Biblical Courage - [Psalm 27:14]

Dear God our Heavenly Father, we thank you Lord for bringing us this morning here to worship you Lord as we open up your word, we pray that You would instruct us you would teach us you would lead us in our walk.

This morning and in the week ahead we come at this time into your hand in Christ name. We pray All right. So today's subject is biblical courage a Little while back. We looked at humility and As I was thinking of some of the characteristics of believers I Saw humility as one of the pieces of the puzzle, you know when God made man There's so many aspects to humanity that we have and one of the things that should characterize us as humility.

But it's with a fall everything is kind of fragmented and we've kind of all fallen apart. And when you take the pieces and put them together again. Humility is one of them that I think we need to work hard and the Bible Emphasizes it a lot for believers.

We need to work at it because by nature we are proud after the fall and one of the complementary sides of humility is courage and. So I thought you know today let's look at what the Bible says about biblical.

The courage the way God meant us to have so here is a quotation I think this would kind of Set us off this morning. Here is a man who said He was standing for something courageously and he said if I change my stance today who will speak out?

I am mindful that I can be assassinated anytime, but I want to live in history as a courageous man. This person his name was Shabazz Bhatti, and he was a Pakistani Christian politician and As many of you know he was assassinated last week, and there was a funeral there.

I do not know about his theology, but it was Genuinely a Christian or not, but he did stand up for something that was Not very popular and some Taliban Assassins actually killed him. He stood up for something boldly even though he knew the consequences.

Biblical Courage in Scripture and Christian Character

When we think of biblical courage. What are some of the names that come to mind who who are some biblical characters that you can think of? Daniel okay Daniel says Daniel Joseph and he stood up for and one of the more common one would be Genesis 39 when he was accused falsely, but.

Yeah, he stood up there. Excellent example that Elijah and the Prophets of Baal so one man standing up against entire nation. And here is every other false prophet, and he has no fear it seems at least when he stands up.

Caleb so Joshua and Caleb entering the promised land and what did Caleb say or do? Yeah good example. Yeah, and I like Caleb even more in his old age. Give me those hills where nobody else wants to go.

Janet John Bunyan. Excellent. Can you give us why. And I think Bunyan's kind of courage is a little more unique. And I think we will see some of those examples, too. Here is his wife and children, and he needs to support them.

He has a choice he can choose not to preach the gospel and come out and support his family, but He says he can't do that so he is almost on his own accord in prison and Has to trust God for his family and everything else.

And great examples. Jesus we will we will get to that. I want to pick one specific example of Jesus Christ as our model for courage this morning. So let's with all those examples in our minds. Let's look at a definition of courage just from the dictionary.

It's the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty danger and pain without fear. It is to have courage of one's convictions to act in accordance with one's beliefs especially in spite of.

It's it's actually an inward quality. It's not necessarily what you actually do, but what is it up inside you that propels you to act courageously or boldly so Does the Bible command us to have courage?

Be strong and of good courage. Excellent. The cowardly one as one of the characteristics of those who do not inherit the kingdom. I'm gonna just use a couple of verses here, and then keep that as our banner.

Look at a few examples of what? Courage is not what courage is and then we will look at an example of Jesus Christ and some instructions for us as believers. And then we will spend the rest of our time in a psalm that is a is a good example I think for all of us to Strengthen those weak arms, and then you know go out into battle, so we that's my goal today.

We will try to move quickly so we can go through this. So this one of the commands that I have is from the song from Psalm 27 Wait for the Lord be strong and let your heart take courage wait for the Lord.

This is the psalm. This is the end of the psalm. After the psalmist has prayed to God he in he Exhausts the believer to wait and and have and be courageous as you wait for the gods deliverance. So let's now look at what courage is not.

Even before we do that. Let's look at it from the worldly Side of things you know courage is something I think even the people in the world would admire. Well as humility is something that not necessarily is as attractive.

Can you give me some examples of worldly courage? People you see who are not necessarily Christians are courageous for. Yeah, so he had a purple heart, and he actually was wounded in the line of duty.

