Often we quote or hear spoken the scripture, “HE causes us always to triumph through Christ Jesus “(depending upon the translation). Now, I might be the only one, but I have had plenty of things that seemingly did not end in victory. There was no knowledge of a triumph in my heart. But as I have pondered on that I was reminded how we often look at things differently than God. It is part of that upside down Kingdom thing going on.
I recently, very recently, today in fact, had one of those events. I had a circumstance that I had given a lot of prayer time to. I had been very careful in my “confession” concerning this thing. I had declared the Word of the Lord over the circumstance and stood on every promise I had ever read or heard from God’s Word. Guess what? I still lost!!!
Now the point. As I came away from a meeting with a facility I felt defeated. Honestly I felt I was in the right. In fact, some of the lower level employees agreed with me. On my drive to the office I cried out at the injustice of the entire matter. I reminded God how HE had assimilated all my documentation for me and how HE had shown me to present my case. And how HE had stood there and let them win.
As I wiped the tears from my face HE spoke gently, “now we are at the heart of the matter. Yes, I could have caused the person in authority to see the reasonableness of your cause and the error in their thinking. But to do so would have not allowed you to see that you were still trying to handle this thing instead of ME. The sheer fact that you are crying and your hands are shaking is proof that you allowed these people to get deeper into your heart concerning this matter than you allowed ME and MY Word to get. You allowed them to steal your peace instead of obeying MY Word when it says to hold onto your peace.”
I always try to be honest with people and not paint myself in a better light than I really am so I confess to you that Jesus was right. And that the true triumphing was not in winning my case, but rather seeing that when it comes to things like this particular type of issue, I had a chink in my armor. HIS causing me to triumph was uncovering a vulnerable area so it could be filled with HIS power. That way in the future that area of my soul will not be exposed to injury and strife.
When I left that facility I felt like Paul’s words had betrayed me. But after the ride to the office and the feeling of HIS near presence while I have worked today things have changed. I feel that truly HE has caused me to triumph through Christ Jesus. I just needed to see it from a different perspective.
Hope to see you in a TEA Room soon,
Elizabeth