Jesus Christ: Victor or Victim?

Good afternoon, everyone. Happy Holy Day! It's nice to see all of you here today and have a nice big crowd. Appreciate all the music as well. I know a lot of time and preparation goes into that. It sounded wonderful. Fantastic words. No words with the accordion, but it carried itself. It's wonderful to be here today with everyone. So if you look up on the screen for a minute, have you ever noticed in life how things can look completely different until you have the full context?

What do we see here? Chances are most of you are thinking it's a picture through some fabulous new technology, some great telescope of the planets. You might be interested in finding out it's actually the bottom of a bunch of old frying pans. Let's move on to the next picture. In this picture, I'm guessing that many of you see a panda. Let's go to the next one after this. This is actually an anteater. If you look carefully at the thin nose up on the top there, what looks like a panda bear is actually the anteater's front left leg. Everyone getting that one? Okay. This comes off a website called Board Panda, by the way.

I'm not endorsing that site, but I happen to find these images there. Let's look at one more. This might look to many of you like an apartment that's much too expensive for you to afford. That's how it looked to me at first. It is actually the picture of an inside of a guitar. That's the end of our slideshow for today. The point is, if you look back at those pictures now after receiving that additional context, you'll never see those pictures the same way again, will you?

It's interesting how when that image comes up, when we see something in front of us, our mind turns to whatever we think it is. Then when we're given additional context, how we see it, how we interpret the things that are out there can change entirely. In a way that actually never goes back the other direction.

As a lot of people would say these days, you can't unsee it once you've seen that context. Now, this time of year, the same context carries into what we're doing today as we're observing the Holy Day. We heard in the fantastic first message the differences that existed in the Holy Day, in terms of the symbols, what they meant to people under the Old Covenant, what they mean under the New Covenant. What I'd like to do is ask everyone to reflect for a moment on what this day must have been like just the day after Jesus Christ was crucified.

It's a real contrast when you think about it. There's actually very little information in the Bible about that intervening time. I don't think there are any scriptures that really talk about what the disciples did on that Holy Day immediately after Jesus Christ died. Probably in part because they were so befuddled and didn't know what they should do with themselves.

Probably besides themselves with grief. And it's not a small contrast when you think about it. Because the Old Testament events that happened at this time were all about victory, weren't they? As we heard in the first message, the children of Israel coming out of Egypt. Not even time to leaven their dough, just strapping things on their back and getting out. If you remember what happened right before that, after the plague and the firstborn were killed, they also went and they plundered the Egyptians.

They took all kinds of things of value, gold and silver and other things. They went out, as the Bible says, with a high hand. They were celebrating victory. And if you talk to those who celebrate the day today as an Old Covenant ceremony, that's what they think of, the deliverance, the victory. But imagine the contrast on that day as the disciples were keeping that very same day. They would have thought about the death of Jesus Christ in the most unbelievable way.

And all of the circumstances that surrounded it. Questions about what they should do next. And I think if we think about it carefully, they probably felt the opposite of victorious in just about every way that you could think of. Because of those events that had happened just within the few short hours before that time. Now, like those pictures we looked at a few minutes ago, the context of all of this changed over the course of time.

And we understand these events through incredibly different eyes because of these intervening events that happened and all of the things that took place. And so when we look on this day, we look at it again as it was under the Old Covenant as a time of victory. Because of the context that we have about the death of Jesus Christ, about his sacrifice, and everything that it means for us. So what I'd like to dwell on today for a little while is that contrast.

What the disciples must have been thinking about at that period of time and what we should consider even afterwards. And this contrast of Victor versus victim. Victor versus victim. What was Jesus Christ? What did the disciples see him as at this very point in time? How would they have interpreted it in contrast to this festival of victory of the children of Israel coming out of Egypt and struggling to see how all of these pieces came together?

So let's turn our minds to this question for the short time that we've got today in this message and think about Jesus Christ, Victor or Victim. And what does that mean for our lives today as those who follow him? So we'll spend most of this message on that very question. Was Jesus a victim or was he a victor? We can make a case for a lot of different views of this and I'd say there's a lot of evidence for the case that he was a victim.

Turn with me if you will to Matthew 2. This started very early in his life. You think of all the time that Jesus and disciples spent together. They would have walked together for three and a half years as he was doing his ministry. He operated as many people did at that time as somebody who was an itinerant preacher.