Excellent. Can you give an example? Excellent example, so you look at it as a sense of minority against a majority. But if the minority is not necessarily standing for the truth, then although they may look courageous.

There's really no Weight behind that excellent example. He's very well known for his speeches and for rallying the troops as you will then and Leading on excellent. Yes, and so the same thing on the positive side you know someone who stands up against injustice but.

And willing to give up their lives now. Let me ask you something for all of these. What is the source of courage for the people in the world? Why would someone throw himself on the bomb or take a bullet or?

Stand up so some one of the motivation thing factors would be their selves. A Principle so something that you you think is so important that you would be willing to even die for it. Yeah, so this is something that I believe is right, and I will give my life for that.

That's right, so sometimes the courage is cumulative not necessarily Individual. Yeah, and that's an excellent example after we need to look at that more closely. But many a time it is not necessarily courage.

But bravado or even foolishness, but if they succeeded then okay. You know everything turned out fine, but there are many who didn't and you don't care about their stories. Actually, we have a few biblical Verses.

I want us to just quickly put in our mind as we think of these so as we think of the world. There are very various reasons self. Maybe even love for someone else like a parent who loves the child so much that they would sacrifice.

And be courageous to support the child, but it doesn't seem humanly possible for ideals for For various reasons, but God is not the main Motivating factor behind this courage it is something other than God and like Charlie was pointing out sometimes these acts of courage may not necessarily be Warranted you know if they could be for the wrong reasons or they Could have been actually dangerous not a wise thing to have been so called courageous.

They could have been just bravado and folly. I have a few verses. So the way I want to do it is if some of you would be willing to read these verses just lift your hands. I'll give you a few verses so all of us can quickly read them.

So can I see a few hands those I need about eight verse eight people who can read this? Okay, Brian, can you take some 107 26? And Jeremiah 4 9 Ezekiel 22 14 Proverbs 7 13 22 14 Proverbs 21 29 Proverbs 28 1.

I need one more and Second Samuel 4 1 so let's go through those verses. We'll quickly skim them, and then we'll go to the biblical courage yes. Give me a reference and then your verse and we'll do the Ezekiel passage, and we'll talk about.

So here are two examples where God has set his face against the people so normally when we think of calamity. We think of it in human terms whether it is natural or man-made, but when God puts his Affliction upon us when he sets his face against us what what God says here through his prophets is.

Your courage cannot stand no matter how how much you put your feet together and your lock your arms together. Nothing is going to stand because when I bring calamity that's going to blow away all your courage.

So those are two examples of how the worldly courage or in this case actually apostate Israel's courage cannot stand up against God and who has some 107. This is if for those of you know someone or seven.

This is the people who take their voyages and ships so the ones who are going to heavens are not in spacecraft. They are on a ship on a very high wave and then but they fall down from there. You know it's it's terrifying and it's just a force of nature and these people who went out there you know brave and courageous out to as See Ferris were overcome by the nature's power and knew that they had really nothing in which to Deal with this problem that has come their way humanly.

It was impossible and it talks about the courage that actually fleas when you are in those circumstances. So there are times no matter how courageous you might be. You know that your end is near and there's really nothing you can do so that's just a human example.

Proverbs 7 13. Yes for those of you who know Proverbs 7 Eric Johanson preached on this last Sunday evening and or the previous Sunday evening. This is about the adulterous woman who? It talks about her husband being away and then seducing another man and of course it takes a lot of courage to do something.

That's stupid, but There is no honor. There is nothing right. There is no value in what she was doing and what the Solomon says here is she just puts on a bold face. She just thinks okay, you know I'm gonna get what I want, and I'm just gonna be bold about it.

But that was going to be destruction as a result of her actions Proverbs 21 29 and one of the ways especially in the world we live in we see people who in the workforce in in Areas where people would just want to project a strong Sense of who they are.

What is it that they I am very good at this job. I'm very good at this and I'm going to just Sell myself you know that's the that's the Society we live in that's how you need to project yourself. Oh, you're not going to get a job.

