FINDING COURAGE IN TRYING TIMES

This is a guest post by Joseph Lalonde. He is a youth leader at Oak Crest Church of God and leadership blogger at JMLalonde.com. Joseph shares leadership tools and encourages you to become a better leader. Connect with him on Twitter or at his blog.

Courage is an amazing tool. It allows us to move forward even when we're fearful of what's ahead. It allows us to overcome the obstacles that we set up for ourselves.

I want you to think about the last time you had to use your courage. Can you think back to a time when you had to do this?

Put yourself into that position again and examine what you had to do to build up the courage to take the action and defeat the fear.

Relive the moment. Let the situation sink in. I bet you'll discover you had to find the courage deep within yourself. 

Why Courage is Important

Courage is important for many reasons. When we have courage you're able to face difficult situations. We're also able to move ahead when we are unsure of what is ahead.

Without courage we might never take the actions to move forward in life. We'd also never take the steps God wants us to take.

His ways are beyond our understanding. You'll find yourself wondering what you should be doing next.

But when we have courage, we can move forward with the confidence that we can overcome the dangers ahead.

Finding Courage

Not everyone has an easy time finding courage to move ahead in life. I'm one of those people at times.

I look at situations around me and feel like there's no hope. No chance of coming out on top.

The times are trying and I'm not sure what to do.

This is what happens when I lack the courage and cannot find it. I'm brought down and become discouraged.

Yet when I find courage my outlook changes. I feel confident. I feel energized. I see excitement and adventure ahead.

I believe there's a way to find courage when we need it in trying times. I know I have and know you can as well.

There's two things that bring us courage:

Experience: There's nothing like having experience in a situation. When you've experienced an issue before and overcome it, you can see that there is hope for the future.

The hope then brings courage to face trying times. You can recall the moments of success and use those as stepping stones to take the next steps you need to take.

God: The other thing that can bring courage is God. We know He's going to call us to do BIG things. He does that to people. Sometimes I think it's to test us. Other times it's to show the world that God uses the least of these and the unqualified.

How can this give us courage when I just said He calls the unqualified? It's easy when we begin to look through the Bible and see what God has done.

He's called men like Moses. What movies like the 10 Commandments and the cute Bible stories overlook is the fact that Moses was a stutterer and had to rely on Aaron to relay God's message to Pharaoh.

Or take a look at Joseph. His brothers beat him up, threw him in a pit, had a woman accuse him of assault, and more. Joseph could easily have given up and lost courage. Instead he kept going because he knew God had a plan. He was able to stay courageous.

Focus on God's goodness and the fact that He wants you to be courageous.

Question: How have you been courageous in the past? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.