Wait. Don’t you have to have something to overcome if you are going to be an overcomer?

 

I’ve often said that the richness of our lives comes not from our times on vacation but from the battles we fight amid challenging circumstances. Overcomers do just that – they overcome stuff.

 

Having experienced so many decades of ministry, I’ve come to recognize some crucial decisions, actions, and attitudes of people having profound personal victories. Becoming victorious is the overcomer’s treasure of life.

 

Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.” – Psalm 23

 

TobyMac penned,

“Thy rod and thy staff

They comfort me when I’m beat-down, broken

Hold my heart when it’s split wide open

Turn these eyes to my Soul Protector

Break the will of this born defector.” ((”I Just Need You” by TobyMac, ForeFront, EMI CMG, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wNpOeakhEM))

 

Your self-condemnation somehow leaves Jesus behind while you follow after your guilt, pain, blame-shifting, and feelings of not being enough. It’s a kind of disloyalty that no one sees on the outside, but it takes its toll – and it takes you down.

 

Sometimes I just have to ask myself a simple question: Is my heavenly Father able and willing to change my circumstances, my behaviors, my thinking, and, therefore, my life?

 

My experience tells me that most believers show little to no evidence that they actually believe that He can or even desires to help.

 

When I read the gospels, I notice that Jesus didn’t hang out with the religious; He rebuked them. Jesus was hospitable to the ones that the religious called sinners – outcasts of society. I see this as His desire to be that great force of the overcomer.

 

Your problems are huge. The Kingdom inside you is so much bigger. It’s time to change your focus.

 

“But Jesus looked at them and said to them, ‘With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'” Matthew 19:26

 

Your way out of the trouble your heart is in requires a complete paradigm shift of your loyalty. Your loyalty from thinking you are a failure because of your circumstances and your toxic thinking patterns. Your loyalties must now shift to the now coming glory of His Kingdom – His rule and reign – and instead of seeing your diminishing demise, envision His glory breaking through the clouds of darkness to rescue you in the here and now.

 

“Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” Psalms 73:25-26

 

Your encouragers may even be the “cloud of witnesses.” While your stacked up sorrows may include your loved ones who have gone before you, a deeper consideration of their glorious positions might bring you to a more significant place. Consider them and how they still love you but now their love is purer than any expressions they might have had from their earthly abode. Now, their love is an explosive form of encouragement. Encouragement to who? To you. Does their love have to remain in heaven and useless to you upon the earth? I think not.

 

Heaven is real. Earth is essential but is greatly overshadowed by heaven and its grandeur.

 

To overcome, to be an overcomer, your loyalties must shift to that which is outside of yourself. Your loyalties must shift to that which is much greater than you alone.

 

“He raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:6

 

 

It is written,

“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.” Hebrews 12:1

 

What is the overcomer’s view?

What is the overcomer’s perspective of troubles?

Where is the overcomer’s loyalty focused?

 

The true overcomer has a viewpoint from the highest place. We must learn to see from the perspective of our victorious Kingdom. We cannot overcome if we are under our circumstances and can only see from an earthly position.

 

The true overcomer sees troubles and even chaos as an opportunity to overcome. This is where we roll up our sleeves with a smile on our faces. Get to work and bring all troublesome circumstances into focus and start planning your attack.  “To execute on them the judgment written. This is an honor for all His godly ones. Praise the LORD!” Psalms 149:9

 

A communicated shift, a deliberate and intentional shift of loyalty from ourselves to the Master of all creation, changes our position. Only then can we start the exciting process of overcoming.

 

Be an overcomer. Overcome your stuff today. Shalom & Joy to you.