I had a friend who was interviewing and he was a weak and kind. Nobody was calling him back. You need to say I can do it. I am I've done all this before and I will do it again and When you look at it from the aspect of righteousness and evil The one who's wicked who set in his ways just goes forth boldly doing whatever he thinks he can and The end of that would be destruction whereas for the believer.

We don't just Walk headlong into whatever path we choose, but rather we Examine it in the light of the Lord. We want to make sure what we do is Godly before we actually step and go forth boldly and the last verse is 2nd Samuel 4 1 and For those of you knowing this background Who is Bush it was the son of Saul?

So you have the armies of David and the armies of Saul fighting after Saul and John and Jonathan are dead and Who was the commander for David's armies? Job and Abner was the commander for it was it and Good or bad Abner is now killed and Ish Bush it had put his trust in his commander.

So his commander was the man who was going to help his line survive. And now that man is dead and there is no longer courage because he had placed his trust in a human being and when that Man is gone.

There is no more hope or courage for his position. So just a few examples of how we can have Courage in the wrong things or not have courage because we do not have the strength in and of ourselves. So with this in mind, what about biblical courage, so what should biblical courage look like what should be its source?

Excellent. The verse the psalm 27. We're going to look at is The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear? Normally when we think of courage think of in the definition difficulty danger and pain that come from some source.

So if the source is anything other than God That's not the place where you need to be afraid of. But rather you need to be looking up to God as the measure of your actions no matter what the danger is and on the flip side.

You know, we do need to fear God because God is the one to whom we are ultimately accountable. So good example. So, yes, yeah this. Yes, this is not a biblical dictionary I Have a longer definition, but I don't think any of them has.

The righteousness aspect of it one of the things that says to act in accordance to one's beliefs but That's as close as the world can come but you're right a true biblical courage has to have righteousness or the will of God behind it.

So the source of the Christians courage is always And completely in God alone the verse that we started off with wait for the Lord be strong and let your heart take courage. Wait for the Lord. It is in God that we take our courage.

It is not in our own abilities. It's not in what even what God has provided for us, but it is in God himself and that's always the source for the Christians Courage and secondly, it would be wise in two senses unlike the World which sometimes just goes headlong and then into destruction the Christian like we read from Proverbs.

One of the Proverbs that we read. You want to be aware of? What God has called you to is this something that you? Need to act upon and when you do do you understand the consequences of what? Your actions would be you just don't go foolishly into something and say I was bold for these actions.

We're going to look at a bunch of examples again. But before we do that, I want to give a caution. I mentioned that biblical courage always takes its source in God. A very famous rallying cry. In the church in the past used to be this dare to be a Daniel.

Have you heard that I honestly didn't know about it till I. Does anyone know what that is dare to be a Daniel and Why that mean is Yes, I think they call it the evangelism strategy for the tweens so from 9 to 13, it's a it is a strategy where Children you do not want to be peer pressured by the rest of your classmates, but rather be bold and courageous for God.

I don't think that necessarily is wrong, but there was Something else that was even before Billy Graham. Okay, I Found this hymn, which is called dare to be a Daniel. You do okay, well if you all don't know it I don't want to spoil your.

I Thought I was the only one who didn't know that him so the point of this hymn is very simple. You know you know what Daniel did. Daniel stood courageously before an entire nation before the king and he said and I'm not going to eat the food that the king offers to me if I.

You know just see that I will prove God to you in one sense and if God if the king doesn't like it then so be it take off our heads and or Daniel's friends in bow down to the Statue and we will not and they Demonstrated courage at the face of death and God proved them.

He walked with them in the In the furnace where they were thrown so these are examples of Christians who or believers who actually trusted in God. Now when you say dad to be a Daniel there is a there is something that you need to watch out for which is.

You know here are these men. Here's what they did and therefore. I want to do it, too. In the New Testament you have something like that that happened. Can you think of something that people did that way and didn't turn out all that well?

Pharisees and Sadducees, okay. Excellent so you just look at the outside. It's beautiful, or you know this is what Seems admirable, and I'm going to do it without really a heart change. That's what I was thinking of so Paul cast out demons by the power of God and here are these Fake Jewish exorcists who come around and try to do the same and the devil says I know Jesus I know Paul, but who are you and?

