THE VICTORY OF FAITH

Hanging on the wall in my office beside my desk is the shield of arms of my college in the University of Durham: St. John’s College, where I did my post-graduate studies in theology. Below the crest is the motto of the college in Latin: FIDES NOSTRA VICTORIA, Our Faith is our Victory, which comes from 1 John 5:4 “For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”

The English words, “Overcomes” and “Victory” are both derived from the Greek “Nike” the goddess of Victory. Nike flew around battlefields rewarding the victors with glory and fame, symbolized by a wreath of Laurel leaves.

The inference John is making is that life is a battlefield. The world in which we live is a society that is opposed to God – a world that is temporal and will pass away – a world which seeks to seduce us with its passions and pride – a world which tries to beat us down, degrade us, discourage us, depress us, defeat us and destroy us. Life is portrayed in the Bible in terms of warfare and struggle where good must combat with evil. The Bible is realistic about the world, about the nature of life as a struggle in which there is much pain and suffering to be endured. “Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble.” (Job 14:1)

How do you survive and overcome in this battle of life? St. John tells that our greatest weapon is our faith: “This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.” That faith is in Jesus, the Son of God. He has won the victory, and we share in his victory as we trust in him.  “He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Cor 15:57)

How do you define faith? As a noun it denotes the faith of Christ. As a verb it denotes how we live out our beliefs in life – to believe what you know to be true but cannot presently see: “Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we don’t see” (Heb 11:1). It is trust in the person of Christ as the way, the truth and the life.

There have been many great battles in the history of the world. On Veterans’ Day we remembered the Armistice that ended the frightful battles of the First World War. There have been many victories that have been celebrated. But even the best of them are passing.

How does the man or woman who has faith in Christ overcome the world? How do we win this life-long war in which we are engaged? When wars are begun the optimists think that they will be over in a few months, but they find that years go by and they are far from an end. They under-estimate the enemy and over-estimate their own strength. We are involved in a war which will not cease until our resurrection. It is a battle for the mind, a contest of the heart, a struggle of the spirit, a strife of the soul. Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

First, we have to overcome the world by our faith when we take up arms against the culture that seeks to influence us to compromise our beliefs in order to conform to its standards. We are told to leave our religion at home or at church and not bring it into our business or office. But our faith will not be compartmentalized or muzzled for the sake of accommodating the world.

Secondly, we have to overcome the world when we are pressured to go along with others in order to avoid criticism, slander, persecution, affliction or mockery. Life in the world can injure us, deal us hurtful blows, can wound us and seek to destroy us. In the midst of such discouragement and in the face of despair we put our faith in the Cross of Christ and seek his power to endure and to overcome.

Thirdly, we have to overcome by our faith when we are rewarded by success in the world. Opportunities beckon us to prosper. We are admired and flattered and become popular. All people speak well of us. Fortune smiles on us. The money rolls in. We can become intoxicated with our prosperity and think that we deserve it. But our faith in Christ protects us from such illusions. “The true child of God is as safe when the world smiles, as when it frowns. He cares as little for her praise as for her dispraise. If he is praised and it is true, he says, ‘My deeds deserve praise, but I refer all honor to my God.’” (Spurgeon) Scott Walker, in his third successful bid to be re-elected Governor of Wisconsin, said, “First off, I want to thank God for his abundant grace and mercy. Win or lose, it is more than sufficient for each and every one of us.” (WSJ, November 8-9m 2014)

Fourthly, we have to overcome the world by our faith when the world turns upon us. Affliction and sorrow attacks us until life becomes a prison and the world its jailer. We find how firm is our faith when life sends us losses and griefs that we find hard to endure. Money becomes scarce, friends become few, sympathy is lacking, and the prospects seems dire. Accidents happen, serious illness strikes, loved ones are afflicted and are taken from us. In this testing time we are tempted to curse God and lose our faith. We become anxious and depressed. But we know that Jesus was tempted as we are and yet did not sin. We call upon him to strengthen us as he cried out in the Garden of Gethsemane with “loud cries and much tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.” (Heb 5:9)

We can only overcome and be victorious in the battle of life by our faith. We do not triumph over the world by our reason, or by common sense, or by education, or by social advantages. All these things are important and valuable, but they will not of themselves give us the victory. Who wins the battles in this world? The person who has faith that they can win, that they can achieve, that they can persevere and do the hard work necessary to be victorious. Men and women with faith achieve far more than those who are fearful of failing. At age 21, Charles Spurgeon, in the flush of youthful enthusiasm preached about the victory of faith.

Faith is the monarch of the realms of the mind. There is no being superior to its strength, no creature which will not bow to its Divine prowess. The lack of faith makes a man despicable, it shrivels him up so small that he might live in a nutshell. Give him faith and he is a leviathan that can dive into the depths of the sea. He is a warhorse that cries aha! Aha! In the battle. He is a giant that takes nations and crumbles them in his hand, who encounters hosts and at a sword they vanish. He binds up sheaves of scepters and gathers up all the crowns as his own. There is nothing like faith. Faith makes you almost as Omnipotent as God, by the borrowed might of its Divinity! Give us faith and we can do all things! (C.H. Spurgeon, Sermon #14, March 18, 1855)

Later in life he had to put this belief to the test when he was afflicted by rheumatoid arthritis, neuralgia and gout that rendered him helpless. During the last twenty-two years of his life illness was never far from him and when attacks came they frequently brought with them a bout of depression. A biographer wrote, “How much he suffered no mortal knew save himself; yet neither pain nor weakness seemed to be able to repress the flow of his spirits or check his wit. He once remarked to one who had been writing about some phase of London life: ‘You might have added the advertisements of the undertaker who said, in large letters, “Why endure the ills of life when you can be comfortably buried for three pound ten?” Undergirding all Spurgeon’s experience in suffering was his conviction that his ill-health was God’s gift. In the furnace of affliction he knew the presence of Christ to give him the victory.

Our faith is in Christ, the Son of God. He gives us his companionship to endure suffering. He gives us his resurrection hope to sustain us. He gives us his sacrificial love to comfort and strengthen us. He gives us his Spirit to empower us to overcome. But we need to be born of God if we are to overcome the world. We need a new heart and a new spirit which can only come through faith in Christ. There must be a change of heart. You need the gift of faith. “For by grace you are saved through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.” Seek this faith.