We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 2 Corinthians 4:8‑9
When it comes to courage, you can’t chart it, you can’t put it on a line graph, you can’t measure its specific density. When it’s displayed, a person is a hero; when it’s missing, we call them cowards.
Eddie Rickenbacker was a man who knew about courage. In World War I, he was responsible for downing 26 planes. Rickenbacker said, “Courage is doing what you are afraid to do. There can be no courage unless you’re scared.”
Someone defined courage saying, “Courage is fear that has prayed.” Certainly, courage involves what you do. One of our modern heroes of medicine is Dr. Werner Forssmann. In 1929, Forssmann, age 25, was a medical student. He was tantalized by the fact it was impossible to treat certain heart conditions, because in those days, doctors knew practically nothing about the inside of the human heart. People constantly died, condemned to their deaths, because doctors knew so little about the heart.
Forssmann had an idea—he thought his idea might be the answer. He went to his professors and shared the proposal with them. They were horrified and expressly forbade his experiment. He was convinced, however, that he was right, and he had the courage to become his own guinea pig. He cut a vein and worked a tiny rubber tube up his arm to his shoulder, then down to his heart. He then walked into the X‑ray room and X‑rayed himself, to be sure the tube had arrived in his heart.
That bold act was the beginning of cardiac catheterization—a technique that has enabled surgeons to X‑ray the heart, measuring vessels in the heart and correct defects. Forssmann demonstrated that courage involves action.
In the realm of the spiritual, just the same, courage is action. Look at Abraham, who left Ur of the Chaldees with only the promise that God would lead him. Courage is what old Elijah had when he stormed into the presence of the king and said, “As the Lord, God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years” (1 Kings 17:1). Wow!
Courage is what Daniel displayed when he went into his home, threw back the windows, and prayed three times a day, even though the king had passed a law forbidding prayer. Courage is what old Jonah had when he walked into the city of Nineveh, a city of perhaps half a million people, and announced God would destroy the city in 40 days.
Whether it is medicine, history, or Scripture, people who have accomplished something have been individuals who were courageous, who acted in the face of danger and accomplished what they didn’t even dare to think.
If ever a time has come when courage was needed, I believe that is today. We need to find courage to speak our convictions, to stand for what is right, to abide by principles, rather than expediency. I have to say, however, that often when you are courageous, you pay a price for that. It would be a fool who says that courage doesn’t cost something, but real courage considers the rightness of the action that you need to take.
So, where do you get this kind of courage? Is there a prescription for it? Paul said, “If God is for us, who can be against us” (Romans 8:31)—that’s part of it. Paul, like any man who stands courageously for a cause, was troubled, but he could say, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed” (2 Corinthians 4:8‑9). Paul could, and so can you, as you thank God and take courage.
Resource Reading: Acts 26
