You can be an overcomer. You can walk in victory. Yesterday I talked to you about finding surrender. It is going to take us surrendering to God to be able to walk in victory. I want to share with you some verses that will encourage you.
Everyday we are in a spiritual battle. Somedays we have to fight and fight hard. Other times the enemy backs off to lick his wounds and try to find a different approach to tear us down. But make no mistake, God will not let us be overtaken by the enemy. When the battles seem to be the hardest, we can rest in the fact that we will overcome by the blood of the Lamb.
I John 5:4 For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
We cannot overcome the world unless we are born of God. This is why it is so hard for people sometimes to make the first step toward yielding to Christ. Because they do not have enough overcoming power yet. It truly takes a large step of faith. But we gain victory in our initial surrender.
Rom 8:35-37 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. 37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
In tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril or threat of the sword we are greater than a conqueror, more than a conqueror through Jesus that loved us. If the power of God lives within us, we can overcome whatever we face. God will not allow us to face anything we are not ready to handle.
I Cor. 15:57-58 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.
Victory is a gift from God through Jesus and the power we have been give from him. It is not our efforts or strength; victory comes from our obedience and surrender.
John 16:33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.
We too can overcome the world because Jesus gives us victory. He is our peace and strength. Finding victory means that our faith aligns to what God says and not what our circumstances says. The report of the enemy will fail in the light of God’s power. We have to believe God’s report. His word, his report says that we have victory over our enemy. We must come into alignment with his word, which says we have the victory.
Right now, it is easy to look around at the state the world is in and be discouraged. Many are out of work or working part-time. These hurricanes have devastated several states. The enemy seems to press in from every side. The news tells of one crisis or another constantly. But even in the middle of the worst things imaginable, God can be found. We will prevail.
The word prevail, as defined by Oxford dictionary: prove more powerful than opposing forces; be victorious:
Our enemy expects that he will wear us out. He thinks by throwing so much at us that we will get to be battle-weary. But we will be victorious because God is on our side. The strength he gives us will prove to be more powerful than our enemy. We will walk in victory.
Falling into fear, anxiety and depression will not help us survive this attack from our enemy. We have to look to our king, our commander in chief named Jesus. He has a battle plan and will fight for us. The enemy will not overtake us. We will prevail.
I will remind you once again about how Jehosophat followed God’s command and set his worshippers out front and marched to battle. But before they arrived at the battlefield, God had already caused the three armies that wanted to destroy Jehosophat, to destroy one another. God will cause our enemy to do the same. We just have to keep praising our Lord and keep praying for his guidance. We will prevail, not because of who we are, but because of whose we are, we belong to the Most High God.
Matt 6:25-27 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? 26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? 27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?
We have all met people who thought too highly of themselves. But even their thoughts didn’t change their status in life. We are not supposed to be concerned about what we will eat, or drink or wear. Because God will take care of us. He will supply our needs.
Phil 4:19 But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
It doesn’t say he sees your need and will only take care of half, or if you are good maybe three-fourths. No, it says ALL your need. Whatever we need, he is our provider.
Matt6:28-30 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: 29 And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?
Matt.6:31-33 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? 32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. 33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
If we seek God first, he will supply our needs. We do not have to worry or fret about what tomorrow will bring. God is our provider. He will take care of his people.
Matt 6:34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Worrying about tomorrow is not a good use of our time. Worry will not add anything to the next day, but it will subtract from the day we are walking in. Today we need to learn to lean on Jesus. Dig deep and find the strength to trust in him. If we can trust Him, we will win the battle. If we learn to trust, we can walk in faith a whole lot easier. Trust makes it easier to praise Him in the storms of life.
Taking each minute as it comes. If we take a look at where we are now and where we have been. He never has failed us; he has not brought us this far to give up on us. That would have been like saving the children of Israel from Egypt only to allow the Pharaoh and his army to destroy the Israelites. But he didn’t allow the enemy to win, he instead drowned him and his army in the Red Sea.
