Good evening. It's so good to be here. I feel like I'm among a family here now. We've been here several times and each time get to know some new folks and so we're really glad to be here and have the opportunity to worship with you this evening. I really had a wonderful training yesterday.
We had 18 participants and so if you need sheet rock repair or roof repair, you've got 18 people now you can call on and they're experts, I guarantee it. But we had an excellent time of training and also sharing and we'll talk a little bit about that in our sermon this evening about some of the things that we were talking about in our training. Part of that is that I enjoy a good overcoming story, like a book or a movie where someone overcomes all the odds to be victorious or to get through something. And so tonight we're going to be talking about Jesus the overcomer. Jesus the one that overcame more than anyone else in history, one that overcame.
And so we're going to be talking about that this evening. So if you would turn in your Bibles to John chapter 16. In this portion of scripture Jesus is encouraging and he's preparing his disciples for what is to come. The disciples don't know what is around the corner but Jesus does and he knows that they will be facing tribulation and trials like they've never experienced before, like they could not imagine that they would be going through.
And so he is preparing them in a sense for what is to come. And so as we look at this Jesus doesn't sugarcoat the fact that his disciples are going to have difficulties but he gives them at the same time assurance. So if you would stand with me as we read God's holy word. So we'll be reading John chapter 16. We'll be reading at the end of the passage verses 31 through 33. John 16 starting verse 31. Hear now the holy and inspired word of God.
Jesus answered them do you now believe? Behold an hour is coming and has already come for you to be scattered each to his own home and to leave me alone and yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. These things I have spoken to you that in me you may have peace.
In the world you will have tribulation. But take courage I have overcome the world. Let's pray. Oh God we thank you for your holy word. We pray now that the words of my mouth and the meditation of all of our hearts will be acceptable in thy sight. Oh Lord our rock and our redeemer our very present help in times of trouble. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.
You may be seated. We'll be talking this evening about two areas where we need help in this life. The first is overcoming inner trouble. So we're talking about overcoming and the first area is overcoming inner trouble.
Things within us that are troubled. Jesus knew better than anyone else that his disciples were flawed. They were weak.
Does that sound familiar? Just like us we are flawed. We are weak. Our inner lives have been affected by sin to the extent that sometimes we become our own worst enemy. We have inner conflict due to the sin that is in our hearts. There's a reality in all of our lives and we see it in the disciples that we are prone with this inner trouble this inner turmoil that we are prone to scatter.
When things get difficult we run away. In verse 32 if you look it says a time is coming when you will be scattered and leave me. Jesus paints this image earlier in John chapter 10. He says a hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming. He will abandon the sheep because they don't belong to him and he isn't their shepherd. And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock. And so we know from the rest of the story that very soon after Jesus speaks these words the disciples are scattered. That they leave Jesus.
They each go to their own home to their own safe place far from Jesus in his hour of need. In verse 31 we see that there was a sense that the disciples had a belief in Jesus. He said do you now believe?
So he's questioning them. He's asking about their faith about their belief in him. But their faith at this point it was weak.
It was not going to hold up when the attack came. And if we're honest if I'm honest this is a description of my own faith. My own journey. Sometimes I'm weak. I'm prone to doubt or when trouble comes I'm prone to try and hide and I'm scattered just like the disciples. There's a hymn that you're all familiar with Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing and if you're like me when you sing that song and you get to the line it says prone to wander Lord I feel it. You start shaking your head yes Lord I feel that that proneness to wander to leave the God I love when things get difficult.
And this is not anything new. This is something that from early history of the of the Israelites we see this proneness to wander to get distracted from where we're supposed to be with God. And if you want to turn to your Bibles just this morning I was reading in my devotions and I came across this passage in First Samuel. If you have your Bibles with you if you want to turn to First Samuel chapter 10. We see that it's not just the disciples that were prone to wander this is part of our human condition.
We are prone to this. We are led astray easily. So in this passage we're where Saul is being chosen as king and Samuel is speaking to the people and he says in verse 18. Thus says the Lord the God of Israel I brought Israel up from Egypt. I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the power of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you. But you today rejected your God who delivers you from all your calamities and your distresses.
Yet you have said no but set a king over us. Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and your clans. And they go on to bring Saul in as their king.
But it says today you've rejected your God. This God who is the overcoming God. God who overcame all the things that Pharaoh was bringing against them. He overcame Pharaoh's army. He overcame all of the trials in the wilderness.
He overcame everything for the Israelites. Yet they were prone to go after other gods. Throughout the history of Israel we see this proneness to scatter and to look for something somewhere else that can be found only in God. And unfortunately in this day and age in our own hearts even as believers we find ourselves in the same situation. We have this tendency in us to wander to go away from the things that we should be looking at. Instead of going to God we are turning to other things to find what we are searching for.