Gives them a routing so the point is it's not about these men who demonstrated the power of God courageously. But rather in the God in whom these men worship so when you talk about there to be a Daniel be very Careful because it's so easy to be caught up in the outward to say oh all this is very nice.

And I want to be just the same and there is actually a sinful pride there where you're not really thinking of bringing honor to God, but rather just be as famous as Daniel was and. And so even when we emulate Christians and biblical models we want to always remember.

It's not about these men. It's never about these men. We will see one of the examples here. It's about the God who enabled these men and the trust and the faith that these men had in their God that helped them walk Through these difficult times, so let's pick a few more verses if I can have a few hands that can read Brian acts 413 acts 431 Ephesians 3 12.

Dave Dave Farrah can I have you have Daniel 10 19 and Acts 23 11 so Brian can you so acts 4? Early church the Apostles are boldly proclaiming the Jewish authorities who have just crucified Jesus Christ bring them in to question them and Peter has no fear when he is speaking before these men.

We want to honor Christ and These men had no education. Humanly they did not have the qualifications to stand up and speak before these Jewish leaders. But the source of their courage source of their knowledge source of their ability everything that they had to speak.

Came from their association with Jesus Christ, and so that's Acts 413 who has 31 yeah. So this follows right after this where the Apostles are now released they were imprisoned or they were in the they were Going to be charged and possibly not permitted to speak.

But they beat them and sent them out and then the church prays together. And then they see an enabling by the Spirit of God so here these they are Strengthened by God himself by the Holy Spirit, and then they now speak with even more boldness.

Although the opposition is mounting they have no fear because God is strengthening them inwardly. Efficience once again. This is this is talking about something different so efficiency you are looking at Courage that we have to approach God so Brian was talking about fearing God of fearing men here.

Paul is writing about the boldness that believers have to access God's own throne and sometimes we just take it for granted as Christians. Yeah, yeah, I went and prayed this morning and If you just think about what it meant in the Old Covenant.

You know it was only the high priest goes once a year into the Holy of Holies here. We have complete access in Hebrews you read into the throne of grace you Romans 5 we we can just walk forth into God's presence and that takes a little bit of courage.

Which I think sometimes we may be a little foolhardy. You know walking into this prayer this morning Lord, thank you so much, and I had a good day. I'm not even thinking sometimes what I'm saying. I'm just praying.

When we remember who this God is and whose presence we are when we petition when we praise I think it you rightly would need that kind of courage which we have through Jesus Christ because he has provided for us.

Dave do you also have Daniel 10? That's okay. Can you? Can I have no that's fine. Dave can I have Daniel 10 19 In the back. This is Daniel. He's a little older now than when he was a teenager, and you know jumping against the king and here he is praying and He has an angelic visitation.

This angelic visitor was withheld by the Prince of Persia, which was a Principality that was at work and here he is coming and this angel. When when Daniel sees him he just feels like he should die. He has no strength anymore to even converse with this with his angelic being in front of him and then The angel speaks to him encourages him and Daniel says I was encouraged I was I was given courage by what this visitor spoke to me.

There are things that are greater and far more dangerous than the rising seas and the and the tornadoes that come our way and Daniel instead of the Food and the and the false idol worship that he had faced as a young man now He looks at something even more fearsome, which is God's Presence and his his angels in whose presence he is now and but my point is this it's not about Daniel.

And his own ability to be strong. But rather the strength that Daniel receives from this angelic visitor and the last one we have is acts 23 11. So this is Paul. He has just finished. Speaking to the Jewish people they want to rip him apart the Romans have kept him for protection and there is a there is a conspiracy to kill him and Just before the conspiracy is revealed the next few verses will will reveal that God says well if you thought the heat was not enough in Jerusalem, we'll now go to Rome.

Jerusalem is the capital of Israel if you will small province of the Empire of Rome. Now you go to the center of the capital pagan city and these emperors in the future We will see will will come at the Christians with force.

