Overcoming

Photo by Luis Villasmil on Unsplash

I understand and concur with the memes about adulting. Even as I quickly approach 40, which means I have been adulting for some time, I still find myself complaining about adulthood. Whether it’s the increased responsibility or the fact that it seems like SO many decisions need to be made. Or the fact that situations seem to be more complex than I remember in my early 20's.

There was a time when my understanding of peace comfortably accommodated the stressors I had in my life. But recently, I noticed stress creeping in. Yes, it was a sign that I needed to change some things. But it also signalled to me that my current understanding of peace needed to deepen. I wanted to comprehend how the peace that Jesus gives us, could apply to this particular season of life. With the hopes that I might walk in it.

To that end, I have found myself pondering a great deal on John 16:33:

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world, you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world”

The fact that Jesus has overcome the world, is supposed to give us a reason to be encouraged. But why? What is it about His overcoming that would give us hope?

For the most part, when I feel stressed it’s because I feel overwhelmed. Like when you get to the end of a work day and you feel like you didn’t get much done. There’s this mental picture that emerges in my subconscious kind of like a large stack of files, representing all the things I still need to do. Then you engage with homelife and there’s a steadily growing pile of clothes, akin to a mountainous range staring you in the face…And the subconscious image of a stack of files, gets bigger. Then there’s homework. The dinner needs to be cooked. The bedtime routine must be done. These are things that can’t be added to the stack of files, but they certainly prevent you from addressing it. Now it’s late and you’re too tired. But when you go to rest your head on the pillow, the stack of files linger in your subconscious chipping away at your pre-sleep thoughts. You get to work tired after a difficult nights sleep, ready to hack at the stack but today comes with a whole new set of tasks. And so the cycle continues. The stack rarely seems to come down enough for you to feel any sense of agency. So you end up doing work on the weekends.

So how in the WORLD, is Jesus OVERCOMING the world supposed to help us with this? Because some of these troubles aren’t even ‘the world’. It’s not typically how we would define ‘the world’. It’s just life and seasons.

Is the fact that Jesus overcomes the WORLD supposed to help us when we are overwhelmed?

See, being overwhelmed is essentially the same as being overcome. Being overcome means a sense of defeat. When we feel overwhelmed we are defining an experience, whereby the multitude of stressors/tasks have mastery over us. The stack of files are just too high. We feel defeated because the odds are stacked against us.

But Jesus is saying that HE has defeated it all. Now obviously that doesn’t erase all tasks and responsibilities from our hands. It just simply means that what He defeats can no longer defeat us. Because He has overcome, we also can overcome.

There are many reasons we feel overwhelmed by all that we must do in life. And many of those reasons have little to do with us comprehending Jesus’ overcoming nature.

• Perfectionism

• The need for approval

• Feeling good enough

• Shame

These are all reasons why we are ruled by a subconscious stack of files. Whichever reason resonates, it all ultimately relates to us overvaluing tasks and believing that our self-worth is attached to our completion rate.

See Jesus’ overcoming, may not mean that He gets down on the ground with you and sorts through the pile of files (although I’m sure He offers more help than we are aware of through the power of the Holy Spirit). But He can stop the vicious pattern that tells you that your value is linked to how successful you are at being in control of it all. We may not define ‘the world’ as the task list, but the phenomenon of attaching our self-worth to accolades, wealth and being in control…well that’s pretty worldly.

Jesus wasn’t interested in one of these things. He didn’t pursue accolades, he didn’t pursue wealth. And He had no interest in being in control.

So what needs to change for you to experience the peace in Him?

Well I know for me, its overcoming some of the worldly expectations about what I am supposed to ‘produce’. So last night, instead of stressing about what to cook and eat for my family (a common stressor for me)….we had cereal. And nobody complained! Everybody was happy.