Many rabbis then would have also had disciples, followers, people who followed him, lived with them, got to know them and understand not just what they said but what they were as people. The things that they had experienced and the impression that it left on them. One of the early things that happened in the life of Jesus Christ, and as we know even some of the disciples were relatives, they were people that would have known him before his ministry. They understood the things that he suffered from early on in his life.

Matthew 2 and verse 16 is one of those areas. And this is just the first of multiple ways that Satan was after Jesus Christ from the very early part of his life. Matthew 2, verse 16.

According to the time which he had determined from the wise men. So Herod made some very careful calculations. He figured out the time span in which Jesus Christ would have been born. He probably knew the prophecies. He understood the area in which it would have happened. And he went and killed all of the children, the male children, of that age, thinking that he could get ahead of this. And of course, we know the story that Mary and Joseph were warned, and they went to Egypt. Different commentators will differ. How long they were there. Many will say it was a few months' time until Herod died. It could be as much as a couple of years, reckoned off of the age of the children who were killed at that time. But they spent some time in Egypt as refugees. Left because God told them to leave. He certainly protected them. But Satan, very early on in Jesus Christ's life, and it must have been a story that he knew. His family must have told it to him. His parents must have recounted how they were delivered in that time. And you can only imagine what it must have been like coming back after that. And even all of his time growing up in that area, having no boys within that couple of years' age range of his. Something that would have been in all of their consciousness. That, of course, wasn't the end of Satan trying to go after Jesus Christ. Turn with me, if you will, to Luke 4. Anyone who knows even a little bit about the ministry of Jesus Christ knows the story of his temptation by Satan. He was tempted in the wilderness. This is one of those accounts in Luke 4. And let's read verses 5 through 7. Luke 4, verses 5 through 7. Then the devil, taking Jesus up on a high mountain, showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment in time. And the devil said to him, All this authority I'll give to you in their glory, for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if you will worship before me, all of this will be yours. So Satan was there, and this was only one of the temptations that he gave, but he was giving Jesus Christ a shortcut. Whether Satan knew exactly what was destined for Jesus Christ to do or not, we could debate. But there's one thing that he clearly laid out here, and that is that he had dominion over these kingdoms of the world, and he was willing to give it to Jesus Christ if he would renounce his mission and what he was there for. So again, Satan was there trying to tempt him, trying to derail him, trying to distract him and take him away from the mission of what he was sent to do. And it didn't stop at this point, which was the beginning, really, of his ministry. It continued on all the way through till the end. Turn with me, if you will, to Matthew 16. We'll read another account from near the end of Jesus Christ's ministry.

This is in the time period, right near the end, before his final trip to Jerusalem, when he begins to really tell the disciples what it is that's going to happen to him, to prepare them for it, something they still didn't fully understand, even after he talked through that with him. But Matthew 16, we'll read verses 22 and 23. Again, focusing here on the fact that Satan was after Jesus Christ throughout his entire human life, looking for ways to get at him. Matthew 16, verse 22. Peter took him aside, and this is after Jesus Christ talked about what was going to happen, that he was going to go to Jerusalem, he was going to be taken, and that he would be killed. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, Far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you. He said, This can't happen. It didn't fit the model of what Peter thought was going to happen. It didn't fit the destiny of what he thought was there. And Jesus turned and said to Peter, Get behind me, Satan. You're an offense to me. For you're not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.

And so we can see that these ideas, these things that Satan was still trying to plant, this idea that Jesus Christ could be something other than the Lamb of God, someone who would be killed, who would die for our sins. Satan was looking for every possible way through his ministry, right from his birth, even long before he began that ministry, all the way through the end of it, looking for ways to derail him.

