercy in deep wounds, we must have the empowering work of the Holy Spirit.
I then built a Biblical case that I don’t believe it is possible to receive ultimate healing without the empowering work of the Holy Spirit.
We saw that through the empowering work of the Holy Spirit healing from deep wounds is absolutely possible. This healing from the Holy Spirit is true healing. It is not counterfeit healing but it is real healing. This healing from the Holy Spirit causes us to extend Mercy to those who have caused us deep wounds.
This morning I want to build on this. I want to get straight to it this morning and that is the Bible does not encourage a victim mentality.
Victim Mentality:
If you have a victim mentality, you will see your entire life through a perspective that things constantly happen ‘to’ you. Victimisation is thus a combination of seeing most things in life as negative, beyond your control, and as something you should be given sympathy for experiencing as you ‘deserve’ better. At its heart, a victim mentality is actually a way to avoid taking any responsibility for yourself or your life. By believing you have no power then you don’t have to take action. (thegospelcoalition.org)
In other words, any bad thing in your life is the fault of other people. They’re the ones that are bad, wrong or dumb, and you are good, right and brilliant. Other people do bad or stupid things, and you suffer as a result.
Let me be clear
This is not saying that there are not victims. Scripture has so much to say about justice for those who are innocent victims. I know that some of you are innocent victims in the deep wounds that you have faced.
People are often innocent victims that have suffered unjust evil at the hands of others.
We must be on guard that being a victim does not mean we move to or adopt a victim mentality.
It is our responsibility as Christ followers to to fight against injustices and to affirm those who suffer because of it. But we do not help those who suffer when we promote them into a victim mentality.
The victim mentality is an ideology that divides society into victims and oppressors. It’s a way of thinking that tells victims that they are part of an oppressive system and they will not overcome it.
Victim Mentality not only shows its self in deep wounds but it has a tendency to come out when Christian’s begin to talk about end times as well.
“The Bible says it is going to get bad and so here it is getting bad and I am stuck in the middle of it. I just can’t wait to get out of here because of the oppression that I am under down here on this earth”
Biblical Example of a Victim Mentality
1 Then the Lord spoke to Moses:
2 “Tell the Israelites to turn back and camp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea; you must camp in front of Baal-zephon, facing it by the sea.
3 Pharaoh will say of the Israelites: They are wandering around the land in confusion; the wilderness has boxed them in.
4 I will harden Pharaoh’s heart so that he will pursue them. Then I will receive glory by means of Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am Yahweh.” So the Israelites did this.
Pharoah says what have we done releasing this labor force and assembles 600 chariots and his troops with him and begins to pursue the Israelites.
10 As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up and saw the Egyptians coming after them. Then the Israelites were terrified and cried out to the Lord for help.
11 They said to Moses: “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you took us to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt?
12 Isn’t this what we told you in Egypt: Leave us alone so that we may serve the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”
13 But Moses said to the people, “Don’t be afraid. Stand firm and see the Lord’s salvation He will provide for you today; for the Egyptians you see today, you will never see again.
14 The Lord will fight for you; you must be quiet.”
The Lord delivers them. He parts the waters of the Red Sea, they cross on dry ground, through the Egyptians into confusion, caused the chariots wheels to swerve and made them drive with difficulty, and the Lord caused the sea to come back on them that pursued them into the sea.
The Victim Mentality sucks the joy out of life
A victim mentality not only magnifies our difficulties but it also minimizes our blessings.
It makes our problems big and our blessings small
Moses sings a song of praise and then this happens
22 Then Moses led Israel on from the Red Sea, and they went out to the Wilderness of Shur. They journeyed for three days in the wilderness without finding water.
23 They came to Marah, but they could not drink the water at Marah because it was bitter—that is why it was named Marah.
24 The people grumbled to Moses, “What are we going to drink?”
25 So he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree. When he threw it into the water, the water became drinkable. He made a statute and ordinance for them at Marah and He tested them there.
26 He said, “If you will carefully obey the Lord your God, do what is right in His eyes, pay attention to His commands, and keep all His statutes, I will not inflict any illnesses on you that I inflicted on the Egyptians. For I am Yahweh who heals you.”
The Israelites had so many amazing things happen to them. God had given them a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to lead them. He had delivered them and done soo much for them and yet all they could focus on was the problems.
God has blessed us
3 Praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens.
Victim Mentality Disempowers us
One of the most harmful impacts of a victim mentality is what it does to people who hold it: it removes nearly all their initiative to improve their situation.
They lose the ability to positively influence their circumstances, and better their lives. In other words, they’re held hostage to their circumstances.
Secular thinker Stephen Covey points out
Reactive people [i.e. people with a victim mentality] are affected by their…environment…When people treat them well, they feel well; when people don’t, they become defensive or protective. Reactive people build their emotional lives around the behaviour of others, empowering the weaknesses of other people to control them.’
Victim Mentality blinds us to our own sin and our need for a Savior
When it is always someone else’s fault, then I don’t need a Savior because I am never wrong. The victim mentality explains our wounds as solely someone else’s fault (again to be clear there are times when it was solely the fault of another).
Even our response to it being solely the fault of the other person can be sin.
It is good for us to see our sin and see that the only solution to sin is Jesus.
The Bible doesn’t encourage a victim mentality
21 For you were called to this, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in His steps.
22 He did not commit sin, and no deceit was found in His mouth;
23 when He was reviled, He did not revile in return; when He was suffering, He did not threaten but entrusted Himself to the One who judges justly.
The greatest injustice in the History of the universe. The one without sin died for those who have sinned.
Left you an example that you might follow in His steps
when he was suffering he did not threaten but entrusted Himself to the One who judges justly.
He surrendered Himself the the one who judges justly
In suffering, it is complete surrender to the one who judges justly.
1 Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us,
2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God’s throne.
Keep our eyes on Jesus
This term implies a definite looking away from others and directing one’s gaze toward Jesus.
It suggest the impossibility of looking in two directions at once.
Jesus is
the source, leader, author, originator or pioneer
Perfecter or finisher of our faith
who for the joy that lay before Him
Jesus knew that He would come out of that tomb alive!
If the cross is the end of the story, then a victim mentality is right an proper, but the cross is not the end of the story and Jesus overcame sin and death.
Jesus knew he would overcome
7 I will praise the Lord who counsels me — even at night my conscience instructs me.
8 I keep the Lord in mind always. Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.
9 Therefore my heart is glad and my spirit rejoices; my body also rests securely.
10 For You will not abandon me to Sheol; You will not allow Your Faithful One to see decay.
11 You reveal the path of life to me; in Your presence is abundant joy; in Your right hand are eternal pleasures.
The Bible Exposition Commentary Chapter Eleven: Stay in the Running! (Hebrews 12)
So “the joy that was set before Him” would include Jesus’ completing the Father’s will, His resurrection and exaltation, and His joy in presenting believers to the Father in glory
24 Now to Him who is able to protect you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of His glory, blameless and with great joy,
2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God’s throne.
Despised the shame
This is an attitude that does not ignore the shame but holds it to be of no consequence in view of the joy.
2 Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials,
3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.
4 But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.