In this weeks CROWD livestream Matt Edmundson continues the series on identity by breaking down exactly what it means to be 'more than a conqueror' in christ.

Key Takeaways

Perseverance Through Adversity: Florence Chadwick's story of attempting to swim from Catalina Island to the Californian coastline serves as a powerful metaphor for perseverance. Despite encountering dense fog and ultimately giving up less than a mile from her goal on her first attempt, she successfully completed the swim on her second try by keeping a mental image of the shoreline. This illustrates the importance of maintaining focus and hope even when the end is not in sight.

Biblical Perspective on Challenges:The sermon emphasizes that being "more than conquerors" does not imply a life free of troubles. Instead, it means facing challenges with the confidence that through Christ, we can achieve victory. Romans 8:37, which states, "In all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us," highlights that our triumph is not just in overcoming but in doing so with overwhelming success because of God's love.

Transformation Through Faith: The sermon encourages a shift in perspective, urging believers to interpret their trials not through their own experiences but through spiritual truths. By renewing our minds and fixing our gaze on unseen, eternal truths rather than temporary troubles, we can transform our approach to life's challenges. This transformation is rooted in a deep trust in God's love and strength, enabling believers to turn tests into testimonies and to find joy and growth even in the midst of adversity.

CROWD | online church | More Than A Conqueror

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And now, the moment you've been waiting for is here. Our online church service starts right now.

Will Sopwith: Yeah, and you Dan.

Nice to see you. How was your weekend?

Dan Orange: So we've had a bit of a linked weekend because My niece has been away with your daughter. Indeed. Indeed. There's been lots of drama and prayer requests come in because they've been away, haven't they? I

Will Sopwith: don't know if any of you saw the game yesterday. Who was it? I can't even remember.

Um, and so, uh, yeah, some hurried getting together of trains and ferries and trying to get them back about 24 hours later and a very, very long day of travel yesterday, but they made it, they made it. They made it back. Yeah, forgive any yawns on my part.

Dan Orange: Yeah, so we had um, lots of Whatsapps and then prayer requests.

Well they're here, can you Can you pray that they, they get somewhere to stay. Can you pray? They, they get back. They got a ferry. It all changed a bit. Yeah,

Will Sopwith: yeah, yeah. They had cabins in the ferry, but they ended up, I think, not sleeping and just running around the ferry. Uh, it was great, great adventure for the kids as things are like this.

Not so much for the parents and definitely not so much for the teachers involved. But, um, well done. Uh, if you catch this, uh, thank you very much.

So we're in a series of, about identity and it's really brilliant. And Pete Farrington last week did a great talk on identity and where you base your identity. So nowadays we based it, we can base it on, uh, what we do as a job, who we, who we think we are, what, what's going on with the world and politics and stuff at the moment.

But he talks about basing it in Christ and something, someone who, who is steadfast, who is fixed, who's not changing. Anyway, I don't want to spoil it for you. If you haven't heard it, I'd really say go back and, um, Have a, have a listen. I had a listen yesterday. It was brilliant talk.

Will Sopwith: Yeah, no, definitely.

Dan Orange: A few things changing up in the, in the world, in the Western world. Indeed, indeed. Very interesting. And it's great that our hope.

Doesn't have to be in politics. I think that's a good way of

Will Sopwith: putting it. Yeah, that's very diplomatically put. Um, but yeah, it's interesting. Identity is such a big issue, isn't it? Um, and how somebody looks, particularly across the Atlantic at the moment. Um, less about that substance. And, uh, yeah, identity is Yeah, it's a really important thing to to get your head around and a really good thing to to think about uh from a a God's God's point of view and from a Christian point of view and where our identity is uh yeah.

Indeed. At least we'll have a go, won't we? Yeah, yeah. See you soon. So here we go, if I press the right button. In fact, there doesn't seem to be a button. Here we go.

Matt Edmundson: Let me tell you about a lady called Florence Chadwick. Now, she stood on the beach at Catalina Island looking at the Californian coastline. The question was in her mind, could she swim that stretch of water?

Could she make it to the other side? It was 20 miles of open water swimming. Now, 25 years before A chap called George Young had wondered the same thing, and he made it across that particular stretch of water in 15 hours and 44 minutes, which was the brand new record for that particular open water swim.

