Take Heart, Take Courage

To live without regret,
To love without reservation,
To hope without hesitation:
This is courage.

The above is sort of a life mission for me but it can essentially be summarized into seven characters, two syllables and one word. It slips off my tongue almost too easily, almost as if to escape from its enormity: Courage. See, I don't need courage when evil lives in another city. I don't require courage when disappointment takes up residence in someone else's house. I don't call for courage when disaster enters someone else's camp. I don't demand courage when the sun is rising and shining brightly in my corner of the world while the other side of the globe only knows a setting sun.

At some point, each person suffers the direct force of evil and its oppression. Disappointments manifest, disasters strike and each of us becomes too familiar with the sunset that leads to the prolonged cold, damp and dark of the night. Morning is a long time coming.

Courage...I've certainly needed a good dose of it already in my life and especially during the last few years. Thankfully, I have many courageous characters from whom I can take notes...

Courage is
a guy in a hole with roaring lions.
a guy in a cell for no reason.
a virgin girl carrying God's son.
a guy stoned to death for his faith.
a grieving husband walking through the unexpected death of his wife with the kind of dignity that holds fast to the faith that brought them together in the first place.
a guy named Job.
a terminally ill woman who accepts that to be truly held by her Creator means letting go, no matter the outcome.
a little guy named David facing a big guy named Goliath

AND

THE WORLD'S ONLY PERFECT MAN, JUST 33 YEARS OLD, DYING FOR ME AND WHO SAYS:

"In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world." John 16:33 NASB