Life sucks, but . . .

Let's face it, guys:  Life sucks.

I had an appointment with my counselor yesterday, and at the end, I said that right now, certain parts of my life just plain sucked.

Government shutdown?  Sucks.
Kid with autism?  Sucks.  (The kid doesn't suck, but dealing with autism day in and day out?  Sucks.)
Financial concerns?  Sucks.
Current events?  Sucks.

On the way to my car, I thought, Jesus' life sucked, too.

I mean, think about it.

No home of his own, sleeping on the ground, persecuted, criticized, betrayed by a friend and abandoned by the rest of them, convicted and executed for things he never did.

Sucks.

And that was when the following verse dropped into my mind:

"In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world."  (John 16:33, NIV)

I thought, That's it.  That is how you deal with the fact that life sucks.

"In this world you will have trouble."

Translation:  Life sucks.

Jesus never said that life would not suck.  Life is going to suck.  Period.  If it sucked for Jesus, the holy Son of God, it is going to suck for us.  Period.

"But take heart!"

You can translate that as "be brave, take courage, be courageous, etc."

Why?  If life sucks, and it sucked even for Jesus, why be brave?  Why can we have courage, take courage?

"I have overcome the world."

I have overcome.

Not, "I will," but "I have."

Jesus said all of this before the garden of Gethsemane, before he heard the muttering of the soldiers coming for him, before the torches lit up the trees, before Peter swung his sword and cut off Malchus' ear.

"I have overcome the world."

I wonder how many times he thought this while he was being marched towards Pilate, standing on trial, listening to everyone accusing him, lying about him, while the whip cut into his back and sprayed blood and bits of skin and bone on the ground.

My Merriam-Webster dictionary app defines "overcome" as a transitive verb meaning "to get the better of".  When I read that definition, I don't see a shiny Jesus holding up his hand and saying in this holy-sounding voice, "Take heard, I have overcome the world."

No, it's a Jesus that says, "Ha!  Gotcha!  I have overcome!  Yeah, things suck and they're going to suck, but guess what?  I'm the Son of God and I have gotten the better of things.  I win!"  Not an, "na-na-na-na-na-pfffth", but, "I win!  No one has gotten the better of me; I have gotten the better of the world.  Ha!"

John 16:33 isn't going to solve our financial problems.  It won't miraculously reopen the government or make autism easier to deal with.  But maybe, just maybe, it will put a new spin on the outlook that I have.

"I have overcome."

He has overcome.

He got the better of the world, and so will we.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.