But that's where you need to go and I'm the one who's going to send you and I will give you the courage that you Need to speak there. So before it happens God strengthens Paul Directly so he can actually speak faithfully in Rome.

So here are a few examples of Christians who were found their strength in God and God ordained means rather than in themselves. Now with that I want to just turn to Matthew 26 because I think the greatest example of courage that we can ever look At is Jesus Christ himself.

When we think of I didn't cover this David we think of David and Goliath young man. When the whole nation is standing at those who went to Israel where you did you visit the valley of Elah where? Can you tell us what it is like.

Sure, one of any of you who've been there and and the valley there. Is it like a Narrow ravine or is it like a wide Space the prophets of Bill. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. I always have this cotton book pictures of the.

You know the river going through and then there is uh, Dave Goliath on one side and and David. Okay. So the point is this you have a battle. This is from first samuel 17. We'll come to Matthew 26 in a minute in first samuel 17.

You have the philistine army standing up over there. You have uh, king saul and the israelite army on this side. And and the philistine army comes and puts out a challenge. Blasphemes the god of israel and says, you know, we have this champion goliath.

Let one of your men who has the courage come and fight against him and whoever wins wins the battle. And the king saul who was head and shoulders above the rest of israel was also the ordained king had the authority to fight but There was no courage in him to to stand up against this um this heathen who was blaspheming God but instead what we see is young David when he comes he has something very different to say Of Yeah, so in verse 45 of first samuel 17 david said you come at me with spear.

Sword and spear and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the lord. Of course the god of the armies of israel whom you have defied. This day the lord will deliver you into my hand and I will strike you down and cut off your head.

And I will give the dead bodies of the hosts of the philistines this day to the birds of the air. And to the wild beasts of the earth and all the earth may know that there is a god in israel. And that all this assembly may know The israelites that the lord saves not with sword and spear for the battle is the lord's and he will give you into our hand.

The norm in ancient warfare was they would do my hebrew prof said trash talk their job is to come and speak low of your enemy and Make your courage go away make you feel afraid and david here comes and he's not talking about his own strength.

But in the strength of the god who was going to fight the battle for him and as you know this end of the story was God vindicated david's faith because god had put that faith in him and he proved himself strong through a strappling youth, I mean goliath saw him and he was.

You're too beneath me to even fight. That was a contempt that he had for david, but god rescued Israel through this nation. It's also wonderful to see how god Convinced israelites and saul to let david fight who would want a young kid to fight lose and then have your nation defeated.

And you it's very interesting when you see what david says to saul. He says god will rescue me. It's not my strength, but god has proved himself to me in the past the same god who's Uh going to defeat goliath is the one who helped me defeat these.

And i'm sure saul was thinking okay lion bear Wild beast goliath. I think that's a fair fight. You know god had actually demonstrated his power to david before but here was a case of victory. And now I want us to look at matthew 26, which is a totally different Scenario altogether.

I think for sake of time we will probably finish with this. We won't get into our Psalm today. So in matthew 26 beginning at verse 36. Then jesus went with them to a place called gethsemane. And he said to his disciples sit here while I go over there and pray.

And taking with him peter and the two sons of sepideh he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them my soul is very sorrowful even to death remain here and watch with me. So as all of you know, this is the last night in the life of jesus christ.

He has come to the culmination of his purpose. He knew all along that this was the reason he has come here. He was born as a baby. He lived a perfect life. He did his ministry on earth for this one Final culmination the cross on which he needs to die and that's what he has come and as you heard in the messages That was the eternal What does pastor might call it the trinitarian council?

Where in eternity past this was decided that jesus christ would come and die on the cross on behalf of sinners and here it is few hours away before this entire purpose of history is to be culminated and jesus knows the consequences of his actions and there he he Says my soul is very sorrowful even to death remain here and watch with me.

Part of courage is always dealing with the problem In your heart and your mind and settling it before you actually act in those circumstances in which you are placed so here christ is seeing the cross the physical agony that he's going to suffer the Spiritual agony of separation from god the father and bearing the sin.

What he has got hates just as thoroughly as the father does and bearing it upon himself and the punishment of sin on himself, too. So all these things are in his mind as he is contemplating it. He goes and prays and We see in verse 39 Going a little further.