Was Jesus a victim? The scribes and the Pharisees sought to kill him. Turn with me, if you will, to Matthew 26. We know, of course, that the scribes and the Pharisees were the religious hierarchy of the day in the world that they lived in. Roman control was there politically over Judea. It was a province of the Roman Empire. The way the Romans operated, though, they left a fair amount of leeway to people to operate religiously in the way that they wanted to, as long as they had allegiance to Caesar, as long as they didn't cause difficulty in the Empire, as long as they paid their taxes. They could do a lot of things. And so the scribes and the Pharisees were there, and they had the religious system that they were part of and that they administered, and they were allowed to do that under Roman rule. And then they decided, in Matthew 26, after all the many things that Jesus Christ was doing, and starting in verse 3, The chiefs priests, the scribes, the elders of the people assembled at the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and they plotted to take Jesus by trickery and to kill him. But they said, we won't do it during the feast, lest there be an uproar among the people. Of course, they were concerned that during the feast, the days of Unleavened Bread were a pilgrim feast, when people would have come from all over the known area into Jerusalem. And so they feared, if they did it, when that many people were around, so many followers of Jesus Christ, that there would be an uproar. And so they sought a different way to do it, in this case, earlier on, before that time. So he was someone who was sought after by the religious establishment. He was at odds with them. In the last part of his ministry, if you remember, when he went into the temple, throughout the money changers, things got much more heated with them.

He was also unlawfully treated by the authorities. So it wasn't only the fact that they were out to get him, but they were doing it unlawfully. In that sense, he was a victim, and he was treated outside of the law. Turn with me, if you will, to verses 67 and 68 of Matthew 26, where we are already.

So the Jewish authorities, we know, also had the ability to put their counsel together, the Sanhedrin, and they met. And they were having, essentially, a trial. But as we know, we won't go through all the details in this, but as we've looked at this, we know that they didn't follow their own rules in the way that they treated Jesus Christ in this proceeding. And one of the ways that that's demonstrated is here in Matthew 26, verses 67 and 68, where rather than giving him a trial, listening to what was going on, considering all of the different things that were going on, what people might have been accusing him of, after he admitted to their words that he was the king, in verse 67, they spat in his face and they beat him. And others struck him with the palms of their hands, saying, prophesied to us, Christ, who's the one that struck you? So they're mocking him, putting a blindfold on him and hitting him, and saying, hey, if you're such a great prophet, who was it that just slapped you on the face? Surely you know if you're a prophet. All of these things that they did, outside of the law, outside of anything that was allowed under the rules of their group, not a fair trial, not showing any type of fairness or even the impartiality that you should in a situation like that to someone who was accused. And then again, we talked about the Romans and the Jews, how they had the different levels of authority. He was finally delivered up to the Romans, and at the end of the day, as we know, he was taken to the cross, which was a Roman form of punishment. How did he end up being killed by the Romans? Let's turn to Matthew 27. In an account we've probably heard before. In fact, we still use this term, don't we? We tell people, if we don't want to have part of a problem, I'm going to wash my hands of this. I'm not going to have anything to do with it. This is where that term comes from. Matthew 27, verses 24 and 25. Pilate was the one who was an authority there locally. He didn't want to have anything to do with this. He knew that Jesus Christ was being railroaded by the Jewish authorities. He knew that this was a vendetta against him, that they didn't like him, and that the Romans really didn't have anything that they could or should put him to death over. But in the end, he sided with political expediency.

It was going to be easier for him politically to just go ahead and let this happen than it was going to be to stand in the way of the mobs. In Matthew 27, verses 24 and 25, when Pilate saw that he could not prevail at all, and this was after he put Jesus Christ up there, he put Barabbas, who was a known criminal. If you think of today's terms, there's a serial killer, there's a thief on the loose that's out there, just burglarizing people's homes. They put somebody like that up against Jesus Christ, and they said, hey, who should we set free? And the crowd said, Barabbas, who would have thought this person was victimizing them? And instead, they wanted to deliver Jesus Christ up. So when Pilate saw he couldn't prevail on the crowd, he couldn't talk them out of it, and that Tumult was coming up, he made a political decision. He was just looking for peace. He was trying to placate people and make sure they didn't have an uprising. And so he took water, and he washed his hands before the multitude, and he said, I'm innocent of the blood of this just person. You see to it. And all the people answered and said, his blood be on us and our children. So we think of all these different elements, all of these things that were at play in the death of Jesus Christ. There's overwhelming evidence in the events of his life to indicate that he was a victim. He was a victim of Satan. He was a victim of mankind. And you can only imagine that on this day, just a very short time after he was crucified, this could very likely be the view that the disciples had that day. You know, Jewish teachers and saviors and supposed messiahs had come and gone. There are others referred to in the scriptures, in fact. And they ended up being killed, and once they were dead, their followers kind of melted away. Because the leader was gone, there was no one there to rise up anymore.

