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The conquest of the land under Joshua has a place in the typical teaching of Scripture
for the believer now, and in so far as he enters by faith into his position with Christ, so
will his realization of victory be more complete. But to act and to pray as though the day
of redemption had come, and the redemption of the body were an accomplished fact, is to
be under the spell of a falsehood, and must lead to disaster. "We are more than
conquerors through Him that loved us" (Rom. 8: 37) is an incomplete quotation, and is
often made to mean the very opposite of the truth. The full quotation is as follows:--
"For Thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the
slaughter. Nay, IN ALL THESE THINGS we are more than conquerors, through Him
that loved us."
The burden of the passage is that none shall separate us from the love of Christ,
neither "tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, or sword", "neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to
come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the
love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 8: 35-39). It is in this sense that
we are more than conquerors, not in the sense of making a conquest over our enemies,
Some take the stand, that seeing they are in Christ, and a part of a new creation, members
of His body, and "far above all" it would be a sign of lack of faith ever to feel the stress
of persecution, the shame of nakedness or the peril of the sword. Not so the apostle. It
was the carnal Corinthians that made the boast that they "reigned as kings". The apostle
said: "I would to God ye did reign, that we also might reign with you" (I Cor. 4: 8).
Then follows that unparalleled list of suffering for Christ:--
"God, I think, displayed us last as condemned criminals, a theatrical spectacle to the
world, both to angels and men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but ye are wise in Christ;
we are weak, but ye strong; ye glorious, but we dishonoured. Up to this very hour we
both hunger and thirst, and are ill-clad, and are buffeted, and are hustled from place to
place, and toil, working with our own hands; being abused, we bless; being persecuted,
we endure; being reviled, we entreat; as refuse of all things are we become the
offscouring of all things till now" (I Cor. 4: 9-13).
The true dominion is seen here. Not in boastful and carnal "reigning", as the
Corinthians, but as the apostle in meek enduring. Paul reveals the spirit of the conqueror,
the true king, the real dominion. When being reviled, he can intreat, when abused,
he can bless. "In all these things" he is "more than conquerors" through Christ. During
this present life dominion of the character of reigning on a throne is not experienced.
Rather are we left as pilgrims and strangers, though joint-heirs with Christ. The position
is that of those graciously allowed (Phil. 1: 29, Gk.) to share the sufferings of Christ,
while confidently looking forward to the glory. When we triumphantly exclaim
(I Cor. 15: 55-57), "O grave, where is thy victory? . . . . . thanks be to God, which giveth
us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ", we do not delude ourselves with the idea
that we are no longer mortal, neither do we act as though death is for ever removed from
us. It would help us if we remembered that Christ did not die to save us from dying, but
to save us from death, and to apply this fact to the two phases of experimental
redemption, the present, with its limitations, and the future, with its "liberty and glory".