Triumphalism – What It is; Why It Matters

Every Wednesday we’ll be posting something to do with doctrine and purity. Hope it helps.

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Triumphalism

What It Is; Why It Matters

In the preaching realm, Triumphalism is a teaching that overemphasizes the triumphant aspects of faith without recognizing the reality of human struggle. So triumphalist teaching would have you believe that God wants you rich, healthy, and problem free, and that anything short of that is second rate. It’s a cruel doctrine because, when presented to a woman with cancer or a child born into terrible poverty, it suggests that if only they had more faith their problems would disappear.

In personal recovery, triumphalism takes on different, though similar form. It suggests that if you’ve gotten better you must be cured and no longer in need of disciplines or accountability. And whereas many people neglect their programs through sheer laziness of inconsistency, the Triumphalist rejects it entirely because he thinks he’s arrived.

I saw this repeatedly when I worked as a case manager in an inpatient psychiatric hospital. A patient would be admitted during a psychotic episode and need immediate medication and stabilizing. So he’d be put on the proper drugs, get individual and group counseling, and develop some better coping skills. Within days, his symptoms would diminish, and he’d say, “I’m cured! Thanks much; I don’t need this anymore.”

And with that, he’d discharge himself against doctor’s advice, and take himself off medication. Within days he’d be back, starting the cycle again. And all because he thought improvement meant cure.

He thought he didn’t need his meds because he was getting better. Yet the fact he was getting better was proof the meds were working, and that he did need them, and there’s a lesson in this.

Your structure – daily prayer, daily reading of the Word, weekly accountability – could be seen as your meds. No doubt, you’ll improve if you stick to your meds. Stay in the Word, develop your bonds with God in prayer, stay accountable, and exercise more impulse control, and you’ll see genuine and lasting change. But when the changes come, recognize why they came. They came because the structure you’re following is working, and if it’s working, why abandon it?

The Apostle Paul himself said he hadn’t arrived:

“Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected. But I press on that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.” (Philippians 3:12)

I guess we’d be wise to say the same.