Overcoming The World

I don’t know where the idea came from that says serving God can’t be the source or the expression of the joy God has given to a person’s life. The Bible says, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

I’m going to be honest. The stone statue Christianity is dying.

What do I mean by this? We once had a Catholic woman visit our congregation. She made the comment that we needed to spice up the décor and add a few statues of the saints. Our Council Chair person at the time looked at her with an amusing smile on his face. “Statues!” he said. “We have plenty of statues in our church. He led her down to the front of the church and turned her around to face the congregation. As he waved his hand over the still and motionless congregation he said, “The best thing about our statues is they are alive and clean themselves.”

The “I Can’t folks” are different story. They are always overcome. The power of faith is always overcome by their own self pitying spirit. Not only do they believe lies from every deceiving spirit that will whisper in their ear, but they will also hold onto their lies to the point that God’s grace is made meaningless in their life.

The I can’t folks sound like this, “I can’t talk to other people about Jesus. I’m not a people person. I don’t have any gifts. God can’t use me. I can’t overcome my addiction, my lust, my beliefs, or my situation. I can’t give, because I’m too poor. I can’t serve, because I’m too busy. I can’t breathe in the forgiving power of the living God, because I’m too hurt, too wounded, too mad, too sad or too worried.

“Dr. Park Tucker, former chaplain of the federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia, told of walking down the street in a certain city, feeling low and depressed and worried about life in general. As he walked along, he lifted his eyes for a moment to the window of a funeral home across the street. He blinked his eyes a couple of times, wondering whether his eyes were deceiving him.

But sure enough, he saw in the window of that funeral home was this sign, in large, bold words: “Why walk around half-dead? We can bury you now for $69.50. P.S. We also give green stamps.” Dr. Tucker said the humor of it was good medicine for his soul. He realized that many people are walking around half-dead, because worry has built a mountain of problems over which they believe there is no path. They have surrendered to fate instead of faith.”

We are not called to be the people who won’t, or the people who can’t. We are the people who are not only called to overcome, but we are empowered to overcome. When we accepted the life of Jesus Christ given by God on our behalf so that we might be saved, then we were saved, born again from above and sealed with the Spirit and power of the living God. It is a shame that in this day and time many Christians will claim this victory, but deny its power. They will deny its power, because they won’t use it for the obeying of God’s commandments to Love him and our neighbor. Everything Jesus taught from feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, sheltering the homeless, caring for the sick, and visiting the imprisoned to the being faithful in marriage, not lusting, forgiving and showing mercy is wrapped up in these two commands.