This is just part of who we are and it's something that we need to be aware of because it happens sometimes even imperceptibly. We are wandering from God and we don't realize it until it's too late and we find that we have wandered far away and usually it comes with a crisis. So Jesus knows this tendency of ours that we each scatter to our own homes when times get tough but He is telling us, He is reminding us that we need to run to Jesus, not away from Him.
We need to run to Him when times are tough. That's the answer but our tendency is to run away but He is reminding us that when we run to Him then and only then can we overcome the situations that we find ourselves in this world. I really resonate with the Father who came before Jesus and He said to Him, Lord I believe, help my unbelief. Lord I believe, yes I believe Lord, but there's still a part of me that sometimes wanders from you, that doesn't believe with all of my heart, with all of my soul, with all of my strength.
I believe part way but not 100%. Lord I believe, help my unbelief. This is a prayer that I resonate with and one that I say quite often, Lord I believe but help me because I am prone to wander. So we're prone to scatter, we're prone to wander but the reality is that Jesus joins us together.
He brings us back. In verse 33 it says, I have said these things to you that in me you may have peace. It's interesting that the word peace means that all essential parts are joined together. Peace is the opposite of being scattered. When you're scattered there's no peace but when we come to Jesus He brings together what needs to be brought together and so we have this sense of peace because Jesus is joining these together. So Jesus joins together all the aspects of our lives.
He brings them together. The trials, the triumphs, the tragedies, He brings everything together and that's where we find our peace. No matter what, the good, the bad and the ugly when we are looking to Jesus that He gives us this peace. It's a peace that the world cannot offer. It's a peace that the world does not understand. It's a peace that only comes from Jesus.
In John chapter 14 verse 27 this is a verse I have read, I have prayed over people in hospital, next to people in their hospital beds or people who have lost loved ones. As a pastor I've used this verse over and over and it's a similar type message. Jesus says in verse John 14 27, peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled.
Neither let them be afraid. So we see this concept of peace where Jesus brings all things together. All things work for good for those who love God who are called according to His purpose. He doesn't say it's going to be easy but He says that in me you can have peace and that's the difference. There was a video I saw recently of an armadillo that, and I didn't know that they did this, but they like roll up into a ball. So when they're threatened they roll up into this little shell, this little ball and it's pretty amazing to see that process. When hard times come sometimes we're tempted to go into that little ball to just get in our shell but Jesus is saying cling to me, come to me and I will give you that peace.
You're not going to find that in that shell. You're still going to be scared. You're still going to be unsettled. But as you come to me you will experience a peace that you can't find anywhere else. Well as we know the disciples did scatter. They left Jesus alone in His greatest hour of need. But in verse 32 at the end it says, even though the disciples have left Him, even though you're going to leave me, yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. So even when all of Jesus' friends, all those that were supposed to be there left, He knew He was still not going to be alone.
His Father would be with Him. There's a simple but profound truth in this and it's this. You're never alone. You're never alone. When Jesus comes into our hearts He will never leave us. In reformed circles that's called perseverance of the saints. But in plain language it means that you're never alone. It means that Jesus is always there.
That no matter what happens you will never walk alone. With Jesus in our lives we can never say these words. We can never say no one understands me. Jesus understands you. No one cares.
Jesus cares. No one's gone through what I've gone through. Jesus has gone through it before you. He has suffered. He has bled. He has died. There's no one there for me. I'm all alone. Jesus is there.
You are not alone. If we need help, Jesus is always there. It's a simple truth but it's one that we forget.
It's one that we don't live our lives in that attitude. We try and figure it out in our own strength. But Jesus is there for us and He always will be. So we need Jesus to bring peace to our inner turmoil.
That's the first thing that we see. That we are inside ourselves. There's a battle. There's difficulties that we need to overcome in our own tendencies, in our own sin. Even after being believers we struggle in this world.
Until we are in heaven and glory we will struggle to the day we die with the sin and with our own selves. But we need to also learn not only how to overcome the inner battles that we have but also how to overcome outside trouble. Things that afflict us from outside, forces that come against us to discourage us, distract us, destroy us. There is an enemy who is every day seeking to discourage believers, to distract believers.
Anyone get distracted out there? To destroy us if he could. So there is an outside force that is bringing trouble against us. The truth is we live in a pressure cooker world. Verse 33 goes on to say, in the world you will have tribulation.
