Courageous Love-What Is Courage?

We can never be successful in life without courage. We’ve all heard amazing stories and acts of heroism that are worthy of the news broadcasts. Most would agree that courage changes things in our lives and those around us on all levels.

We need relational, moral and spiritual courage. My guess is that you want more courage in your life too. No one wants to live a life motivated by fear and anxiety. So, what is courage?

Courage is often portrayed in the culture as a one-time event or a particular profession. You might not think about it this way, but it also takes courage to make decisions with the ordinary challenges we face in our daily lives.

Often times we make choices so quickly we don’t even realize their impact on others. We go with the flow instead of making decisions that are courageous.

”The probability that we may struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe is just.”

-Abraham Lincoln-

During the Civil War, Lincoln stood tall against the conventional wisdom of the day by making difficult, principled decisions. Despite the challenges he would endure Lincoln courageously kept his conviction rather than cave in for convenience or the approval of the majority.

If you were do a study of the Bible on courage you would find countless characters who were fearful, yet demonstrated courage. We would discover many ‘fear nots’ proclaimed to ordinary people who were overwhelmed and without control of their circumstances. Are you feeling overwhelmed right now?

Joshua was feeling intimidated and fearful about taking over for Moses and leading Israel into the Promised Land.  But that’s why God encouraged Joshua three times to, “be strong and courageous.” God wants to encourage you with three realities about courage:

We need spiritual courage.

Some say Christians are wimpy, weak willed, and in need of religion for their own insecurities. Yet, Christianity challenges people to give their whole heart, their whole life to God, to give the best they have. It takes courage to repent, to own up to your sins. It takes courage to admit you’re wrong.

It’s so easy to choose ourselves over others, greed over sharing, and pleasure over giving. But, it takes courage to look in the mirror and say, “I need to change.” It takes courage to speak the truth in love when it’s more convenient not to. It takes courage to live for God when the culture is screaming why bother.

We need moral courage.

I don’t see a lot of moral courage in today’s culture. It takes courage to stick with your convictions. It takes guts to stand firm in your values and principles in the marketplace. But it can cost you something, perhaps popularity, maybe friends, or maybe that promotion because you told a client the truth. Stand up for truth and grace, the brave ones do, and you can be one of them.

“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”

-Teddy Roosevelt-

“I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”

-Nelson Mandela-

We need relational courage.

It takes courage to develop meaningful relationships, to self disclose, to be vulnerable and  honest. It takes courage to not blame someone else for our stuff or to not self-justify our own actions when we have hurt others. It takes courage to recognize and do something about the blind spots we all have.

It takes courage to talk about issues that need to be resolved rather than run from them. It takes courage to raise kids. It takes courage in a relationship to fight off the greener-grass mentality. You know what, we’ll never really enjoy life to the fullest without courage.

We all need and want courage, but how do we get it?

I don’t know if there is an exact answer, but it does have to do with facing our fears.Someone else said courage is not the absence of fear, its fear that has said its prayers.

I like what the former Editor of Parade Magazine, Walter Anderson said about his book, ‘Courage is a Three-Letter Word,’ “Real courage is saying ‘yes’ to life instead of backing down when we face adversity. Courage is acting with fear, not without it. Of all the successful people I’ve known and wrote about in the book it’s not just that they learned to live with anxiety or to cope with anxiety, they’ve learned to live better because of it.”

Fear can paralyze us, yet if we want to diffuse our fear and grow in courage we’ll need to inevitably face our fears. So, what fear paralyzes you? Is it your family, workplace or personal?

If we want to grow in courage we need to increase our exposure to people who have shown themselves to be courageous. We can read about many of the biblical characters, though not without fear, made the choices to be courageous. Being courageous is not just for a few, but it’s for you and I in the midst of our ordinary lives.

Courage impacts all of us one way or the other. It took courage for the U.S. 101^st Airborne during the Battle of the Bulge, one of the bloodiest battles of WWII. There’s a memorial to them which reads, “Seldom has so much blood been shed in a single course of action. Oh Lord, help us to remember.” Certainly, a fitting and deserved tribute to the courageous soldiers who gave their lives for you and I.

There’s another act of ultimate courage.

It took courage for Jesus to go to the cross for you and I.

The writer of Hebrews wrote about a night of extreme anxiety in a garden, “During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.” (Hebrews 5:7)

He could have walked away and saved himself, but chose to be courageous because he was thinking of YOU! “…who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:2)

There has never been nor will ever be such a courageous act of love for you and me. Never in history have so many owed so much to one Man! Lord, help us to remember what your courage did for us! We owe you our lives!

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