All she could see was a dense fog and this started to have a real impact on her morale and her sense of progress. It felt like she was just swimming and not really seeing any kind of movement forward. It didn't matter how hard she tried, it seemed like she was getting nowhere. www. aurionmedia. co. uk www.

Well, when Chadwick was pulled out of the water, little did she know that she was less than one mile away from the shore, less than one mile from achieving her goal. She was so close She just didn't know it. So two months later, she has another go. Oh, yes. Only this time, she was going to think differently.

She thought differently, and as a result, she conquered, oh yes, she conquered what was in front of her. So just like Florence Chadwick, we face our own fog in life, our challenges, our obstacles, that sort of obscure our vision and sap our morale. And the Bible is not surprised by this, not at all. Anyway, and what's remarkable is not that we are promised an easy way out of the challenges of life, but in them, we have a really, really unique position.

So what does it mean? What does it mean to be more than a conqueror? So let's start by clearing up a common misconception. Being more than a conqueror doesn't mean that we will never face troubles in life. Actually, it's quite the opposite. By definition, to conquer something, you must have something to conquer.

And you can't really understand Romans 8 37 about being more than a conqueror without first reading the preceding verses where Paul gives context, writing about the challenges that we might face in life. Two verses previous, he says, Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble, or hardship, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?

He didn't ask why you are in trouble or facing hardship. He didn't rebuke their lack of faith for the famine or, or tell you that you had unconfessed sin and that's why you're being persecuted. On the contrary. It's almost like he's wearing these things as a badge of honour. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Shall trouble, or hardship, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness? or Danger or Sword. As it is written, for your sake we face death all day long. We are considered a sheep to be slaughtered. No! In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. It's good stuff, this. You can preach yourself happy just on these verses.

Rome conquered. Everyone knew what that meant, but let's look at what Paul said. Notice he doesn't say that we conquer too. He doesn't compare us to Rome. He takes it a lot further. He says, no, we are more than conquerors, which means we overwhelmingly. Conquer. This isn't a mere victory. It's decisive. It's complete.

Christ. Why? Because he said right at the start, nothing we face can separate us from the love of Christ. Hence, we are more than conquerors part of our identity. Who you are right now. is more than a conqueror. I want you to let that sink in. The very things that threaten to break you can become the environment in which God builds us up, deepens our faith and our character, and brings about an overwhelming, undeniable victory.

He turns things, what your enemy meant for evil, he turns it through good. Christ, it's good stuff. It's not about mustering up some kind of emotion in my own strength, but relying on his strength, his divine strength, the strength that enables us to face any challenge with the confidence, knowing that we do so not in our own power, but in his.

Their son, Dave's nephew, was murdered and it was a case of mistaken identity. So it wasn't even, it didn't make sense on any kind of level. So how can you be more than a conqueror there? Well Mick and Lynn, they came to a place of forgiveness over it. It didn't change what happened to their son, but in the midst of tragedy, they did something that only Jesus could do.

He had to leave the family home as he wasn't allowed to be around his kids, unsupervised. He was charged and eventually ended up in court. Finally, after two years of turmoil, a jury very quickly found him innocent of all charges. But you can't imagine the shame and the upheaval that family had to deal with during that time.

More Than A Conqueror. Wherever you are, whatever you are facing, whatever you are feeling right now, how close to God you are, or how distant from him you feel, rest assured that God always has the final say. He has got you. And when he sent Christ to the cross, he made you more than a conqueror. And we see this All over the Bible, imagine being chased by a king and his entire bloodthirsty army.

They want you dead and they're not going to stop. You are. This is what happened to David of David and Goliath fame. Saul, who was king at the time, and his army chased David into the wilderness and set up camp. David, being a special kind of adrenaline junkie, decides to up the stakes a little bit by deciding that it's time for him to actually stop running.

They're asleep. Right in front of him. He could kill the king right then and there, end this pursuit, and take his place as a king of Israel. He could conquer. It would have been an easy thing to do, and it's actually what all the people wanted anyway. So why not? But David knows that this is the wrong way to go about things.

This tickles me. You see, now God is involved. The supernatural is starting to happen and when God gets involved, the strategy he gives Might not make a whole bunch of sense. You can see a way to end the pain right there. Just takes the spear through Saul's vitals. Basically, I don't wanna go too graphic, but you know what I mean.