It's not a question in this world. Well maybe we might have trouble, maybe not. We might skate through without any difficulties. The reality is that we all face trouble. At some point I know anyone who has lived more than a day has experienced some type of trouble. So right now things might be going okay for you but we know that there is trouble coming. That we cannot escape this world without troubles, tribulations, trials. Now tribulation, the word here, troubles, tribulations, it means being restricted without options. So being in this situation where it doesn't feel like there is any way out. There is no options.
You are stuck in this situation. One time I was given an air compressor and so I plugged it in to see if it worked and the motor was running and it was running and it was running and the pressure was building and building and building. So I knew the compressor worked but the thing that really scared me was is this compressor going to turn off? Because I had visions of this compressor getting to such a high pressure that the tanks would explode and there would be shrapnel going all over my neighborhood. This is the idea of this word, this pressure cooker where things are growing and growing. We feel like we are in this pressure in our lives. There is no shut off valve and it feels like there is going to be a blow out at some point. If you have never experienced that I am grateful but most of us have experienced that pressure coming into our lives where we just feel like how am I going to get out of this?
How am I going to survive this? It's too much. We have pressures at work. Have you ever been under a deadline at work? You are just like I'm not going to get this done.
It's just not going to happen. I've got all this pressure from my boss but I'm not going to get this done. How about if you are in school and you have students and the teacher is giving you all this work and you are like I just can't get all this done. There is just too much pressure here. This is what we live with day in and day out. The pressures of this world they mount up on us and we are in a pressure cooker. In face of this pressure Jesus says take heart, be of good cheer. Yesterday when we were in our training we were talking about how do you approach people who have gone through a disaster, who have lost everything.
We talked about the fact that we have to be sensitive to their needs, to their situation. To go in and say take heart, be of good cheer. No big deal, your house was just destroyed in a tornado or a flood. It's okay. It's no big deal.
Well it is a big deal. If you've ever been through trouble in your life you know it's a big deal. So we never want to minimize what people are going through. So Jesus is not minimizing that. He is stating the truth. Be encouraged, be of good cheer. And Jesus can say that better than any one of us. But in the name of Jesus we can do that obviously in a sensitive way but we can come into people's lives and say be encouraged. Jesus is here.
He is going to help. Now Jesus uses the word in here, the word in Greek is Tharsai, which has the meaning that you have this boldness from within. So be bold, be strengthened, be encouraged.
It's coming within you, there's this sense. But this is not a boldness that naturally comes to us. In our human condition we aren't very bold, especially in spiritual matters, especially when we're going through trouble.
We have very little boldness. This inner strength can only come to us through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one that emboldens us to have strength in the face of trouble. To carry on when everything is falling down around you. It's the Holy Spirit that emboldens us to have the courage to take that next step. Have you ever been in a situation where you just didn't even know if you could make it through another day but you just had to get out of bed, you just had to take that step and make it through that day and then the next day and then the next day. The Holy Spirit helps us, gives us strength each day, enough strength to stumble even sometimes through that day to make it through.
But he's always there helping us. I'm telling you this evening and Jesus is encouraging us in this passage. Be bold, be strong despite the things that face you, despite the pressures of this world. Be bold, be strong for the Lord your God is with you. Joshua 9 a verse you've all heard, have I not commanded you be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid, do not be discouraged.
Why? Why can we not be afraid or discouraged? For the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go. It is the presence of Jesus in our lives that gives us courage, that gives us boldness, that helps us make it through even the darkest of times. Now at the conclusion of our passage Jesus gives the reason that we can take heart in the middle of tribulation.
The reason? I have overcome the world. Jesus came to us as the overcomer. He has overcome when we understand the power of Jesus to overcome the troubles of this world.
That's where we find hope. When we know that Jesus is the one that overcomes all of the things in this world, all of the difficulties, all of the trials, he's overcome our sin, ultimately he's overcome death. So even worst case scenario where we are on our deathbed, Jesus has overcome even that. When we understand that Jesus is the overcomer, that's where we find hope.
This is really the purpose of the disaster response ministry. We want to share with those who have lost everything to take heart, to be encouraged that Jesus is bigger than any storm. He's bigger than any disaster, any catastrophe. He's the only one that really can help you through this. He can give you peace.
He can give you strength to survive the challenges that this difficult day brings. All may be lost today. All may seem like it's come crashing down around you this day, but not all is lost. All is lost, but not all is lost.
All is lost from a worldly perspective, but if Jesus is with us, if everything else is stripped away and all we have is Jesus, we have everything we need. You know the sneaker brand Nike comes from the word in Greek, the word here overcome. The word is Nike. It means to conquer, to be victorious. For believers we know that we have, in the words of the well-known hymn, we have victory, Nike, in Jesus. We overcome, we have victory over the trials and tribulations through Jesus. 1 John 5, 4 through 5 says for everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. Born of God, overcomer. And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world?