And so without the additional context that would soon come, they were despondent. They were wondering what in the world was going to happen next, perhaps wondering if they'd put their faith in the wrong place. Now, just like that picture of the planets, which was actually the bottom of a bunch of frying pans, that's not the true picture, is it?

It's a recounting of the facts, but it's not the true picture. How do we know that?

Jesus tells us, actually, a completely different story. He adds context, as do the events that happened later. Let's go to John 10.

In John 10, Jesus lays out a completely different context to all of these events that actually did happen. Absolute facts, and they happened for a reason, which we'll talk about later. But in John 10, one of many locations where Jesus and his followers lay out a different story, a different context that we have to understand as we consider this picture a victim or victor. Verse 11 of John 10. Jesus here says, What does he say?

Not that it's taken from him.

He says, The shepherds and he flees, and the wolf catches the sheep and he scatters them. The hireling flees because he is a hireling, and he doesn't care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep, and I'm known by my own. As the father knows me, even so, I know the father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. It's like a shepherd who, in that time, even today in parts of Africa, for example, on the Masai Mara, you get the Masai who are out there, their wealth is tied up in their cattle, whether it's sheep, whether it's cows, and they guard those things with their lives. It was no different at this time. A pastoral population, they have their sheep, that's what's worth money. They produce wool, they produce meat, they can be sold, they can be traded and bartered. A shepherd would lay down his life for the sheep because those were the things of value that he had. Just like we might think right now, if somebody broke into our home and tried to steal something, if somebody carjacked us and tried to take our car, often people will react, they'll try to fight a thief, because the thing of value that's being taken from them, that's what's being talked about here. Verse 15, As the father knows me, even so, I know the father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. Other sheep which I have are not of this fold, them also I must bring, and they'll hear my voice, there will be one flock and one shepherd. And in verse 17, Therefore my father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, I have power to take it again. This command I've received from my father.

Powerful words that he says here. The disciples didn't understand at that time what it was that he was saying. It took them a much longer time to understand that context, as they reflected back, as they saw the events that happened after this point in time. But this encapsulates the purpose of what he did. It establishes that Jesus was not a victim of circumstance.

He didn't die because Satan was after him. He didn't die because there was a plot against him by the scribes and Pharisees. He didn't die because the Romans put him on a cross. Those were all elements and absolute facts of his death. But the reason that he died was something very different. It was a sacrifice that he willingly and consciously gave for his sheep. There's incredible power in that. That's something we absolutely have to understand. It's central, central to our Christianity. Turn with me, if you will, to one other scripture that lays this out. Mr. Thomas made reference to this during our Passover service just a short time ago. That's in Matthew 26 again, here in verses 53 and 54.

This is the account where, after the Passover, after the time that Jesus is in the garden praying to his father, finally they come and they take him into custody. Peter, of course, wields the sword, slices off the ear of the servant of the high priest. There's one thing we know, and that is he was not aiming for his ear.

If he would have had better aim, he would have made his intent, which was probably to lop the guy's head off. That's how strongly Peter felt about the situation. In Matthew 26, verse 53, Jesus says, Are you not aware that I can call on my father? And at once he'll put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels, thousands. But how then would the scripture be fulfilled that say, the scriptures that say it must happen this way?

It wasn't that Jesus was powerless.

He did this willingly. It was his mission. He submitted to the Father. He set his own will to this for a reason, for a purpose. And let's look in the last part of this section exactly at that. What looked like Jesus being a victim actually served a much greater and victorious purpose.

And that's what this day is all about. Isaiah 53.

Those of us who have been around for a while are aware of the Messianic prophecies in the Old Testament. Isaiah 53 is probably the most prominent of those chapters. There are all kinds of things written about it, about the ways that it foretells Jesus Christ. Again, for those who have that frame of reference, for those who understand it, there are many who don't look to the New Testament, who understand Isaiah 53 actually in a very different context. But in verses 3 and 4, talking here about Jesus Christ, as we know from the New Testament Scriptures, Isaiah 53, verse 3, He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and we hid as it were our faces from him. He was despised, and we didn't esteem him. Surely he's borne our griefs, he's carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and he's rejected.

