Overcome

Overcome..............is that like Come over? In John 16:33 Jesus tells his disciples there in the Upper Room, where He has been giving them their final instructions on how to do this life.......His way....."I have told you all this so that you WILL have peace of mind and heart. Here on earth you WILL have many trials and sorrows, but, cheer up, for I have overcome the world."

ReallY?? MANY trials and sorrows?? No kidding!!! Right now, Jan 7, 2009, I would say that is putting it mildly.

Now, I would not have always said that. I grew up in the 50's in middle America where we never locked our doors.....cars or houses.....when we left them. Seriously!! We, my siblings and I, would take off down the street and go blocks away for hours on end to play.....in the puddles of water in a parking lot after a summer rain.........to go to the park and look under the bleachers for bottle caps and empty bottles to return for money at the local grocery store. I remember walking to the grocery story and signing my name on a little receipt for the few grocery items I picked up for Mother, or for the carton of chocolate milk I drank, or the two pieces of peanut butter logs I bought for 2 cents. Then either she or Daddy would go in once a month or so and pay the debt of all that had been "charged to our account"!! It was a "handshake agreement" between two honest men who believed each other!!

Doesn't that sound like another life time? And I am not THAT old!! I am 62. I have said many times recently to some of our peers that we grew up in the best era, to which they all agreed.

I never heard the word "divorce" / "school shootings" / "cancer" / "bi-polar" and on and on. Not because I was sheltered, but because that was how life was. There were not a lot of "trials and sorrows" around me. OR, it might have been that 10-year-olds just didn't hear of such things back then because they were still allowed to be children living in innocence of a child.

Now fast-forward 50 years!! What a contrast! Between Dec 30 and Jan 5th, I received three phone calls from three young women who love the LORD who are either separated or soon going to be, all looking to a possible divorce in 2009!! That, my friend, would be trials and sorrows.

I have heard of and experienced more "trials and sorrows" than I can recount in the last 12 months. Right now, I can not think of one person in my expanded circle of family and friends who is not going through some sort of "trial or sorrow".

Our daughter is headed for Denver to sign the papers on Friday that will be presented to the judge who will then declare her divorced from her husband of 11 1/2 years. In my mind, I see it this way. Last August it was like she had received the news that she had terminal cancer that would cause death soon. And this Friday that death is coming. It is the death of her life as we have known it for 11 1/2 years. I call this "trials and sorrows".

My three dear friends, married varying lengths of time, have received that same kind of "news" and are in the death process. The oppression is rampant. The stories of tragedies are daily, it seems.

BUT Jesus said that He told them (and us) the things that He did so that we could have PEACE of heart and mind. He backed that up with using that word "overcome". He has "overcome", so Cheer Up!! IS that enough? Is it enough just to tell yourself, "Jesus said Cheer UP!!!" So I am just going to think positively and this will all get better.

WHy? Why is it so hard right now for so many? I wonder? Is it like when Satan went to God as we are told in Job 1 and God put before him His righteous servant Job. God gave Satan permission to do anything he wanted to to Job, except kill him. I wonder??? Is that what God is doing with His Bride, the Church? Is He telling Satan he can have at us, but he can't kill us, to test us, to try us with "trials and sorrows" to see whether our faith is pure or not? Job never read the book of Job. He never got the answers.........the reasons for his "trials and sorrows"! But we get to read it and the lesson for us is that God can do that!! He can let Satan test His rightoues ones.........because He is GOD!!

And we can have peace of mind and heart because He has overcome the world!! Let's be overcomers in Jesus' name!! Cheer up!!