Except the one who believes that Jesus is the son of God. Overcomer comes from faith in Christ. If you want to be an overcomer in this world, someone who faces adversity with grace, with peace, that can only come through Jesus, through faith in him, through the knowledge that even if everything else is taken away, that if we have him, we have all we need. Which brings us to our final point this evening, that we can overcome only because Jesus overcame first. We overcome in our lives trials and tribulations, difficulties only because Jesus has gone before us. He has already overcome everything so that we can overcome.
In Revelation 3.21, it's the final chapter of this overcoming story and it says to the one who overcomes. So to all of us who overcome through Jesus, I will grant the right to sit with me on my throne just as I overcame, just as I overcame and sat down with my father on his throne. Jesus overcame, he's seated on the throne and because of that, we overcome. And when we overcome in the name of Jesus, he grants us that privilege to one day be with him and to reign and rule with him because we, like Jesus, will have become overcomers. Now, our ability to overcome the troubles of this world are based only on our faith in Christ. There's no other way that we can overcome the things of this world apart from Jesus. He goes before us. There's no situation, no trial, no difficulty that he hasn't already overcome. He's already done it.
He's accomplished it. We just need to have faith in that. This is how we take heart in this world of trouble. Jesus assures us, I have overcome the world. Now, some of my favorite overcomer stories are the missionaries, especially some of those first missionaries who went out, who faced hardships beyond our comprehension to bring the gospel to foreign lands.
Now, Adoniram Judson was an overcomer in Jesus. He was one of the first American missionaries to be sent out to a foreign field. And he went out in a time, you know, there weren't airplanes, there was no internet, there was no comforts of this world that we're used to. He was sent to serve in Burma, which is now called Myanmar.
And he spent nearly 40 years there where he overcame unimaginable trials and tribulations. His firstborn son, Roger, died there at six months. Judson was then imprisoned for 18 months in terrible conditions for the things that he was teaching about Jesus.
When he was finally released, his wife Nancy and their baby girl Maria died. Judson then was plunged after that death into a deep depression. At one point he went into the jungle in isolation, living by himself. He even dug a grave, his own grave, and sat back by it, contemplating his own death and wanting just to die and be done with his life.
That's how low he was. That's the darkness of his depression. But God brought him out of that pit and he married another woman named Sarah Boardman. She gave birth to eight children, but three of them never lived to adulthood.
And a year after her last child was born, Sarah herself died. Through the overcoming power of Jesus, Adoniram Judson overcame the tribulations, the difficulties of this world. Eventually, because of that, because of that trust in Jesus, his ministry bore fruit. He translated the Bible into the Burmese language and saw many of the Burmese come to Jesus, receive Jesus into their lives, be transformed.
There was much growth among the Burmese believers in the church. And I want to close our time tonight with this quote by Judson because it sums up what we've been talking about tonight. He said, if I had not felt certain that every additional trial was ordered by infinite love and mercy, I could not have survived my accumulated suffering. Did you hear that? He says every additional trial was ordered by infinite love and mercy.
How can that be? How can a trial be ordered by a loving and merciful God? Judson's trust was in Jesus that even in the trials, Jesus was there.
And that allowed him to survive. People of God, take heart. Your trials, and I don't know what you all are going through right now. Some of you, it may be a sweet season.
You know, things are pretty calm in your lives. But I hope that through that, you will have this attitude that, hey, when the trials come, or when tomorrow I go in to work or to school, or there's something in my family that comes up, that I'm going to go to Jesus. I'm going to trust in him. That I'm going to get my strength and my hope from him.
Because your trials are no match, no match for God's love and mercy. Jesus is the overcomer. So let's go out and overcome in his name.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you sent your son Jesus to overcome sin and death for us. And so we've received forgiveness. We've received newness of life. We have received eternal life in him. But Lord, in this world, we will have trouble and tribulation.
We live in a pressure cooker world. And Lord, we are prone to wander. We are prone to leave and to look to other things. Lord, I pray for each person in this room tonight. Lord, I don't know what trials, what tribulations they have faced or will face or are facing at this moment. But Lord, I pray that we would all look to Jesus. We'd all trust in him. That because Jesus overcame, that we would overcome in his name. That our hope would be in him alone. That our trust would be in him alone. That our strength would be in him alone. And that, Lord, through Jesus Christ, you would help us to be overcomers who one day will reign and rule with you in heaven. We thank you for your word. And I pray that this week we would apply it to our hearts and to our lives. In Jesus' name, amen.
