I’ve been inspired about a word this week that is so very true for our lives, but for many it just is not grasped as important or they don’t really understand the depths of this word.  That word is ‘Victory.’  Victory brings about a great deal of thoughts and even emotions for people.  It’s associated with sports when a team comes out on top to win, particularly a championship like Duke just winning the NCAA Men’s Basketball title last month or the Patriots pulling off a last second Super Bowl win.  It’s also more associated with the battle field and war.  The dictionary defines victory as ‘a success or triumph over an enemy in battle or war.’  For the victorious, there is a great deal of joy.  A great deal of pride.  The triumph can mean so much to the victorious.

I’ve began thinking and meditating on this word recently and the thoughts about another victory.  One that many lose sight of.  Actually a victory that is more significant and everlasting than any battlefield triumph or sports championship here in this world.  That is the victory that we have in the finished works of Jesus Christ.  This is so significant to all of our lives, yet so many fail to really grasp the real victory that we have and the battle that was won through Christ.

We live in a world filled with darkness and chaos all over.  It’s all over the evening news.  Look at what happened in Baltimore this week with the riots that broke out.  Also we saw where more brothers in the faith were martyred by ISIS when they were marched to the cost and killed.  The faith is under attack by post-modern thinking that discounts our faith or diminishes pieces of the Word for their own purposes and demonizes believers for staying true to God’s Word.  It’s running rampant and throughout history our fallen world has been filled with darkness and chaos.

Some 2,000 years ago, however, something significant happened when Jesus was crucified, he was then raised to life, and ascended to the thrown at God’s right hand.  Jesus has won the ultimate victory for us in many ways.  Sin was forever defeated, death was conquered, and Jesus is given authority over heaven and earth.  Jesus’s blood paid the ransom for our lives.  He took everything we deserved having fallen so far from God and now we live under God’s undeserved grace because of the obedience of Jesus.  It’s quite a victory and nothing could ever top just how significant a victory it was and is.

1 Corinthians 15:57 says, “but thanks be to God, who gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Jesus is victorious.  He has already won the battle and what a sweet victory it is.  What’s even more awesome is that nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing can ever take this victory away.  The only thing that can happen is that we choose to turn away from it, but that’s our own choice in then end.  Jesus said in John 16:33 that we can take courage because He overcame the world.  1 John 5:4 tells us, “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith.”

I write about this because I feel it’s so significant to our lives.  Day after day we see suffering.  We see people that feel like there is absolutely no hope.  Not just in the news, but in our everyday lives.  They feel lost and don’t know where to turn.  I have seen this very close to home from kids to grown adults losing all hope feeling all alone. People just lose complete sight of the victory because of trauma and wounds they’ve experienced or just feeling like that they have no body.

The enemy sees this hurt and plants a foothold blinding them. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might now see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” Now this points to the unbelieving, but the same can be said for the believer when they allow tribulations in their lives to pull them away from Christ.  It boils down to faith. In Matthew 17, Jesus said that faith as small as a mustard seed is strong enough to move mountains.  Nothing is impossible.  For many, because of our fallen nature it’s still so easy to lose heart and fall back away and forget that the victory is won.

I love the hook in Trip Lee’s song, “Sweet Victory” where it says:

I feel thorns where my crown was
I’ll be weak but I’m alive
From the dust until dawn yeah
I’ll survive cause I got
Sweet Victory
Nobody can take it from me
Sweet victory
Cause I got, sweet victory yeah

I feel like this so powerful for all of us to remember.  We may feel weak.  We may have times where we just struggle, we may feel down, but we are alive in Christ.  We have sweet victory that can’t be taken from us, ever.  We win because Christ already won for us.  As Jesus said, we will still have trials and tribulation in our lives.  Until His return that’s the world we live in still.  We can take heart and bring the finished works of Jesus Christ over our lives and bring the Cross of Christ between us and any struggles we face.  We are victorious in Him, forever.  Let’s take great joy in this and know that no matter what we face, Christ overcame to free us and we can overcome through Him.

“God expects you to have the mentality of a conqueror. See yourself as a victor in Christ Jesus, and go about life with a holy swagger!” – Pedro Okoro