Something could have happened in an instant to end it. It's lying there right on the floor. But God's ways on our ways. They're much better. And we have a choice to listen to the Holy Spirit or take a shortcut to a victory that would have been short lived. David took the spear and the jug of water. Now the reason I chuckle whenever I read this story, the reason I find it so funny, is because that would not have been an easy thing to either carry or keep quiet.

So when Saul hears this, Scripture tells us that Saul confessed, I have sinned. Oh, come back, my dear son, David. I won't hurt you anymore. You have honored me this day, treating my life as most precious, and I've acted the fool, the moral dunce, a real clown. Love how the message puts that particular version of that verse.

It's about listening and obeying the Holy Spirit despite the pain. It's seeing our trials as opportunities for transformation. And it's realizing that in Him, we have the power to turn every test. into a testimony. And it's why Paul wrote this to the church in Corinthians. He said, But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he that believes. Jesus is the Son of God. We are more than conquerors. We are overcomers and we are victorious in Christ. So how do we, like Florence Chadwick, hold onto the belief that the shoreline is out there even when we can't see it?

How do we live as more than conquerors in a thick, dense fog of life's challenges? In other words, how do I apply this to my life, Matt? How does it actually, how does it affect me on a Monday morning? Well, for me The first step is to stop interpreting spiritual truths by my lived experience. So when I choose to let my feelings and my experience dictate my theology, I create a very shaky platform.

And I think we can ask God to change our perspective, to change what we see, what we fix our eyes on. Paul wrote this to the church in Corinthians. To the church in Corinth, known as the Corinthian Church. This is why we never give up, for our present troubles are small and won't last very long, yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever.

We find a way, in the midst of it, to fix our eyes. On what is unseen, we shift our perspective. It might not change what we are going through or even how we feel about what we are going through, but transformation starts. with a renewed mind, something that we will look at much more very, very soon. Now, when we meditate on the truth of God, when we start to see who we are through the eyes of God, everything changes.

on these things. Fix your mind on them. That's what meditate means. Fix your minds on them and it will renew your thinking. One of the key things that happens when you renew your mind is that you give your soul and your spirit an opportunity to hear from God. So whatever he tells you to do, Do that. It might not solve the problem, but it will be just for you.

So here's my challenge. If you're a regular crowd, you'll know I like my challenges. Here's my challenge. I want you to put on a post it note, um, the verse Romans 8, 37. I want you to put it on your bathroom mirror. Uh, and just write out, no, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

I am more than a conqueror through him who loved me. Now remember, this journey isn't about a sudden overnight change, but it can change you. Starting today, as you fix your eyes on the unseen, the shoreline in the fog, what is that for you? What is the shoreline that God is showing you? What is he helping you see?

But I asked, who are you? Well, let me tell you who you are, my brother and sister. You are a child of God. All of God and air created in Christ Jesus for good works, and you are more than a conqueror through him who loves you.

Will Sopwith: Fantastic.

Dan Orange: Yeah. Thanks, Matt. Thanks for that. Um, brilliant, brilliant talk, loads, loads of things to get ahead round and mention. So I'm going to say Will, what's the first thing, what's the first thing that jumps into your mind?

Um, this whole idea of conquest and conquerors and quite, quite kind of militant and, and, and we overcome and everything else. And as Matt began to talk about it, it's like, No, no, no, no, no, God's way is a different way. And I'm really glad he said that because that's absolutely where I'm coming from. Um, I think this verse actually has been misused by so many to justify so much, but I love the way he unpacked it and said, uh, actually there's a, there's a whole load about, Jesus's way and how Jesus wins that is entirely different from our human understanding our cultural understanding of what being a conqueror really means of what winning really means yeah and so yeah fantastic examples great great stories in there

So Paul talk says we're more than a conqueror. Um, he says fix your eyes on him. He, um, he says we're a child of God, we're heirs. Yet, Paul died, most of the disciples died a very, very unconquering looking way, didn't they? Yeah. Because it's, it's, it's that not winning in. It's not, it's keeping your eyes on God, and what he's asked you to do.

And that challenge. Yeah. And that life that is just committed,

Um, often, um, forgiveness is a fantastic example and that kind of grace of those who've been through some real trauma of no fault of their own. They got every right to To Be Bitter, Resentful, To Fight, um, and you get this kind of, you know, it's hard for, I absolutely know, but you get this grace and this peace and that deep joy that, that, that Matt talked about, um, and, and an ability to, to To release someone from that debt that you feel owed, uh, in a very real way, like the, like the, like the death of a child and, and there's lots of stories like that.

