The Ultimate Victory
“For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” 1 Corinthians 15:3-4
In sports we pursue not just victory, but the ultimate victory. In college basketball it’s winning the NCAA tournament. In baseball it’s winning the World Series. But what about the ultimate victory in life? Thanks be to God it’s already been won; it was won for us by Jesus Christ when He rose from the dead on that game changing Sunday morning some 2,000 years ago.
What is the ultimate victory in life? It’s overcoming sin and death. When Adam and Eve first disobeyed God sin entered the world and each of us as their descendants inherited their sin nature. We’ve proved that we have a sin nature by the fact that we too fail to live up to God’s standards of justice, love, forgiveness, and righteousness. As sinners, death is our destiny, but we have victory in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
“If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins” writes the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:17. “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead,” he asserts in verse 20 and that is our victory. Look at how that great chapter ends: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.”
Are you living in the power of the resurrection, giving yourself fully to the work of the Lord? Are you experiencing the ultimate victory won for us by Jesus?
Having begun as a guest speaker in 2005, Dan was appointed Interim Pastor in 2008 and has been serving Maple Root Baptist ever since. As a small group leader and Chaplin for the Connecticut Tigers, Dan has a heart for the lost and the God that saves them.