Overcoming Tribulation

"In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

John 16:33 (NKJV)

Jesus did not say you might have tribulation, or that if you are not careful you will have tribulation. He said you will have tribulation. It is as certain as tomorrow. And the person who has been told otherwise, who was sold a version of the Christian life in which faith protects you from all difficulty, will be unprepared when the storm hits.

But the sentence does not stop there. The full statement is one of the most remarkable combinations of honesty and hope in all of Scripture: in the world you will have tribulation. But be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.

The word translated 'tribulation' carries the sense of pressure: the kind that presses from outside. And Jesus is not saying this pressure will go away. He is saying that in the middle of it, you can be of good cheer, because the One who is with you has already overcome everything that is pressing on you.

When trials come, and they will, our immediate response is often to question God. Why is this happening? What have I done to deserve this? Where are You? These are honest questions, and God is not offended by them. But they are shortsighted questions. They look at the storm and forget the One who stands above it.

The answer to tribulation is not the removal of tribulation. It is the presence of Christ within the tribulation. He does not promise to take us around the hard places. He promises to take us through them. And He says: be of good cheer. Not because the tribulation is not real. But because I am real too, and I have already won.

Whatever you are facing today, Jesus has faced something harder. Whatever is pressing on you, He has overcome what pressed on Him. And His victory is not just historical. It is available to you, now, by His Spirit within you.

Be of good cheer. He has overcome.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank You for Your honesty about the reality of tribulation, and for the greater reality of Your victory over it. I choose to be of good cheer today, not because my circumstances are easy, but because You have overcome the world. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Pastor Ras
All Nations Community Church

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