Real Victory
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
Romans 8:37
The deeper Christian life is a victorious, holy, faith-centered, Spirit-empowered, Christ-dependent, surrendered, fruit-bearing, broken, overcoming, sustained life. Abiding in Christ is another way of describing the deeper Christian life: a life of an on-going conversational relationship with Christ. This “life abundant” is maintained by faith through gratitude in the midst of life disappointments, dependence on the Spirit, and acknowledgment of our numerous weaknesses and failings. The deeper Christian life is daily experiencing the presence of Christ by allowing him to live his life in and through us. Christ lives the Christian life in us because by our own efforts we cannot imitate Christ’s love and selflessness.
It is by the grace of God that we can be conquerors. To be a conqueror, one must allow God to live His Life in and through us. Again and again he has to break us; that is to say, He breaks the things in us that protect and maintain “self.” We must surrender totally to Him, and let Him do all that is necessary. Thus he gets more and more room in us. He does not want only a part of us, but to fill our whole heart with His power; to fill us more and more with Himself. That means a closer fellowship with Him. That is glory!
Corrie ten Boom quoted in His Victorious Indwelling, ed., Nick Harrison (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1998), 240.