Tag Archives: Personal

20 Seconds of Insane Courage

January 9, 2012 By in Current Events, Encouragement Tags: , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Over the Christmas holiday my family and I went to see “We Bought a Zoo”. This was a great movie for our family and we really enjoyed it. But there was one line in the movie that I could not stop thinking about. The father, played by Matt Damon, was talking to his son and told him “All you need is 20 seconds of insane courage and I promise you something great will come of it.” His family had been looking for a home and had found the perfect one. The only problem was that the house came with a zoo and he knew nothing about running a zoo. But in a moment of insane courage he decided that he and his family would purchase the house with the zoo and would figure it out as they went along.

I thought about how there are lots of things you can do in 20 seconds that takes insane courage. And many of them will reap huge benefits if you are willing to do something you never thought you would be able to do.

I thought about how I was not really that type of person. I’ve never done anything that really took insane courage. I’ve done plenty of things that required insane stupidity on my part but nothing that I could think of that would qualify as courageous.

Then God so lovingly revealed something to me. I had done something. Many years ago an amazing teacher of mine shared her faith and what God had done in her life. She shared that she had accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior. She said that He chose to die on the cross for all of our sins so that we could be forgiven and could spend eternity in Heaven. She said that if we wanted to accept His forgiveness and to spend eternity with Him all we had to do was believe in our hearts that what she was sharing was true then raise our hands and pray a prayer asking for that forgiveness.

I was a 7th grader at the time and what my peers thought of me was crucial to my existance. I was insecure and didn’t want to be made fun of. I was terrified. But there was something in me that desperately wanted to experience the love and acceptance she spoke of. I wanted to be forgiven of all the wrong things I had done and choices I had made. I wanted to have the assurance that I would spend eternity in heaven with the One who loved me completely. I was so afraid of the consequences but in those 20 seconds of insane courage that it would take me to raise my hand I knew something great would come of it so I did it. I raised my hand and boldly chose to say “I believe”.

My life has not been perfect since that 20 seconds of insane courage. I’ve certainly had my share of ups and downs. But what happened in that moment to a scared middle-schooler forever changed my life. There has never been a moment of regret in that choice. It took courage. It took making the choice that I didn’t care what other people thought – I wanted everything that teacher told me the bible promised. I wanted to experience that kind of love and peace and joy. I wanted to change and not be the person I had become anymore. And 32 years later I still want Jesus more than anything else. It’s a choice every day that I make to follow Him and not follow my own selfish ways. But there is nothing this world can offer that will ever compare to the love of Jesus.

If you’re like I was as a scared 7th grader and you’ve heard the gospel that promises forgiveness, eternal salvation and a new life in Christ but you’re afraid of the consequences to responding, know that there is no other 20 seconds of courage decision you can make that will impact your life more than choosing to follow Jesus and make Him the Lord and Savior of your life. And the best part about it is you don’t have to step out in that decision alone. He will be right there beside you every step of the way. (Joshua 1:9). You’ve got nothing to lose and I promise you, something great will come of it.

So That’s What a Meteor Shower Looks Like

January 6, 2012 By in Current Events, Encouragement Tags: , , , , , , 2 Comments

In the very, very early morning hours on Wednesday my two sons and I went outside to watch the Quadrantid meteor shower. Because there was no school the next day it was the perfect time to stay up and view our first one. I didn’t know a whole lot about meteor showers but I guess I expected that the word “shower” meant they would be coming down like rain and would be very visible. The peak time to see them was 1:30 am so we bundled up and headed out to stare into the northeast sky because according to space.com that was the direction to be looking. We looked to the northeast from the back of the house. Then we looked from the front of the house. We rechecked our compass. We looked in different directions. Nothing. We checked social networks to see if anyone was talking about it. Nobody was saying anything except “I don’t see anything”. We looked some more. Nothing.

So we decided to go inside. It was cold and there was nothing to see. Maybe next time. We turned away from the northeast sky and headed inside. When we were almost to the door I turned to look back one more time. Then I saw it. I saw a shooting star streak across the sky. I almost screamed, “Oh my gosh! Did you see it?!” My youngest son exuberantly said “Yes!! I saw it”.

