The Benefits Of New Life- Victory Series

I came away from my time at camp this week very encouraged and refreshed. I came away with a renewed sense of God’s complete and total sovereignty. He is in control.

For the past few weeks we have been talking about some of the great benefits of new life in Christ. We talked about the benefit of the Holy Spirit and the benefit of hope for the future. This week we will investigate another great benefit of new life in Christ, victory. As I mentioned a few weeks back, here in chapter 8 Paul is teaching about the third stage of our salvation, glorification. The victory that we now experience isn’t just a future blessing, but a present benefit as well.

The section of scripture that we will study today is full of these important truths for us to cling to. This passage should make us feel empowered and invincible. These words should almost make us a little smug. We have absolutely nothing to fear or worry about because of what God has done for us.

Follow along as I read 8:28-39…

I see four clear areas where we have victory from these verses. First, we have victory in all circumstances. Romans 8:28 is one of the most amazing, important, beautify verses in the whole Bible. I want you to memorize it. I’ve printed it in big letters on the back of your sermon guide. Put it on the fridge when you get home and think about it all this week.

I want to camp out here on this verse for just a few minutes because it is just so important. We have victory in all circumstances, in all things, because God works all things together for our good.

This verse is a declaration of God’s sovereignty and power. It is a revelation of God’s unconditional love. It is a promise of good in a world of bad. We should start each day by dwelling on this truth, remember this fact in the midst of every hardship, and praise God for this reality at the end of each day.

God takes the good and the bad and works it for our good. God takes all the evil, rotten, sinful stuff around us and turns it around. Every time Satan thinks he has won some kind of victory, God thwarts it by turning that evil into good. God is in the business of working all things together for our good.

Here’s an example from a newspaper story out of New Hampshire a few years ago…

“A temporary power outage on Friday was blamed on a man who chocked on a piece of food while driving.

Police say Ronald Tinker, 40, was eating chicken when a piece got caught in his throat. He choked, blacked out and veered off the road, taking down a wire that was supporting a utility pole.

The pole snapped, cutting power to several nearby businesses for much of the day Friday.

Tinker said the crash must have knocked the chicken out of his throat. He was taken to New London Hospital, where he was treated for minor injuries and released.”

Now choking, blacking out, and crashing your car into a power pole would all be considered unfortunate things. But God used those events to dislodge the chicken and keep the poor guy from choking to death.

Alice Tucker knew that I was about to preach on this passage, so she lent me this book she had been reading. It’s called Captured By Grace by David Jeremiah. If you are looking for a great Christian book to read I would recommend this one.