Today's Journey
Jesus – Our Champion!
Jan.26,2013
http://getmorestrength.org
“ ‘But what about you?’ he asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’ ” Matthew 16:15
At
some point in life we’ve all felt the frustration and fear of being up
against situations that we can’t deal with and, worse yet, there seems
to be no one to help. If you were to ask me to tell you about the times I
have felt the twinges of hopelessness, my early recollections would be
from my first year in high school.
From kindergarten through
eighth grade I attended a small Christian school. My dad was a
well-known pastor in the area, which meant that I was the big man on
campus. Everyone knew who I was, and I had it made—until the day I
graduated from that school and enrolled in the nearby public high
school. Nobody knew me or my dad at the new school, and nobody cared.
So, needless to say, I wasn’t a big shot anymore. What’s worse, I became
the victim of Ronnie, who decided to prove his emerging manhood on me.
Whenever I passed him in the hall, he would shove and taunt me. I was
traumatized. Every day at school I was filled with anxiety and fear
because of Ronnie. I needed somebody to help me. I pleaded with friends
who knew Ronnie to ask him to stop, but they never did. I was all alone
in my problem, and I needed a champion.
In Jesus’ day, the Jewish
people were up against the oppressive regime of Rome. Every day they
lived with the shame of being a despised minority under the tyrannical
thumb of Caesar, who demanded hefty taxes and unflinching allegiance.
The once-proud Israel was now a puppet servant state of a brutal and
pagan empire. They desperately needed someone to champion their cause.
Could it be that Jesus was the long-awaited deliverer? Hence, this
on-the-spot quiz! Peter came up with the right answer when he declared
Jesus as “the Christ”—the “Messiah” who would deliver them from the
oppression they had endured for so long. Against the backdrop of
Caesar-worship and rampant paganism in Caesarea Philippi, the disciples
pinned their hopes on Jesus.
What Peter didn’t know was that Jesus
would be their champion on a far more significant level than a
political one: the oppression of Rome. Jesus came to overthrow the source
of our problems, not the symptoms. Rome was merely the tool of Satan to
defeat God’s people and tarnish God’s glory.
Defeating Rome would have
been a great accomplishment, but the enemy of our souls would have found
another way to wage war against the people of God. So Jesus went
head-to-head against Satan, engaged in battle on an old rugged cross,
and after a three-day struggle with death rose victoriously from the
grave to assure the final victory over the enemy of our souls.
Jesus
is the ultimate champion! And when we cast our lot with Him, He assures
us that the victory is already won on our behalf. The next time you
find yourself in a full nelson up against the wall of despair, claim
Jesus as your champion. As Paul declares, you may be “struck down, but
not destroyed” (2 Corinthians 4:9). Since He won the battle at Calvary, you are now entitled to share in the spoils of His victory. Thanks to Jesus, the word defeat is not in our vocabulary!
YOUR JOURNEY…
- How would you answer Jesus’ question, “Who do you say I am?”
- Read Romans 8:31-39 and 1 Corinthians 15:50-58. What types of things threaten to defeat you? What promises are listed in these verses?
- What are the “spoils of victory”? Take some time to list some of the benefits that the Champion has made available to you.
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