Overcoming the World

“For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world: our faith.” – 1 John 5:4

For the past decades you couldn’t pass a movie theater without at least one superhero movie poster out front. The plot for each is remarkably similar: a group, a city, a nation, a world, or the entire universe has gotten itself into existential peril and it’s down to the superhero from the poster to find a way to save said entity in peril.

Canned superhero sent to save canned situation from going to hell in a handbasket.

Concurrently, environmentalists have taken a so-called “non-fiction” approach to the same situation: a group, a city, a nation, or our world is under threat of annihilation and they alone have figured out just the thing to save us all, either from the ground up or the sky down.

A speaker addresses a packed audience about a bold global eco-reset solution.

Saving people (some or all of them) is a noble endeavor. It’s also overwhelming! The amount of impact any individual has (short of having super-human powers) is miniscule. It’s frustrating! Not everyone sees the threat in the same way. It’s thankless! Even the little bit of effect you end up having in your little corner of the world may broadly go unnoticed. The chance of you personally having any kind of grand-scale effect on the entire world is statistically nil!

Turns out you cannot save the world.

Our society drives us toward the hero psyche. Scripture drives us in a different direction. (As an aside, we should not be surprised that society and Scripture are telling different tales; Jesus said it would be so.) Scripture, namely 1 John 5:4, gives us a world-overcoming solution that is altogether surprising, if not a little lack-luster. As we ponder the plentiful perils of the world upon which we perch, our minds can’t help but wander to grandiose solutions too big to accomplish. No one thinks in small terms, not when so much is at stake.

Scripture gives us only one singular solution: faith in Jesus.

Faith in Jesus overcomes the world.

That’s it. Our plain old, everyday, take-it-for-granted-as-really-not-that-big-of-a-deal FAITH. Everyone born of God has overcome the world. All her dangers and disasters, overcome. And that which overcomes: your faith! Just faith. My little old faith in Jesus.

Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Faith in Him overcomes the world!

Planted in the Garden

“At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden    a new tomb … they laid Jesus there.” (John 19:41-42)

 For us, today is a day of rest and Sabbath in this Holy Week. The day that Jesus rested in the tomb was also Sabbath day for the Jewish people. They kept the Sabbath in their homes, many heartbroken because Jesus had so quickly been taken from them.

But a “seed” was planted in that garden on Good Friday, a seed that would become “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). Jesus once said to some Gentiles who were seeking Him, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” (John 12:24). Jesus was “planted” into the earth on the same afternoon He died. He remained there, sealed in the tomb, as His people kept the Sabbath. But He wouldn’t remain for long. Soon Jesus would rise from death and begin to bear much fruit! And you are that fruit! Because Jesus was indeed crucified and is risen for you, you who believe in Him will flourish and bloom with life immortal and imperishable! (1 Cor. 15:54)

Jesus, I thank You because You were crucified, died, and buried for me. Amen.