Courage...Do You Have It?

by Sylvia Gaston

Courage is something everyone wants. It’s a trait that people admire and garners respect. Courage grows our confidence and inspires others.

The dictionary defines courage as: the ability to do something that frightens and strength in the face of pain or grief.

Have you done something even though you were frightened? Sure you have. From the time we were small kids, we were often afraid as we learned how to navigate school and relationships and life. As we got older, our fears change somewhat. Though lists of top fears vary slightly, here is one that is pretty common.

      1.     Flying
      2.     Public speaking
      3.     Heights
      4.     The dark
      5.     Intimacy
      6.     Death
      7.     Failure
      8.     Rejection
      9.     Spiders
    10.     Commitment

Fears fall into 2 categories – specific phobias and social phobias. The “specific” ones are most common and usually focus on simple objects such as spiders, flying, or heights. “Social” phobias are those that cause extreme anxiety in social or public situations such as public speaking, rejection, or commitment.

I’m sure that the specifics of our lives and past experiences come into play, as well. Do you work in a dangerous environment? Do you have children? Is your future uncertain? Do you have health issues?

Let’s take a look at the second part of the definition of courage. Have you remained strong in pain or grief? I’m sure we all have, to some degree. We have all experienced pain, loss, or crisis of some sort. Did you come apart at the seams or remain strong?

My fears, at this stage of life, tend to revolve around my children’s safety and decision-making and the health of those I care about.

God has a lot to say about fear and courage. I could recite tens of them here, but you have a computer – just Google it. But, let me share my favorite…

Six years ago, in the midst of a personal crisis, I relied on a verse I found in the Bible in Isaiah 41:13 that says,

“For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you Do not fear; I will help you.”

I wrote that verse on a 3X5 card and taped it to my refrigerator. It stayed there for months. I wanted to see it often and I knew others in my household needed to see it, too. It was a reminder to us that, because we follow Jesus, God will never leave us. He will strengthen us (give us courage) to endure whatever life throws our way.

That little 3X5 card is still around. It resides on the inside of my spice cabinet. I’ve relied on those words when my sister was dying, when one of my kids’ messed up, when my husband was very sick, and when my daughters took their first out-of-town road trips.

You see, I’m a pretty strong person. I can be extremely tough when the going gets tough. But we all have our limits or breaking points – emotional ones and physical ones. It’s easy to become overwhelmed. How do you find strength when you feel you can’t go on? How do you find courage when you are afraid?

I have learned to rely on someone with all the resources, power and authority to move heaven and earth, as He sees fit. Of course, I always hope God sees fit to move heaven and earth for me, but the outcome is not always what I want. It doesn’t matter. He’s still there to pick me up, to love me, and to see me through the incredible challenges of life hear on earth.

As I get older, and wiser, I use this reliance on God to help me even when I’m not in the middle of a mess. I have fewer worries, headaches, and stress when I just do my part and leave the rest to Him. Because, really, who am I kidding? I may be a tough chick but God is soooo much smarter, and more capable, than I am.

So I say to you…“Be strong in the Lord and in His might power.” –Ephesians 6:10

Keep Yourself

by Andrew Cromwell

Life is full of ups and downs. No one is immune to challenges and problems. Even the people who we consider to be the most fortunate have to face the reality of a broken and sin-filled world. But how do we deal with this contradiction of the good and the bad in all of our lives? 

Some people become jaded and bitter. Some do their best to ignore and minimize the problems and live in a kind of denial. Some spend their lives and resources trying to organize their world in a way that minimizes the possibility of being hurt. 


But none of these options is the right one. All of them fall short of the way that God intended us to respond to the challenges we face in life. 

There is a tiny book — a letter really — towards the end of the Bible called Jude. It’s no more than a single page, but it is rich with content. Found tucked towards the end of its twenty-five verses are a few lines about enduring in a difficult world.

But you, dear friends, by building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life.

There is much to glean from these two short verses, but the centerpiece is the phrase “keep yourselves in God’s love”. 

At first glance, it might seem that this is a contradiction to the main teaching of Scripture. For Jesus made it clear that God’s love for us was full and complete and that there was nothing we could do to change the way He felt about us. Christ came and gave His life for all human beings, even those who have not accepted Him! That’s the kind of love that Father God has for us.

So why would we need to “keep ourselves in His love”? Well, it is certainly not about earning God’s love (for we could never do that). Instead it is about experiencing God’s love. And that is a challenge sometimes!

There is something about this world that is corrosive to our very souls. When we are banged up by life, we often tend to lash out against God or withdraw from Him. Before we know it we have lost our way. Jude knew that. And that is why he encouraged his readers to keep themselves in God’s love. 

Keeping yourself in God’s love is a constant activity. It is something we are engaged in. Far too often, when the bad stuff in life happens, we throw a pity party when we should be throwing our arms out to God. The very moment when we are deciding that God has forgotten us and we start walking in the other direction, is the exact moment when we need to be walking towards Him! 

Imagine yourself like a ship in the ocean. The ocean is God’s love. You are always in it. But there is a section of the ocean where the sun is shining through the clouds and there in that place you actually experience — you feel — God’s love. When you are sailing in the sunshine, you sense His nearness and you feel connected to God. But when the storms of life blow you out of the sunshine, you start to feel disconnected and distant from the Father. He still loves you, He still has you surrounded in love, but you don’t feel it.


And this is where the “keeping” comes in. When you are blown off course, you have to pull out the sails and work the tackle and sometimes even stick the oars in the water and fight to get back into the sunshine. This is work. When the wind is blowing it takes ten times the effort to stay in the sunshine. Where a small course correction would have kept you on course when the weather was fair, now it seems nearly impossible.

