The Victory Is Ours

I’ve seen it numerous times in football games when the winning team has the ball at the end of the game: the victory formation. When they do this, they are saying to the other team the victory is ours. This will only happen when the time is running out and they are ahead by a certain number of points where they can ensure the win is theirs.

Did you know that we as Christians are in victory formation right now? We’ve looked at our enemy on the Dark Side. The Bible has told us all we need to know about our opponent. We’ve looked at the Lord’s Side. The Bible tells us this is the side we want to be on. As people who belong to the Lord’s Side, we know that we can claim victory because of what Jesus Christ has done for us. The Scripture we previously looked at in Revelation about the war in heaven says those in the kingdom “overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony…” (12:11). The victory is ours, but we need to talk about some aspects of this victory according to Scripture.

The Victory Is Planned

Nobody is going to go into a game, war, competition, etc., without some kind of plan. It has been said that to fail to plan is to plan to fail. I remember watching The A-Team on television many years ago. One of the characters named Hannibal was notorious for saying “I love it when a plan comes together” (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084967/quotes). Those who want victory in anything have to plan for it.

God planned for our victory by putting a sacrificial plan in place. This was not a reactionary plan, but it was a pre-actionary plan. Consider what the Bible says. “For He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you” (1 Pet. 1:20). “…He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world…” (Eph. 1:4). God enacted this before sin even entered the world. He knew what would happen, so He arranged for this ultimate sacrifice.

The concept of sacrifice implies that something must be given up. When Araunah tried to provide King David with everything he needed to build an altar and sacrifice to the Lord, David replied “’…No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God which cost me nothing’” (2 Sam. 24:24). When God was giving Moses the instructions for the institution of the Passover, it was required there be a spotless lamb for the offering (Ex. 12:5). We know that the sacrificial lamb to take away the sins of the world was Jesus, the Son of God (Jn. 1:29; 1 Cor. 5:7). This was the plan of God.

The Victory Is Pledged

When someone goes to buy a piece of property, there is something called earnest money that must be given. It is a down payment, a promise that lets the one who is selling the property know that you are intending to buy the property. By giving this earnest money to the seller, the buyer is making a pledge to fulfill the purchase of the property. It is a guarantee. You might remember watching the cooking show with the Cajun chef, Justin Wilson, where you would hear him utter the phrase “’I gar-on-tee’” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Wilson_%28chef%29).

Christians have been given a guarantee by God. Consider what Paul says: “…you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory” (Eph. 1:13-14). God’s Spirit is given to us as a pledge that we will have the inheritance in Heaven. One of the aspects of the Holy Spirit is God’s guarantee that He will fulfill His promise.

The Holy Spirit is a much debated part of our lives. I want to go by what the Bible says about the Spirit. Some go to the extremes by saying the Spirit indwells only through the Word and others by saying the Spirit spoke to me and still works miracles today. Here’s what the Bible says: 1) It indwells us (1 Cor. 6:19; Rom. 8:9ff); 2) It works through the Scripture (Eph. 6:17); 3) It works through prayer (Eph. 6:18; Rom. 8:26); 4) It bears witness with our spirit (Rom. 8:16); 5) The Spirit cries from our hearts “Abba! Father!” (Gal. 4:6); 6) The Spirit is a seal from God (Eph. 1:13); 7) The Spirit is the pledge of our inheritance (Eph. 1:14). This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I simply wanted to show that many times we devalue and de-emphasize the role of the Spirit in our lives. Let us be a people who follow what the Scripture says about God’s Spirit and understand that this pledge we have from God is active in our lives to help us understand our victory.

The Victory Is Protected

Outside of a Buddhist temple in Malaysia you will find a statue called the Panca-Rupa. It combines parts of different animals that it supposedly uses to be the protector of the world (http://encircleworldphotos.photoshelter.com/image/I00007ynLLVOR2d4). We know that is nonsense, and we have protection from something much greater than a funny-looking animal combination. We have the ultimate protection plan put in place by God. Peter says:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (1 Pet. 1:3-5).

Our inheritance is protected more than the gold at Fort Knox! Nobody is going to take what we have through Jesus Christ our Lord. The Dark Side is powerful, but Christians who display their faith in God are protected by His power. The only way to be seduced by the Dark Side is if we turn aside on our own, like Judas (Acts 1:25). This protection is not the same thing that is promoted by Calvinism, which is referred to as the perseverance of the saints. Once saved always saved is a flawed principle, as Scripture tells us it is possible to fall from grace and lose our salvation. Without covering all of that right now, let’s return to the protection. Peter says it is through faith that we receive this protection. We can ensure that we are receiving God’s protection if we are faithful children of His. 

We have the victory over Satan if we will uphold our faith in Him.

Those of us who are on the Lord’s Side can go ahead and claim victory. The Apostle John writes “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, in order that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 Jn. 5:13). Are you one who knows you have the victory this morning? If you know you are saved, you know you are victorious. The victory is ours.