Sermon Tone Analysis

How to be an Overcomer

Good morning children of God, brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus.

Have you ever looked around at the folks we come to church with.

What a beautiful and amazing group of people.

Different careers, different places in our walks, different backgrounds, yet all here because of Jesus Christ.

It still blows my mind how awesome Abba Daddy is to us.

When we use the phrase ”I am a believer,” it means we BELIEVE that Jesus died, rose again, and sits at the right hand of the Father.

It also means that we believe what our LORD and Savior tells us.

Being a believer means we walk in victory because of what He did for you and for me.

It means that we are overcomers.

John the beloved records Jesus Christ telling His disciples, including us, that through Him, we have been given the power to overcome.

Jesus was hours away from being arrested when he spoke these words.

Imagine the inner turmoil he was experiencing.

Yet Jesus takes the time to tell us that we can have peace in Him.

Now, I struggled with this verse for some time.

Here I have my Savior, knowing he is about to suffer terribly telling me that I am not only going to have some trials and sorrows, but many!

How am I going to find peace in that!

The key to this verse is in the word “peace.”

In the Greek, that word peace (your-rain-ay) means:

Peace (eirene) means to bind together, to join, to weave together.

It means that a person is bound, woven and joined together with himself and with God and others.

You are woven together, bound with, and joined with Jesus, God, Holy Spirit, and other believers.

If Jesus overcame the world, it means that we overcome the world through Him.

The problem is in our mindset.

We focus so much on the sorrow, trials, the things that bother us, the things that get under our skin, that we end up diving head first into the muck and mire.

Our thoughts end up something like this:

I am facing all these problems!

I don’t know what to do.

Things are terrible!

I am so angry!

I am hurt.

I feel so alone.

God, where are you in this.

Jesus help me.

Most of us will admit that we find ourselves in places like this at times.

The negative, the hurt, the pain is so overwhelming that it seems all but impossible to change our focus.

That is exactly what Jesus is telling us in John 16:33.

The difference is is that if we know and believe that we are woven and joined with Jesus, we approach trials and sorrows with a different attitude.

Instead of drowning in despair we stand with our head up and say “Thank you for being with me LORD, thank you for going before me, let’s do this.”

The peace we get from the world is transient.

It passes.

The peace that Jesus brings is an overcoming peace.

We know and we are assured by the Word of our Savior’s mouth.

When we look at Jesus, the disciples, and the prophets, we find a pattern that answers the “how to be an overcomer.”

This is this is where we see the manifestation of Christ in the person who continually turns their life over to Christ.

The first thing we see through all of scripture from Genesis through Revelation is prayer.

Now, you all may decide to fire me for this, but there are times when I have difficulty praying.

It is almost like I become a little kid, stomping my feet, and saying “I don’t wanna!” Thais what we are sometimes though I think.

Little kids upset, stomping their feet, and saying “Come on Dad!” When that happens, I have discovered that I am actually in prayer.

I am talking to God, and when I finally get over myself, I am sharing my heart with Abba Daddy.

We MUST:

1. Prevail in Prayer

Every victory in Scripture begins with prayer.

Simply stated, we are communicating with God.

Prayer may include petition, entreaty, supplication, thanksgiving, praise, hymns, and lament.

We sometimes focus so much on praying for physical healing.

Many of us have witnessed the effectual power of prayer in physical healings.

Let’s talk about spiritual healing for a moment.

That earnest prayer, nothing left, you have nothing left to give, you cant fix the problem, you are now relying totally on God.

Has anybody ever been there?

Now, I would be willing to wager that when that prayer was over, that you recieved some kind of spiritual healing or peace or direction from Holy Spirit.

That is the kind of prayer we are talking about here.

When we pray earnestly we experience the power of God within ourselves and often times with others.

Every failure, every sin, every trial, and every trouble can be brought before God.

The second thing we see in scripture that overcomers do is:

Prevail in Prayer

Pursue the Promises

The Apostle Paul told us this that we would have a clear understanding about our adoption into the family of Abraham.

I want to preface what I am about to say by looking at Galatians 3:9

The Jews were distinguished in a very particular manner by the promises which they received from God; the promises to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and the prophets.

God promised to be their God; to protect, support, and save them; to give them what was emphatically called the promised land; and to cause the Messiah to spring from their race.

The Apostle Peter tells us that God had also given unto the Church of Jesus Christ exceeding great promises; indeed all that he had given to the Jews (except for the promised land settlement) add to that redemption through the blood of Christ, the indwelling influence of Holy Spirit, and eternal rest in the Kingdom of Glory.

AMEN!

We share in God’s divine nature!

Now, if nature determines appetite, what are our appetites?

More importantly, how do we overcome our worldly appetites to take on the nature of Jesus?

Prevail in Prayer

Pursue the Promises

Persist in Progress

The Apostle Peter is telling us this journey does not end with faith alone.

As we continue our walk, we are adding to our faith by living out the very characteristics of Jesus Christ.

Moral excellence means that we develop goodness of character, even if those around us are not.

It is striving to live life as we should.

Being an excellent person.

As we live that way, we naturally add knowledge because we have learned how to handle those everyday situations.

It is seeing those trials or those situations, knowing what to do, and doing it.

2 peter 1:6

Self-control.

Who struggles with self-control at times?

A brother and I were talking the other day and we both said “Man, How did Jesus do it.”

Peter is referring more to the pleasures in life.

When we indulge in those things or do things we know are not good for us.

I have shared this before, but I will share again.

I met with my doctor for a followup after I had the heart attack.

I looked at him and said “Doc, I don’t get why I had a heart attack so young.”

His face was great!

He says “Bob, do you think the two packs of cigarettes a day, the pound of bacon a week, and the three pounds of cheese with the bacon had anything to do with it?”

I knew that much was bad for me, but I had not developed self-control.

I still eat bacon and cheese, just not nearly as much.

We are all called to continue to develop both spiritual and physical self-control as we mature as Christians.