Claiming victory

I get confused sometimes... especially when it comes to the things of God. I suppose that to some point, that level of confusion is encouraging in realizing that my mind cannot begin to comprehend or even try to wrap itself around certain aspects of God. The mystery of God is necessary in order to keep ourselves in proper perspective as the creation, made in the image of a Creator... not the other way around.
One aspect that often confuses me is the idea of claiming victory in Jesus. We are told that because God uses all things in our life, good and bad, to direct those of us who have submitted to the Lordship of Christ in the direction of the will of God, that we can get through tough times by simply claiming our victory in Jesus.
I don't know about you, but I have no idea what that is supposed to look like, I can't envision it well, and it doesn't seem like one of those huge God things that are supposed to be mysterious. This is a practical resolution to a problem, and an idea that I think God wants His children to understand... He wants me to understand what it tangibly looks and feels like to claim victory in Jesus, and here is what I'm getting right now:

In the Old Testament, we see many times that the Israelites were facing a battle. Many times they were ferociously overmatched, whether by strength, size, or even both. But we also see a resolve because they knew they were to claim the victory already won for them by God, they just had to be humbly obedient. That part is easy to understand. I get that if I am humbly obedient and following the will of God that I will be victorious. But the catch is this: victorious doesn't always mean what we think it will. Victorious can quickly become a selfish pursuit of greatness, holiness, righteousness, so on and so forth... we see this because God was always with His chosen people, watching out for them, helping them through their battles, but there were times that they thought they were to be "victorious" from a prideful and selfish heart, and yet, they were defeated, enslaved, etc... they were still "claiming victory in God". Yet they were not "victorious".
We have to be willing to accept that the victory we claim in Christ is not always going to be what we expect. But by claiming the victory, we are submitting to the Lordship of Christ to say that His victory is good, right, and unwavering. We don't always get to define a victory, we are called to humbly, obediently take part in the battle, follow the command of our Lord, and celebrate the outcome with glorious praise and worship...