So it was destined, it was determined by God and his Father, that one of the things Jesus would have to do is come in human flesh and suffer.

That's not something that was within the paradigm of people at that time. They were looking for a victorious king to just return, blow away the Romans, and set up righteous rule on earth. It wasn't until much later that people could understand this idea that suffering of Jesus Christ was part of the plan. He looked like a victim, but he was scoring the victory by doing this.

Why do we say that? Turn with me, if you will, to Hebrews 4.

Because there's this incredible truth, this incredible function that Jesus Christ plays for us as New Testament Christians. And it's only possible through what he suffered. The things he was willing to go through, he didn't need to.

He wasn't victimized by others because he was powerless. He did it out of his love for us and what he was doing for mankind. And he became, as a result of those things, our spiritual high priest, replacing and completely doing away with the need for the physical priesthood that existed under the Old Covenant. Hebrews 4, 3, verse 14 and 15. Seeing then that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confessions. So very clearly saying that Jesus is the high priest under the New Covenant. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but in all points was tempted as we are, yet without sin.

So the key here is the fact that Jesus had to live what we live. He's there as an intercessor. He's there as a go-between. Just like in the Old Testament, the high priest would take the animals, would take the offerings, was given that administrative task of taking these things before God on behalf of the people. Jesus Christ, in what looked like a situation of him becoming a victim, was there for a very real reason to live human life. To suffer. To be ridiculed. To be mocked. To have pain.

All of those things, so he could do this. He could be our high priest. He could make intercession to God for us, because he can understand every element of what it is that we experience as human beings. That's victory. That's what Jesus Christ accomplished. Turn with me, if you will, to John 16, verse 33. This is what enables Jesus Christ to say these words in the last moments, the last hours of his human life, as he's giving his parting words to the disciples, John 16, and verse 33. I often joke that this is the one promise that is always kept, because it says, in the world you will have tribulation. That's a promise from God. It's not one that people like to go and get on their knees and ask for. It just comes as a natural part of human life. But again, that's why Jesus lived a human life, so he could understand all of those things we go through just by virtue of being human, before we get into all the things that we do ourselves, by giving into sin and temptation and the other things that we do. But John 16, 33, these things I've spoken to you, Jesus said, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. He was victorious. This is what he was saying at the very end of his earthly ministry as he was breathing some of his last hours of breath as a human being. I have overcome the world. An expression of victory, as he knew, as painful as it was going to be, that he had walked his walk and he had fulfilled his mission. He'd had the full human experience, and that experience, the purpose of it, was not just to be a victim of the world and the forces of evil, but to be victorious over them after having experienced them and what it feels like as a human being to have to deal with them. And that victory extends to us. Let's look at one more scripture on this theme. That's in 1 Corinthians 15. We'll read verses 56 and 57 of 1 Corinthians 15, thinking again about victory and the meaning of that in the context of these Holy Days. We think of 1 Corinthians 15 a lot as the passage that talks about the resurrection. But in verses 56 and 57, this theme is hit right on the nose. 1 Corinthians 15, 56, The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law, but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. So Jesus was victorious. He was victorious over sin. He was victorious over all of the powers that came through the most unlikely of ways by giving his life. Not the way that we think about scoring victories as human beings. And that victory extends to us through his sacrifice and through his blood.

So as we wrap up this first part in thinking about Jesus' victim or victor, there's incredible theological importance to understand this view of events of the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It is essential that we understand this as the center of his mission, that he gave up his life and he gave it willingly. He had the power to do something else, and he didn't. He chose to give his life, to live as a human being, to go through all of the different types of aches, pains, emotional distress, physical distress that we go through. And he chose to do that in order to be victorious. He did those things for us. So as a result of that, in this last part of this message, let's dwell on two outcomes, that this reality of Jesus as a victor and not a victim should work out in our lives. What should this do in our lives? Of course we know that the blood of Jesus Christ, the new life that comes in him, being able to live as a new man or a woman, is an incredibly powerful thing. But there are two things that I want to dwell on today, directly from this idea of Jesus Christ as the one who's victorious, the one in whom we have victory. And the first one is boldness, or confidence. It's something that's spoken about a fair amount in the Scriptures, something that we'll read about here in the same passage that we read just a short moment ago. According to Vines dictionary, the Greek word for boldness is thareo, and it means a variety of things, to be confident, to be bold, to be courageous, to be of good courage. So we can sort of use interchangeably these ideas of boldness and courage and confidence, and I think we understand how all of those concepts sort of wrap together in a similar way of being. Let's look in Hebrews 4, where we were earlier, that talked about Jesus Christ as the high priest under the New Covenant, and let's see how this theory or this element of boldness comes into play, or confidence.