We stopped in our tracks and stood staring at the sky for 45 more minutes. We didn’t say a word except when one of us would see one we would ask if the others had seen it too. It was beautiful and peaceful. We forgot we were cold. We forgot our necks were hurting from staring up in the same position for so long. We forgot how long we were out there. We just wanted to see another one.

It’s like that when we’re waiting on God to “fix” our situation. We pray. We get an idea in our mind what His answer to our prayer will look like. We wait as we look for His anwer. But the waiting is uncomfortable. We decide it’s not worth it and we give up. It’s too hard to wait.

If we give up before He answers in His perfect timing we may just miss something spectacular. But if we will just wait it out a little bit longer and keep our focus upward we might just get a glimpse of what we’ve been waiting for. It could be so subtle we may miss it if we don’t stay focused. It may not look like we expected it to. If we don’t allow others into our lives, those who we can count on to say “there it is – that’s what you’ve been waiting for, did you see it!?” we may miss it.

But if we’ll wait and keep our focus on Jesus, He will give us a glimpse. We don’t always get all the answers at once like we may have expected. But we get enough to make us want more. We get enough to make the continued waiting worthwhile. We just have to hang on for that first glimpse.

In the cold, quiet morning I thought about how I almost missed it. I told God “thank you”. I thanked Him that I didn’t miss it and that He gave us just a glimpse. A glimpse that made us hungry for more. I thanked Him for the beautiful show He put on for us. I thanked Him that I got to share that moment with the ones I love. I thanked Him that He loves us so much that He knows exactly what we need and when we need it. I thanked Him for just enough to keep hanging on.

In a World Full of Options

January 4, 2012 By in Encouragement, Observations Tags: , , , , , , 4 Comments

We live in a world that is full of options. When we are faced with challenges there are many available solutions. And for most of us, when everything is going well we would probably all agree, that in the world we live in it seems that there are options for most any circumstance or situation that we may face. With the resources available today there is options you may never have thought possible. In most cases it’s just a matter of deciding which is the best option.

But for some reason when things are not going so well and we hit difficult times in our lives many of us are quick to come to the conclusion that there aren’t any options. I hear people say “divorce is the only option”. Or their excuse for making a wrong decision that caused their life to be a huge mess is “I didn’t have any other option”.  Why do we place such limits in our lives when things are not going according to plan? The reason is because we falsely believe that it’s up to us to fix everything that we’ve messed up. That things will only get better through our limited abilities. And when our own selfish choices are the reason for the mess, we feel incapable in our own strength to fix it because we already failed by allowing it to happen in the first place.

Whether it’s a marriage in crisis, children who are out of control or financial debt so deep that we cannot see a way out, we see no other option but giving up. People will say “I’m at the end of my rope, I can’t take it any more”. Many of these are people who believe in God. They know He exists and they believe that He is the creator of the universe and is capable of healing the sick and giving sight to the blind. But because they think it’s up to them to fix their situation, they don’t see our God, the God of miracles, as an option to bring a miracle to their situation. So they give up hope.

But when you are out of options, you’ve reached the end of your rope and you see that giving up is the only option left, then you are in a perfect place for God to step into your impossible situation and do the miraculous. When you think all hope is gone and you’ve exhausted all that you in your own power are capable of, then God is just waiting for you to say “God, I surrender! I can’t fix this!” It’s in that moment of surrender when you are willing to turn the situation over to Him that the doors can begin to open for your miracle to happen. The marriage that you thought never stoood a chance, the impossible financial situation, the hurt inside that you thought you would always have to live with or the addiction you can’t seem to overcome can begin to turn around. The key is surrender.

In a world seemingly filled with options, there really is only one foolproof option that works every time and that’s trusting God with every area of our lives. The best option will always be to surrender control to the One who has the world in His hands, including your world. He is more than able to make a miracle out of your mess. But in order for that to happen you must see God as an option in the first place then you have to be in a place where He is your only option. When those two things happen then nothing is impossible because with God all things are possible. Are you ready to surrender?