Jesus Overcame

What Did Jesus Do?

…take heart, I have overcome the world.
John 16.33

There was once a song titled “You and Me Against the World.” It was a forlorn hope, taking on the world. History is replete with world conquerors who have all ultimately been defeated by the world—with one exception. One person alone has in fact overcome the world. And when we team up with Him, well, that makes us overcomers too, not that it’s easy.

Just getting along with the world is hard enough for many. Most of us would be happy if we could just somehow slip through the world without the world taking any particular notice of us at all. The world hands out gold watches to people who manage to keep their head down and quietly go about their business without upsetting the order of things; it hands out crosses to those who oppose it. Now, don’t get me wrong, Jesus didn’t come to condemn the world, He came to save it; that is plain enough. It’s just that to save the world, He had to oppose the world’s way of doing pretty much everything and overcome it.

When this is your life’s purpose it makes allies hard to come by. Everyone and everything that is invested in the ways of the world will oppose you. And all the rest, who might not be all that in love with the world because the world treats them rather disdainfully, even roughly, won’t join your side because they are absolutely convinced there simply is no overcoming the world.

But Jesus, observing the way things were and how people lived based on what they had learned in and from the world, introduced whole new ways of understanding and living to the world by teaching, “You have heard ___________…But I say_________.” Take anger for instance. The ultimate expression of anger is murder. People had been taught that it was wrong to murder. Jesus didn’t come to encourage murder; but to save the world He had to convict everyone of us who has ever been angry with a brother or sister, or friend or neighbor, or anyone else, of, in effect murdering another. “Don’t allow anger to condemn you to the flames of hell; let it go, and reconcile all differences immediately.” Great advice, but to a world that loves to hold on to anger and grudges, to people who are convinced being right is more important than forgiving trespasses, it was a lesson that was and is hard to accept. (See Matthew 5.21-26)

Here’s another example—Lust. Adultery had been rightly condemned, not that condemnation has ever discouraged all that many people from committing it. But Jesus taught that even those of us who have “wandering eyes” have committed adultery! (See Matthew 5.27-30) This pretty much means that Jesus has convicted every man who has ever lived, which means just about every man will have “issues” with Jesus. But how can a man be saved without his adulteries being exposed and dealt with? Why, it is no wonder that Jesus was crucified. Actually, I am surprised that the angry men who had chased the woman caught in adultery didn’t throw their stones at Jesus right on the spot! (See John 8.1-11)

Overcoming the world means overcoming the whole world and everyone in it. In the world there are two kinds of people: the overcame, and those needing to be overcome. The “overcamed” are all who have been convicted of their sins by the Holy Spirit, and who have surrendered to Jesus, they are more commonly known as “the saved.” Those who still need to be overcome, more commonly called “the unsaved,” live in ignorance of their sins, or in stubborn refusal to repent of their sins, or in helpless, miserable bondage to their sins. As you can imagine, overcoming isn’t easy. There’s much more persecution and sacrifice and surrender in confronting sin than there is fame and fortune.

But, like it or not, Jesus calls the “overcamed” to be overcomers who love the world and everyone in it so much that they refuse to allow the world and everyone in it to their fate, even though it means inviting the persecution of the world. It’s not so much a matter of so-called “tough love” as it is that loving like Jesus is tough. But, tough as it is, we have to love the world to overcome it. That’s what Jesus did.

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministrie.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4