DO NOT BE OVERCOME BY EVIL
"Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good". --Romans 12:21
The Bible tells us how to deal with those who hate us and how to overcome.
We are told by our Lord Jesus to "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you" (Matt 5:44).
Then the Apostle Paul tells us to "Overcome evil with good". But before this he says "Do not be overcome by evil".
What does he mean by "Do not be overcome by evil"?
We are overcome by evil when we retaliate against evildoers in the same way in which they act against us. By doing so, we choose to go down to their level and suddenly find themselves standing on the same moral ground as they stand. We are then at their level, because our actions show that we are just like them, no matter how much more morally superior to them we claim to be.
A couple of years ago some people attacked me and our ministry. The most vocal of them was a wealthy man, a church leader, who went around and said many things against me to turn people against me. Everything that he said was 100% lies.
I was in a meeting with this group to reason with them when this man, who was their ringleader, spoke up and hurled accusation after accusation against me for over two hours. The Lord told me "This man has sin in his life. Do not say anything to defend yourself. Do not say anything. If you touch him, then I cannot touch him". So I stayed quiet and my leaders who were with me were surprised that I did not say anything.
A few months later this man was exposed. It came into the open that he had a secret mistress on the side with whom he had two children. He was disgraced and lost all his credibility. Suddenly nobody believed anything he said anymore. I was vindicated and today many of those who hated me show me respect and stand under my leadership today.
Jesus teaches us to follow Him and be like Him. It is not easy on the flesh of man because it goes against the way of thinking of man in his natural state. That is why we should crucify our flesh every day to be like Him. Personally, it is a battle that I fight every day; my flesh fights back to be like "me" and not like Jesus. So every time I fail, I just repent and make things right, just because the greatest desire of my life is to be like my Master.
The way of the Cross is not always easy on the flesh of man, and I can vouch for that after 48 years as a Christian, but we should press on no matter how taxing it is on the flesh, because ultimately we will win. One day we shall be like Him. That is what the journey of faith is all about !
The Apostle Paul says:
"I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus". Phil 3:10-14
And then he says in the next verse,
"All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things!"
Originally posted on Facebook by Pastor Christopher Alam