Uncommon Bravery

“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized they had been with Jesus.”

- Acts 4:13

I don't know who said this next thing, It was scribbled next to this passage in my bible. Could be my could be my pastor. Who knows? Regardless the message is clear “When we are common and do uncommonly brave things for God people are driven to see that we have been with Jesus.”

How cool is that? One of the marks of being with Christ is uncommon bravery.

As fall is fast approaching bringing change to many of us we have to remember this. As we worry about fitting in and finding friends we have to balance it with knowing that we are different. Christ makes us different. But he doesn't give us a spirit of fear but of power and love and of a sound mind. We must first and foremost follow hard after Jesus with reckless abandon.

Here's when someone else would tell you that when you follow Jesus you will get friends and a boyfriend or girlfriend, or a good job, or a nice dorm. But that's not what I'm going to tell you. Because that's not the truth.

Let's have a story shall we? Peter, after Jesus of course, is my favorite bible character. Dudes so relatable.

So Peter just finishes a kinda wack dinner with Jesus, the last supper, and Jesus said to him “Hey just to let you know satan asked if he could have you so he could shift you like wheat.”

“Ha Ha! Satan! Man bru that dude is crazy right? Shift me like wheat...” *laughs*

“I actually told him yes.”

“Say what now?”

“I told him that he could, but I prayed that you can stand it, and when you have you can encourage others around you.”

• Luke 22:31-32, Not like directly quoted obviously, you should read the chunk yourself.

And that is exactly what happens, right after this is the rooster incident with Peter and then he repents and stays with the disciples and then he leads them as they tackle the next bit of life together.

So back to the point though God let Peter have all that stuff happen to him, and many other times in the bible we see a promise of persecution as a Christian. Basically all summed up following hard after Christ won't guarantee you friends, or a nice car, or a job, or a licence, or a significant other. In fact it only guarantees you one thing. Christ. But Christ is all we need.

He gives us bravery to go and do things, and meet people so we can glorify him. He gives us that uncommon bravery that draws people's attention not so we can feed our egos and do big things for us but so we can pass the attention to him.

So it doesn't really matter who we’re friends with, God will bring the people that you need to be in contact with. It doesn't really matter if you're moving because even though you're leaving behind a lot. You're not leaving behind Christ. See what I mean? Charles Spergeon sums it up perfectly.

“Don't let your hopes and fears come between you and Jesus; follow hard after him. He will never fail you.