Be encouraged this weekend, dig into the word, pray and seek God’s plan. He will never let us down, we will prevail as long as we put our full trust in him. There is not a problem that we face that we cannot overcome with Jesus by our side. There is not a battle too big for our God. We will prevail.
The title of today’s episode: INTENSITY MEANS VICTORY
There is no doubt in the minds of Christians that we are in a battle. We are in the most intense battle of our lives. Evil is being portrayed as good. It seems that evil has taken over and even praised. The mutilation and slaughtering of children is praised as a choice. Child trafficking for all sorts of evil purposes is, for the most part, ignored because people do not want to face what is happening to these innocent souls.
Drug abuse is on the rise. Satan wants everyone to be numbed by drugs so that they do not pay attention or even care about what is happening. People are dying every day at their own hands because their minds are confused by satan and his lies.
There is a tipping point in every war. The point where the few find a backbone of steel. Where they become determined to stand up for the truth and for good. Many of my grandparents’ generation died on the beach of Normandy and all across Europe to stop an evil man called Hitler. He had his mind set on wiping out all the Jewish people.
Many died on American soil during our civil war in the late 1800’s. Because they felt it was wrong to enslave another human being, just because their skin color was different.
All of these things seem to be separate issues, but really they all boil down to a spiritual war. Trafficking of children, slavery of a race, the total annihilation of another race (who happen to be God’s chosen people) it is all a spiritual war backed by satan.
Since the Garden of Eden, satan has been trying to manipulate people into not believing God. Satan wants people to trust him and his lies. Every time people choose to stand against him, it is a battle. But we never have to fight this battle alone. GOD IS WITH US!!!
John10:10-11 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. 11 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.
Our Shepherd will not leave us to fight off the wolf that is trying to kill and destroy us. Satan wants to steal the things that God has for us, because he is jealous that God gave us power. We can overcome him, as long as we stay plugged into our power source, who is Jesus.
When the king told the three Hebrew men that they had to bow to his statue. Who do you think was in charge of that idea? Satan doesn’t care that we bow to a statue, he doesn’t care that we idol worship a celebrity. Because he is in it for the long game. He knows if we bow to the idols of this world we are really bowing to him.
When the Hebrew men refused, the king commanded that they be thrown into the fiery furnace. The furnace was turned up seven times hotter than normal. Notice the enemy always turns up the intensity right before he loses.
God did not let any harm come to his children. Only what had them bound, their ropes were burned. When we pass through a fiery trial, God will use it to burn out our impurities and what has us bound. They were dancing and shouting their victory in the worst of their storm.
Satan hates it when we worship God, because we are stepping into the place God made him to be, he was in charge of worship. Above anything we can do, worship gives the enemy a black eye and connects us more closely to Jesus.
I hope you are getting what I am trying to convey to you. Things seem to be getting more intense every day. We are on the edge of our moment of decision. Will we bow or will we stand? Will we say I don’t care how hot the fire, I will not bow to satan?
Satan comes at us by slightly manipulating the truth. Until, our way of thinking believes his lie. He will tell us that God is far away. Then he turns things on us and makes us believe that we are our own worst enemy. He uses condemnation to make us feel less than and that God can never use us, because we made a mistake.
He tries to make us forget that we are children of the most high God. One who has promised to never leave us. One that has promised to fight our battles for us. Certainly, satan wants us to believe that God is far away. This will give him more time to talk to us and try to discourage us.
If we grow in the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not believe his lies any longer, then he comes at us with fatigue, busyness and discouragement. He will try to make us tired and apathetic.
I want to encourage you today to stand strong. If the enemy has turned up the fire in your furnace. Be Bold and take a stand. Do not bow to whatever he has brought into your life to get you to give up. Your relationship with Jesus is more important than bowing to anything else.
Do not allow fear of what the enemy is doing to cause your faith to waiver. We will be victorious. The battle is not ours but God’s, we just have to praise him and keep marching forward. We cannot allow the enemy to turn us around.