He fell on his face and prayed saying my father if it is possible Let this cup the cup of your wrath pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will but as you will jesus was not Wavering in his resolve to obey the father's will but as a human he felt the weight.

Um when when we there is a term I didn't write this down. Um, when we think of weak knees uh Who's the king belshazzar when he saw the finger writing on the wall? We read that his knees basically shook and he lost courage.

He knew that this was judgment upon him when we think of buckling Legs you are looking at a weight that is upon you not necessarily physical but a situation that is just so enormous That you can no longer bear yourself up.

That's what happened to belshazzar his legs started to buckle. Here you have jesus christ looking at the enormity of the suffering that is before him and he Does not rely on himself. I mean throughout the life of jesus christ, even though he's god completely divine and Sinless he as a human fully and completely relies in god and god alone.

And even here when he comes to the culmination the greatest test of his um The greatest test that he is going to face. He comes to god the father and lays his petition before him and that's an excellent model for all of us today when we face our Weight that is beyond us.

The place that we need to find our strength is in god the father. In god himself, even though he is the one who is ordained that particular trial in us so he comes before god lays his petition before him and says if it is your will this is I.

I do not Take joy in drinking this cup of your wrath. He goes back to his disciples. They're still sleeping. They can't watch what with one within one hour Comes back again verse 42 and he says father if this cannot pass unless I drink it Your will be done and he takes great courage in knowing that the father in whom he trusts is sufficient for all his needs even though the path through which he needs to get through is Is not something that he is going to enjoy it is going to be like a defeat before he can see the End and in fact throughout the life of christ when you look at the glory and especially in the gospel of john the glory is always In the suffering when you actually trust god and demonstrate that you you believe in him.

So the courage that comes out of it is your relationship to god with god that is proved in the midst of that trial and there is a Throne waiting on the other side. There is a crown that will be given and there is a resurrection that is to come.

But you need to walk through that cross you need to walk through that valley of the shadow of death and will you Trust in god through that time and that is the demonstration of God's power in our life and it showcases the courage that we as believers are called to.

So we have just a couple of minutes that we have left, um. What I wanted to do was just throw out a few Practical examples so you and I may not necessarily face an assassin's bullet tomorrow or you know, we're not living on a um in libya where you know, you can have some rebels break down your walls and um Helicopters shoot you down and your family our Trials may seem a little more mundane in comparison to these but in each of our lives in the places that we are called to live That specific trial Is what god wants us to live courageously through?

He those specific trials are the ones where god wants to prove his power in your life and in the lives of those around you. So I had a few written down but you can just throw Some examples out as well.

I had a few external examples like when financial strains just overwhelm you when help of yourself or your loved ones just goes So bad that it seems that there is no hope when relationships with loved ones break.

And you are in a place where you need to act but there seems to be no A pleasant way to act or the ones that are even more dangerous are the ones that are inwardly in your own heart when your mind struggles With what is right and wrong or when your mind does not have the fortitude To act upon what you know is right when your emotions just seem to be playing In all different directions are not as focused upon the will of god as you would like it to be.

What would you do right now will Let me stop here. So I just threw out a few examples. Uh, there's there's plenty more but Give me a give me Seeing what we've seen from the scriptures. What do you see?

Christian's response a courageous response in trials like these on others excellent, so uh God says that his grace is sufficient for us in our time of trial. He never tempts us. He never puts a trial for which we are Insufficiently matched so if god would place us in a place Of trial we can always be sure that god also gives us everything that we need in order to walk faithfully through that time and To step one step back is to know scripture.

So when you know this, you know that you are not there Uh as an orphan abandoned in battle you have your father with you in the midst of your trial. Excellent example That used to be my favorite verse, uh, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee because when did you lose all hope there's Some verses that you just cling on to and Um, each of us has our own favorite one.

Um, not necessarily scriptural a scripture to back this up. Um, examples of how you actually walk through those trials any On your knees and that's normally the hardest thing for us to do in the midst of a trial isn't it when?