BE STRONG AND COURAGEOUS!
Are you? We’d like to follow this biblical encouragement passed from Moses to Joshua to all of us. Who doesn’t want to be *courageous*? Stand for justice? Save the kid from a burning building? Take a bullet for a friend?
Followers of Jesus are courageous…right?
“Take courage. I AM. Don’t be afraid.”
Jesus walked on water and invited Peter to join Him. And wonderful, impulsive, Peter jumped from the boat, took a few steps…and sank like a stone.
Staring directly into the face of Jesus, Peter lost courage. I’m not banging on poor Peter, but there’s a lesson for you and me.
Perhaps we ought to be careful about claiming future courage.
Awfully easy to be certain, from the safety of the couch, how we’d react. We can train and plan and imagine, but we can’t know what we’ll do “in that situation” until we’re there.
Jesus didn’t kick Peter to the curb for this failure, or later when Peter denied Jesus three times. He continued to encourage because He knew courage is hard. He also knew self-dependent courage always fails.
When Peter’s walk on water failed, Jesus didn’t call him a coward. He asked, “Why did you doubt?”
Authentic courage is about faith.
Courage means confronting our fears, acknowledging and refusing to be controlled by them. Jesus’ invitation places HIM in the center of the equation.
“Take courage. I AM. Don’t be afraid.”
Interesting paradox: courage requires stepping out in faith. Which requires the humility to know we can’t do it by ourselves.