Once we survive our fiery trial:
Daniel 3:28-30 Then Nebuchadnezzar spake, and said, Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who hath sent his angel, and delivered his servants that trusted in him, and have changed the king’s word, and yielded their bodies, that they might not serve nor worship any god, except their own God. 29 Therefore I make a decree, That every people, nation, and language, which speak any thing amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall be made a dunghill: because there is no other God that can deliver after this sort. 30 Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in the province of Babylon.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were promoted. Our fiery trials serve only to elevate us. We will come out on the other side with more overcoming power and a stronger witness.
They were not the only ones promoted. In the story of Daniel and the lions den. He was forbidden to pray to any god but the king. Daniel was not quiet with his prayers but opened his windows and prayed loudly to Jehovah. He was bold and brave and knew his God was the only one to answer prayers.
When he was caught the punishment was to be tossed into the lion’s den. He would be torn to shreds by a pack of hungry lions. But God had other plans. Daniel had a peaceful nights sleep. God shut the mouths of the lions. They didn’t touch Daniel.
When the king came to see if he had survived and found him alive he promoted Daniel.
Daniel 2:47-48 The king answered unto Daniel, and said, Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret. 48 Then the king made Daniel a great man, and gave him many great gifts, and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon.
As we face the trials ahead, be strong in the Lord. Remember he will not leave us to fight alone. The more intense the battle the greater the victory. Once we are through the fiery furnace or lion’s den, a promotion is waiting for us.
We need to be praying today for strength to stand against what we have facing us. Ask God to go before us and fight our battles. Then all we have to do is to worship and wait for the time to pass, that we walk out of our fiery furnace or lion’s den.
Remember, the level of intensity, will determine your level of victory.
The title of today’s episode is: “PRAISE AND VICTORY”
I COR 15:57 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
We have victory. There are times when we may not feel very victorious. Even in those times we have victory because of the blood of Jesus. We often don’t see things clearly because of our emotions. We can’t see the big picture of how things are going to work out. We feel like we are defeated, but that is the enemy’s way of distracting us from the goodness of God.
God is faithful in pulling us through anything we face in life. When bad news hits us like a semi-truck, we don’t feel victorious. We feel pain that has flattened us and taken the wind from our lungs. God is right there making sure we have air in our lungs so we can keep breathing.
He already sees the way we will rise from our ashes and hurt. He sees us victorious. Even when we cannot imagine ever being in a place of victory. The same thing goes for anyone struggling with an addiction. God sees them on the other side of that struggle. He sees them victorious. But they cannot imagine a time when they will have victory.
Job is the perfect example of this, he had the victory. God knew that he would not let his circumstances dictate his victory. Satan tried everything. To everyone around him, things looked like Job would never have victory again. But he held onto God through the process. He came out the other side victorious. Victory was always there; they just couldn’t see it for the circumstances.
1 Cor 5:7 We walk by faith and not by sight.
When we are walking through tough moments and we cannot see the victory, we pray. God says, “Wait.”
Waiting is the last thing we ever want to do. None of us enjoy the quiet time of waiting. We are the microwave generation. But God’s timing is perfect.
Isaiah 40:31 But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
We will rise above everything that is coming against us. If we wait on the Lord, He will give us strength. He will not allow us to be overtaken. Victory will be ours as long as we trust in Him.
We have to praise God when we are waiting for our victory.
Exodus 17:10-12 — So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. 11 And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. 12 But Moses hands were heavy; and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.
Hur and Aaron held up Moses’ hands, and Joshua and the Children of Israel prevailed against Amalek. As long as he held up his hands, they gained ground. When his arms were let down, the tables turned, and they started losing.
We need to lift our hands and praise the Lord. Not because of what we need Him to do. Not because of our circumstances, but because of who He is and because He is worthy of our praise. Giving God praise and worship will distract our minds until we see our breakthrough. If we keep our hands lifted up, we will see our victory.
1 John 5:4 For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
If you need victory, wait and praise the Lord. He will come through at just the right moment.
GOD FOCUS--Psalm 34:3 O magnify the Lord with me.... 