How do we keep ourselves in God’s love? Well, Jude says that too. We “build ourselves up in our faith” and we “pray in the Holy Spirit.”  More on that next time!

Giants Among Us

by Tim Howard

A very interesting story about the Israelites is recorded in Numbers, chapter 13 of the Old Testament. They were on the verge of war and the Commander in Chief deployed 12 spies for reconnaissance to hopefully gather information for preparing a strategy.

On their return 10 of the 12 had a negative report, stressing their belief that the war was unwinnable. They gave this reason. “We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are…they are giants and we look like grasshoppers in comparison.”

When I read this, I was reminded of the time when my family had the opportunity to see the Los Angeles Lakers play the Golden State Warriors in basketball. We were seated three rows behind the Lakers bench and I’ve got to tell you Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, James Worthy and the others were gigantic. As exciting as that was for my family, a problem arose. We couldn’t see the game through the giants.

There are still giants among us! But I’m not speaking about people. I’m talking about challenges. Any time you face something beyond your ability to understand, control or change you are facing a giant.

Giants are those things you face in life that are bigger than you. They can be intimidating because of their size and they tend to threaten your security and sanity. If not dealt with they will skew your perspective and keep you from seeing clearly.

Many have heard the story about David and Goliath but if you haven’t, you can find the details in 1 Samuel, chapter 17. To learn how to win battles against giants you need to study winners and not whiners. David was a winner.

Here’s three things to learn about giants from David.

1. Just because giants are bigger than you, they aren’t necessarily better than you. Bigger is bigger not better. Solomon said: “The race is not always to the swift or the battle to the strong … but time and chance happen to them all.” We learned from Aesop’s Fables – just because the Hare is faster than the Tortoise doesn’t mean he automatically wins. Your battles may be asymmetric but not unwinnable.

2. Giants don’t go away if you ignore them. Goliath taunted the Israelites for 40 days until someone stepped up. You may have heard about the proverbial Pink Elephant in the room. No one wants to focus on it. No one wants to talk about it. No one wants to deal with it so we learn to live with it. We choose to embrace the mediocre rather than strive for the best. Maybe you should ask yourself this question:  What am I ignoring right now? What should I deal with but am unwilling to do so? What hurt am I simply trying to ignore? Maybe we ignore things because we’ve convinced ourselves they go away.  Not so!

 You know you are ignoring something when you keep postponing and procrastinate.  "One of these days... I'm going to go to the dentist." – You ignore that little pain "... I'm going to get that surgery"  "... I'm going to get some marriage counseling etc." We always postpone what is painful. Listen:

Postponing pain NEVER solves the pain. The fact is – procrastination turns minor problems into major ones. David was the only one who took the bull by the horns, so to speak.

3. Last of all, David won because his confidence was in God. Goliath was cocky and put his confidence in himself. Self-confidence is one thing but you need God-confidence to win battles against giants.

Gaining Confidence

by Blake Cromwell

A little boy was overheard talking to himself as he strode through his back yard, baseball cap in place and toting ball and bat. “I’m the greatest homerun hitter in the world,” he said with confidence. Then he tossed the ball in the air, swung and missed. Undaunted, he picked up the ball, threw it into the air and said to himself again, “I’m the greatest homerun hitter ever!” He swung at the ball again, and again he missed. He paused a moment to examine bat and ball carefully before throwing the ball into the air once more and saying, “I’m the greatest homerun hitter who ever lived.” He swung the bat hard and again missed the ball.

“Wow!” he exclaimed. “I am the greatest pitcher in the world!”

Unlike the boy who “missed the ball” and turned failure into success, we often take “missing the ball” as a severe blow to our self-confidence. More often then not, we become fearful when faced with failure and allow the circumstances to rob us of our spirit.

Our lack of confidence affects how we view ourselves and the challenges we face. If you are tired of being fearful, let me assure you that you can learn how to capture the confidence our Lord. He was confident as He faced the challenges of life and He promises to make His Followers as bold and “confident as lions.”

We see this confidence when we study the people of God. After the crucifixion the Disciples of Jesus were whimpering and fearful men, but when the resurrection occurred these same men were strangely different. Instead of hiding, now they were “going where no man had gone before.” Once afraid in the garden to be counted with Christ, now they were willing to risk everything for Him. So real was their confidence, they were fearless even when martyred for their faith.

In the story of Moses and the Children of Israel, we see how God gave His people great confidence. Israel had been in slavery in Egypt for over four hundred years and they had learned to bow their eyes in submission. Their will had long been surrendered to the stern orders of their masters. All personal pride, security and confidence had been crushed out of God’s people. They were slaves — broken, defeated and insecure around their Egyptian masters.

But when God visited Egypt with the Ten Miracles the browbeaten Israelite slaves were strangely transformed into God’s confident people. They suddenly knew God could do anything. Since He overthrew the Egyptians they were confident that whatever they would face in the future God would be with them.

The key to the transformation of the Disciples and the Israelites was that both groups meet with an All Powerful God. The Disciples saw and spoke with a resurrected Lord. The Israelites had the presence of God in the center of their camp and were made confident by the visible evidences that God was with them.

As the Prophet Daniel declares, “They that know their God shall be strong and confident doing exploits.” A natural by-product of communion with God is an inner boldness. The last promise made to the Followers of Christ is that they would receive the Holy Spirit and He would fill them with confidence and power to be witnesses for Christ.

The Pastors in the Kings County would love to minister to you this weekend the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. Just remember, “Those that wait upon the Lord shall have renewed strength.” Why not gather with us and others this weekend in a church, waiting upon the Father to send us our Helper, the Holy Spirit.