Hebrews 4 will start in verse 14. Seeing then that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession, for we don't have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses but in all points was tempted as we are yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Important words to focus on. What is it that we do as human beings when we've done something wrong? We see this example in Adam and Eve when they took of the tree. God comes walking through the garden in the cool of the evening like He always did, suddenly it's like, Adam, Eve, where are you? What did they do? They hid themselves. They knew they'd done something they shouldn't have, and they hid themselves. And we see this in little kids, don't we? It's like this innate human thing. When we do something wrong and we know that we have, we tend to pull back, we tend to hide. A child might hide him or herself in the closet, or hide behind a bed or something, right, when they've done something wrong. It's like this innate action that comes with being guilty, and then they're being sought out. What is it in contrast that we're told to do? Because grace, grace and mercy, applies to our sins.

When we want to find grace and mercy, verse 16, we're to come boldly with confidence, with courage, to the throne of God. Because we know that Jesus Christ understands temptation, He didn't give into it, but He understands it. He understands the pain and the suffering, the difficulty that we feel as human beings. And because He was victorious over that, because He sits there next to God to intercede on our behalf, we can come boldly before the throne. We can ask for that forgiveness. We can ask for that grace and that mercy that comes. Let's read another passage in Hebrew, this one a little bit longer, that drills down more on this same concept of confidence, boldness, courage, and coming before God. We'll go to Hebrews 10, and we'll start in verse 16.

You know, we often think about Christianity as being, I don't know, what's the right word? Well, humble, obviously, certainly. But being sort of demure, not being assertive, hanging back and not calling attention, not being pushy, right? This boldness, this confidence in how we approach God is actually very different from that view. And it comes from understanding the victory that Jesus Christ had and that He has granted to us. Hebrews 10, let's start in verse 16. This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, said the Lord. I'll put my law into their hearts and their minds, I'll write them. And He adds their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. Now, where there's a remission of these, there's no longer an offering for sin. Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way that He concentrated for us through the veil that is His flesh, and having a high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, our bodies washed with pure water. This applies to us today. Jesus Christ has died. The new covenant has come. We are part of it. Let us hold fast in verse 23, the confession of our hope without wavering. For He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another to stir up love and good works, not forsaking, assembling ourselves together, as is the manner of sun, but exhorting one another, and so much more as the day is approaching. And skipping down to verse 35, one more time. Therefore, do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise. Don't cast away your confidence. Don't let people talk you into the idea that you are anything but victorious through Jesus Christ.

We recognize, of course, there's so much that comes along with that as He lives within us. We talk about taking in of unleavened bread, taking in of Jesus Christ every day during these seven days, figuratively. And we know that our entire life is living according to the new man. The Bible even talks about going from being slaves of the flesh to being slaves of God.

Because we're that focused on following Him and doing His will in everything that we do. But in that, there is great confidence. Because Jesus Christ has been victorious, we have victory in Him. How confident are we? How confident are we in what Jesus Christ has done for each and every one of us? It's something that we should reflect on during these days, as we're taking that unleavened bread, as we're remembering not only the sacrifice, but the new life that we have in Jesus Christ. That victorious life where we can be confident. This is why Paul wrote in his epistles that he could do all things through Jesus Christ to strengthen Him.

He had that faith and that understanding of the power of Jesus Christ.

Lastly, let's look at one other element, and that's joy. Joy. Joy. We talked about boldness and confidence as an outgrowth, as an end product that gets produced because of this understanding that we have of Jesus Christ as a victor and not a victim. And let's talk about joy. Joy is much different than happiness. Joy is a downstream effect of really, fully, and truly understanding that we also, through Jesus Christ, are victors and not victims, and exercising the confidence that it gives us. It's rooted as seeing the resurrection of Jesus Christ as proof of what God has in store for us. The reason he's called the firstborn among many brethren. Do we focus on the fact that we're among those many brethren? He was the first. He's the proof point. God did it for him, and He promised that He will do it for those who come after Him. Turn with me, if you will, to John 15.

