| The Grapevine
Number 131 July 2, 2006 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed rightly dividing the word of truth. II Timothy 2:15 Victim or Victor by Jack Northart The Word of God is truth. The promises of God are sure and absolute. What God has said in His Word can be trusted and relied upon in every situation, and under every condition. There is never a time when His promises will fail us when we believe them. What about adversity? What about setbacks in life? What about failures that we encounter? What about troubles in life? Where do they come from, and why do they happen if God's promises are true, absolute and certain? These types of questions of doubt will come to most people's minds in the course of life. The answers and the proper response to these questions are to be found in God's Word. I Peter 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: Our adversary is the devil. He looks for ways to make trouble for us, and he does this by sneaking around like a roaring lion, looking to find someone to attack. The roar of a lion is what freezes an animal in its tracks. As long as its prey keeps moving ahead without stopping, the lion cannot capture it. It is only when the fear from the lion's roar stops it; then it can be devoured. The devil is the source of adversity. He mounts the pressure and mounts the trouble against us. He cannot literally "eat us," but it is the trouble and pressure that can eat at us, if we allow it to. It is our job to be alert and aware of what's going on when trouble comes. We don't allow it to seize us and take us down. We don't allow ourselves to become the victim. To the contrary, we keep moving ahead as the victor, being more than conquerors, knowing that God in Christ has given us the victory. Romans 8:31-32 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? What can we say about all this? If God is on our side, can anyone be against us? God did not keep back His own Son, but He gave him for us. If God did this, won't He freely give us everything else? Verses 33-34 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. If God says his chosen ones are acceptable to Him, can anyone bring charges against them? Or can anyone condemn them? No indeed! Christ died and was raised to life, and now he is at God's right hand, speaking to Him on our behalf. Verses 35-36 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Can trouble, suffering, and hard times, hunger, nakedness, danger or even death separate us from the love of Christ? These are rhetorical questions, and the answer is coming in the next verse, but they are the same questions that we all ask ourselves from time to time. We conclude sometimes that, after all, it is written in Psalm 44:22 that we are like sheep on their way to be butchered. We might as well pack it in, because there is no hope for us anyway. Right? Wrong! Verse 37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. In everything we have won more than a victory because of Christ who loves us! He never stops loving us, and he never stops giving us the victory. We only become victims to all of these nasty things when we choose to do so. When we start to look for someone or something to blame for getting us into these bad situations, we become the victim and not the victor. When we allow resentment to reign in our lives, we have succumbed to the adversity. However, when we look to God, knowing that He has given us the victory, no matter what, then we are more than a conqueror and have the victory. We must make up our minds that no matter what setbacks, or troubles may come, God will always make us victorious and will continue to love us, without reservation. Verses 38-39 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. We must become fully persuaded that beyond a shadow of doubt, that nothing can separate us from God's love--not life or death, not angels or devil spirits, not the present or the future. Nothing in all creation can separate us from God's love for us in Christ Jesus our Lord! I Corinthians 15:57-58 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 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. Return to main page |