Dan Orange: us in.

Yeah, I think without forgiveness the the battle can be lost there. Can't it? The action can have happened like with them Mick and Lynn the the horrific thing happened. And that thing could have been the end, that could have been the conquering thing that won. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But through forgiveness, that was the thing that won.

Will Sopwith: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I love the, again, that some of the stories that Matt said, that it's like, yeah, God turns things around. But it's like he's got a whole Completely different set of, I don't even couldn't call them weapons, but a whole different toolkit. Yeah. Than, than, than we were kind of mostly familiar with.

And, uh, and, and it's, and it's that, that we, that's the good news, isn't it? That that's what we inherit. As we follow God, we begin to understand, oh, there's a whole way there's. There's a whole set of different power tools that I didn't even know existed. Yes. And actually these are so much more effective, so much better to use.

Dan Orange: Yeah, I love this comment that Andy put on the, um, on the comments, but you can't have an easy life and have a great character. And I think we see that, we see that in the Bible all the time. And with the example that Matt. Brought out with David and Saul, he could have just killed Saul and that would have been the Saul, it would have been turmoil, but in the end it was Saul saw his character, the, his then, um, when he was king, the people around him would have known his character, they would have known that story, it transforms, not just the situation, but transformed him.

Will Sopwith: The great thing about that David story, though, is that David already knew that he was going to be king. God had already prophesied into David's life. He'd been anointed like years before then and said, No, one day you will be king. And David could have gone, Oh, look, here's the chance.

This is what God told me those years ago. And I was a shepherd boy. And I was anointed by Samuel the prophet. And God said, Yeah, I was going to be king one day. Oh, this is it. This is what I should do. And David had had enough of that character, even though he'd been hunted down. like a terrorist. He was hiding in a cave.

He, he really, he properly honoured Saul. If you read through the story and other stories like it, he really respected the fact that Saul was king, even though Saul was behaving terribly. He, he, he respected the office of king and God's anointing for Saul as king. And so even though it was actually his right, you could argue, it was his right to kill Saul at that point and take the kingdom.

God had even said it. Uh, he still refused to do it and, uh, it's like he refused to play the same game. Yeah. And I think in our application that this is a really, Key thing is to think about, well, what, what is the opposite? What's the opposite spirit that I can come in? So when someone comes against you, um, effing and blinding, full of rage, it's like, yeah, that's an invitation to, to, to fight back.

Again, to kill Saul. And even in the final battle with Saul, he said, nobody kills Saul. You know, I don't want him killed, even though it was like, it got to that point of like, two massive battles and Saul continued to hunt him. But he was still saying no, no, no, I want to protect Saul and protect his family, his God's anointed.

Yeah, I mean, amazing.

Dan Orange: I think you picked up on a really great point there, which was that Um, I bet this is right. He knew he was going to be king. He could do it this way and we can have that thinking, can't we? But this is, yeah, I know I could do this another way. I know perhaps the Holy Spirit's guiding me, but this is my right.

Take the easy way out. Yeah. Take the easy way out. It can

Will Sopwith: be kind of, yeah. And actually, the world's very good at telling us our rights, isn't it? And actually, our friends at times as well, it's like, no, you have every right to feel this outrage and this resentment and this bitterness and this unforgiveness and all the rest.

Um, we can almost be encouraged in that kind of battle. From

I don't want you to say that to that person. I want you to forgive. Yeah, I want you to move on. I want you to, yeah, you know, take that spear. Yeah,

Will Sopwith: yeah. And there's an element of faith in this. Let's be real about that. I mean, you need to Well, first of all, to hear, to hear God, but actually there's an awful lot of faith needed as well to be able to take that path and not feel like, Oh, I'm just being completely taken advantage of here.

And that, that faith to say, no, God has, I am God's son. I am an heir of God. Um, he has promised nothing separate from me. He has promised that I'll be more than a conqueror. Um, there's an element of faith in that. But I tell you, when you start doing it and you, and you have a few stories of your own like that, maybe not as extreme, um, that really boosts your faith.