Again, going to these last words of Jesus' human life. John 15, we'll start in verse 9.

Here talking to the disciples about the importance of loving one another, really having that spirit of love of one body within us. John 15, verse 9, As the Father loved me, I also have loved you, so abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you'll abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments, and I abide in His love. These things I've spoken to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. So again, something we reflected on just a couple of nights ago, but remarkable that as He was getting ready to be taken captive and go through all of the horrid physical pain and ultimately death, He was talking about joy. Not only victory, but joy in knowing what it was that He was going to produce in all of us. Romans 4.4, in a similar vein, says, Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I will say, rejoice.

Now, I think about sometimes when I read this a class I had in college, and the reason I bring it up is that we have to be careful, because this is not a command to just be enthusiastic and have a smile on your face no matter what's going on, because you were told you're supposed to be happy. Not a fake it until you make it kind of a situation. I had a class in college, and I used to always cringe.

The instructor would get up in front of the class and say, alright, everybody, stand up! I'm going to have you repeat after me ten times. If you act enthusiastic, you'll be enthusiastic. And I would just say, ahhh! This idea that if you act a certain way, you can be a certain way, and that's all that it takes. And this sort of superficial, be happy and don't have any worries or anything else, that's not what joy is.

Joy is not a denial of reality. Joy is not pretending that things are different than they really are. It's understanding that underlying all that is a greater truth, and that is the victory of Jesus Christ, and the fact that He's there for us and we can have boldness when we come before God's throne. No matter what the situation is around us, it's not blindness. It's not being out of touch with reality. It's recognizing, just like those pictures that we saw, that there's a different context that's there in God that goes way beyond the context of what we see in our human lives.

That allows us to have true joy. So as we reflect on the victory of Jesus Christ as we take in unleavened bread this week, we need to think as well not only about the confidence but about the joy, about the fact that underlying all of the physical things that go on around us, there is this victory, this underlying victory that is there in Jesus Christ, this plan that He has for us, the Holy Spirit that came, as we'll commemorate on the day of Pentecost coming not too far from now, and the power that we have, and most of all, the hope that we have through Jesus Christ in our future lives.

So let's tie all this together here in conclusion. We started with the concept of how one thing can look very different when you look at it in a different context. And you know, this Holy Day, back days, a day after Jesus Christ died, must have looked quite bleak for the disciples. And when we see how completely dumbfounded they were when Jesus Christ came back, Thomas to the point where he had to touch him and put his hand in his side to even believe it was really Him, we know for a fact that they weren't just sitting around on this day saying, Oh yeah, he said he was going to be resurrected.

Let's not worry about it. He's coming back in a couple days. It's all good. It's a very, very different context. It took time for them to understand all of this, that we, through the power of hindsight and the additional context that we have, we can understand in a very different way. We've seen by looking not only at what Jesus endured, but His purpose and willingness in sacrificing Himself, that He was anything but a victim. He was victorious over all other powers that exist through His sacrifice, all other powers. As we reflect on that victory, we can have confidence in our ability to approach the throne of God with an advocate there beside us, one who understands everything about what it means to be human.

All the sorrows, all the weaknesses, all the challenges that go with it, and can advocate on our behalf. Jesus Christ is not there to cast stones at us. He's not there because He wants us to feel awful and to fail. He's there because He wants us to succeed.

He calls us His brothers and His sisters. And as we deepen our understanding of His total victory, the door opens for us to experience joy in a way that's so different than just happiness, having some fun, but a deep-seated understanding, this contentedness, this joy that comes from knowing that regardless of what we see around us, there's a greater context, there's a different context that means so much more. I'd like to close by reading a few words from the Apostle Paul. It happens to be one of my favorite passages in the Bible, so I'll leave you with this as we wrap up this message.

And that's in Romans 8. We'll read verses 31 through 37. Because I think this encapsulates all of what it means to have this victory. Romans 8, starting in verse 31. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It's God who justifies. Who condemns? It's Christ who died and furthermore is risen, who is at the right hand of God, who makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness, peril or sword?

As it is written, for your sake we are killed all day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.