VICTIM OR VICTOR? YOU CHOOSE!!!

In today’s world it seems everyone is a victim.  Victimization is embraced, worn as a badge of honor, published and celebrated.  It seems that if you find yourself without your own personal story of victimization, you can make up one.  Just accuse someone of harming you, fill in a few details, and find a magazine to pick it up or publish it yourself.  You don’t even need to consider that you have falsely accused a person whose life and reputation may be ruined...you have joined the ranks of the injured; YOU ARE A VICTIM!!!  If it is discovered that the victimization was a figment of your imagination, embrace it, show your outrage, and shed a few tears because now you have been DOUBLY VICTIMIZED.

Now before you all throw stones at me and I become a victim, let me add that most of us have been victims at some time in our lives in various ways.  Perhaps someone has taken advantage of your generosity, physically or mentally harmed you, stabbed you in the back, started a malicious rumor or lied about you.  I am not trying to trivialize anything that you have experienced or the pain the experience has caused.  What I am saying is that you do NOT have to allow the circumstances of victimization to define you or set the future path you will travel.  You do NOT have to choose the label VICTIM!!!

John 16:33 “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”  Jesus was telling His disciples, be prepared because you will have people come against you, lie about you, physically harm you and attempt to take your life.  You can choose to be a VICTIM or you can choose to be a VICTOR!!  If anyone had the right to wear the victim label, Jesus had that right.  In the womb, his conception was questioned.  Around the age of 2, he had to flee to Egypt because a king had put a hit out on him.  He was laughed at, spit upon, betrayed by a friend, beaten up and ultimately put to death.  Even in His darkest hour, hanging on the cross, you find His mother and just a handful of friends lingering near.  But as Jesus told His disciples, “I have overcome the world!”  Jesus wears the VICTOR’S CROWN because He refused to be defined by the label, VICTIM.

Lest anyone think that in my perfect life I have never suffered victimization, I will open a window, just a crack, into an event that I experienced over 50 years ago.  There are only 3 or 4 people over my lifetime that I have felt brave enough to share with and now you.  I was an innocent 5 year old and there are many details that will never be revealed but will remain locked inside my brain forever.  In case you think I had a revelation of “repressed memories” or my experience is a result of watching too many movies or reading too many novels, let me assure you that the precise details have never left my mind, been diluted or changed.  In an instant, I can take you back to the exact place, identify the people and give you quotes from the people involved.  Did it affect certain areas of my life or my thinking on specific issues?  Absolutely, but at a very young age, I found peace in a Savior that had overcome the world.  I REFUSED to allow one event to define the rest of my life.  I REFUSED the label VICTIM; I am a VICTOR!!!

I will not pretend to put myself into your circumstance or understand what pain you are suffering.  We all have different responses to unpleasant events in our lives.  Romans 8:37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.  Because of His great love, God has given us the power not just to overcome but to CONQUER the enemy.  The writer of Romans goes on to assure us in verses 38 & 39, that NOTHING can stop you from being a VICTOR because NOTHING can separate you from the love of God.  For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

There is one TRUTH that remains the same for every person, no matter the circumstance; WE CAN BE VICTORIOUS BECAUSE JESUS HAS OVERCOME THE WORLD!  Your Victorious Life can begin the moment you REFUSE to be labeled a VICTIM.  You are a VICTOR.