And, and yeah, and, and for me, I know, you know, a couple of stories where, where I've, I've done that and I've suddenly realized that it, it just unlocks a power that I could not have, and a situation actually that I couldn't have done myself. Um, so, um, Yeah, we'll walk

that,

Will Sopwith: that path of faith, but it does, it does require some faith.

You know, for the swimmer, it might have been 16 hours. For us, it might be weeks or months or years. It's not something, um, like Matt said, this is not an overnight thing. Yeah, absolutely. This is a fix your eyes on God. He's steadfast. Everything around us can change. Matt said a great thing there, he said don't let your emotions dictate your theology, which is very easy to do.

I'm going to find a verse in the Bible that seems to answer what I'm thinking. I know the general theme of the Bible doesn't do that, but there must be some way I can turn it around in my mind. Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, if we, if we lived our lives on our experiences. Yeah, we wouldn't get very far. No. We wouldn't get to see some of what God's got for us.

Yeah. We'd miss out on those things.

Dan Orange: Like you said before, more than conquerors, we can say, ah, conquerors, we're going to do this, do that. But read just the verse before the verse afterwards. Yeah,

Will Sopwith: absolutely. So So what are your fogs? What are the things that are fogging your your effort to do this epic swim? Um, that, that was something that Matt talked about a couple of times.

Uh, yeah, put it, put them in chat if you, if you're listening, any, uh, examples of that kind of fog that can distract but also demotivate you. Um, yeah, and it could be any, any sphere of life. So yeah, do, do put those in the chat, um, if you've got any of those. Um, Yeah, what else from you, Dan?

Um, and I, it was, it was just to emphasize what Matt was saying that, um, that challenge that he put at the end to have that we're more than conquerors in him who loves us, write it, write it somewhere. Yeah. Um, and have it and think about it. This week. Yeah. And to know that, yeah, it's not an immediate thing, but it's a, something that does start today, doesn't it?

Yeah. You got it to start.

That's a really good example of somewhere where you need to start a journey with God and just rethink, actually, who am I? What's my identity in God? Going back to Pete's talk last week. What, what's my position in God? I'm an heir of God. And when you begin to kind of look at God and what God said about you, and take the first step, The focus of yourself and what you're supposed to be achieving.

Dan Orange: And in that situation you talked about, the situation hasn't changed, has it? No. You're still in that job. You've still got those challenges. You've still got those things around you. Yeah. Um, so the, yeah, situation. Things haven't changed. It's, uh Um, focus on God. It's putting more on him, taking things that, yeah, we've take things on ourselves that

Will Sopwith: it's, again, it becomes, it is, it is the way we do it.

Um, I find, you know, when I'm not stressed and when I've got a better balance of my understanding of who I am and what my role is in a particular situation, what my responsibility is, I actually become much more effective anyway in doing what I do because I've got peace about and so that that can then change the situation.

Um, but yeah, it's this. It's this coming in a different, a different way, uh, using some different tools.

Dan Orange: Um, and I, I think I mentioned it a couple of weeks ago, but there's a song and, and it, it, it's, it's a Bible verse, but it said that the verse is peace that passes all understanding. Um, but the, the song just says peace.

Will Sopwith: And I mean, Matt said it, isn't it? It's like, how does that even work? Um, and some of the stories that he used, like that joy in the depths of, yeah, just an awful situation.

How does that work? And again, this is, this is partly those steps of faith. I, I can't explain it to you actually. I can, I can't. I could describe it a little bit, um, given a bit more time, maybe, and a bit more presence of mind in some of the stories from my own life. But there's an element of, of doing it, of stepping out and beginning to know it for yourself.

Because it doesn't Obviously makes sense, but it is true. I can absolutely testify to that.

So tune in. And if you've got, again, if you've got any prayer requests, if you've got any questions, Go to www. crowd. church, whatsapp there, you can email us, contact form, and we'd love to pray for you, try and answer your questions, um, yeah, thanks very much for tuning in and listening.

Will Sopwith: Just finally, on Matt's final point actually, on the um, That we have this power to turn tests into testimony, share testimony, you know, if you've got some encouraging stories of where test has become testimony, um, if you've been able to come with the opposite spirit, if you've been able to come, you know, fix your eyes more on Jesus, share those as well, because it's really great to hear other people's stories.

Dan Orange: Absolutely. Brilliant. Thank you very much, Will. Okay, well, lovely to see you Dan. very much on the comments and we will see you next time. Next week. All right.

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