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” ~ John 16:33


Jesus wants to give his disciples a “heads up” here, as he has been doing for awhile now. The time is drawing close to the day of crucifixion as it looms ever closer. Every step they take together means that soon one of them will be walking alone to his death on a cross. Things the disciples cannot at this point imagine will soon happen, and still, they do not really understand. Still after three years of miracles and happenings they just now say they believe in him. We wonder at the stumbling minds of these men, but really, we are no different. All that was to come in the following days for Jesus and the disciples was to be earth shaking in its cruelty and hatred. People who had followed, seeking the bread and water of Jesus would turn on him with screams of “Crucify him!”. Trouble upon trouble would come upon the disciples as they followed and fled from this Man. The world would retaliate! But take heart, said Jesus, and to us he says it still. “Take heart, my friend,” Jesus says, “I have overcome the world for you.” And he is faithful who says these words. This history making year of 2020 is almost at an end. The pandemic was barely a mention a year ago and now it is world-wide and continuing to transform itself, infect many, take the lives of loved ones in private, draining the energy of those who survive it and leave marks that it had inhabited their body. It is a year we pray will not continue into the new one, but we know it will not immediately end on the first day of the New Year. And more lies ahead, for this world is ever more becoming an angry, hurting place, rejecting the God of Creation. But for those who follow the Prince of Peace, fear need not be our state. The world may throw at us what it will, but Jesus has overcome the world; he overcame the principalities of spiritual darkness, of death and separation, and he overcame sin, all on the Cross and at his Resurrection. We are not alone in our troubles, no matter what may come upon us. The Overcomer walks with us every day. Do not fear, my friend. There is nothing that can happen to you that your dear Lord is not aware of, and he will not abandon you to it.

Pastor Julia

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