Overcoming is a Choice AND a Prayer

Ever been in a spiritual, mental and physical funk? I know, at one time or another, we all have been there. We might have even camped there because it was too hard to take down all the camping equipment and gear to get up and out!

I am well acquainted with “funks”! Those were times when I wasn’t hearing God’s voice clearly. My hope was deferred, and I actually got sick and tired – to the point that I was done with sick and tired. I didn’t want “defeated” to be my name any longer. That’s when I decided being a conqueror was the team I wanted to be on.

Being a conqueror is not for the faint-hearted or defeated who give up and throw in the towel. Conqueror is for the determined, the above and beyond thinkers and doers.

In the seasons and years when we feel weary, unseen and tired, we are meant to be more than conquerors. That’s when “overcomers” becomes a part of our new name — if we don’t give up.

To the woman facing an unwanted break-up or betrayal; to the man who just lost his job or the one who just left the funeral home after the passing of a loved one — the name “overcomer” is not what you think of yourself.

But let’s not miss the questions that precede what the Apostle Paul asks of us. “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?” (Romans 8:35)

And he answers the question for us: Romans 8:37 says that “in all things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us.” Right in the middle of all those hardships and trials, we are told that we can be more than conquerors.

Being more than a conqueror means whatever the enemy intended to use to take us out — whatever was meant to destroy us — didn’t destroy us at all. It all turned out for God receiving the glory for our determination to be a conqueror!

It means we don’t rename ourselves in the seasons we feel forgotten and forsaken. It means we persevere to the other side of the trial and wait, expectantly, for our new name.

Our stories becaome a testimony about what God has done for us. But there’s a second part to our stories. How are we overcoming? How are we being made new? What’s God doing inside of us, not just yesterday or last week or 10 years ago, but today? Do our stories show God’s ongoing faithfulness? Let me tell you my story:

I used to see myself as an orphan, but now I know I am an adopted daughter of Almighty God! I am more than a conqueror.

I used to label myself forgotten, but now I know I am chosen by God and a seat has my name on it around the table of God! I am more than a conqueror.

I used to feel unwanted, but now I know God went to great lengths to save me. By His power, I am more than a conqueror.

Paul says our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us (v.18). Imagine the delight our Heavenly Father must feel when He sees us graduate from “Overcoming School” and we are awarded with our new title: “More than a Conqueror”!

So let’s soldier up by not giving up and assigning ourselves some “woe is me” name badge! No way, José! Listen to this song by Matthew West and change those defeated names to the Child of the one true King! Amazing Grace is the song we sing.

Hello, I’m a child of the one true King so I am more than a conqueror!