Frederickson Blog

Have you ever had to exercise a good amount of courage to overcome a difficult situation?

I’ll never forget the time several years back when I had to be courageous to complete a high ropes course at senior high camp. I was doing just fine when something incredibly out of the ordinary happened to me. About halfway through the ropes course, a bird, weaving its way through the tapestry of trees and apparently not seeing me, slammed into the side of my helmet, causing me to lose my focus. Suddenly, I dropped to my knees while hanging on for dear life to the ropes on both sides of me. As I knelt there scared stiff, trying to piece together what had just happened to me, I wondered, “How am I going to pull myself up from this one?”

Noticing that I wasn’t planning on moving anytime soon, my wife hollered up to me, “Stop focusing on failing and start focusing on finishing!” As I processed what she was saying to me, I realized there was no backing out. I had to shift my focus. So, after taking a few more moments of collecting myself, I started to change my focus from failing to envisioning myself finishing. I found myself feeling more and more confident, eventually to the point that I was able to gather enough courage to pick myself up and finish out the ropes course.

Throughout the month of October, we will be studying what it means for us to have unshakeable courage, a mindset or feeling that empowers us to face and overcome difficulty and/or dangerous situations. Being a part of God’s mission to save the world is a lot like being on a high ropes course. It is filled with unexpected turns and twists. It is filled with surprises that can suddenly knock us off course. If we are going to move ahead, we have to have courage!

The Bible promises us that when we face difficult circumstances, by shifting our focus onto the One who is unshakeable and leaning into the support of those He has placed in our lives, we can have unshakeable courage to overcome any challenge we may face—big or small!

This month, our students will be studying people like Gideon and Hezekiah, both of whom relied on the promises of God for courage to overcome the challenging surprises they faced. We will talk about the roles of the church and the Holy Spirit in our lives as the means through which God gives us courage to do what He has called us to do. We will also study historical figures like Dwight L. Moody, who—through his confidence in God and the support of others—had the courage to do God’s work in incredibly difficult circumstances.

When things try to knock us off the “high ropes course” of the mission of God, we have His promises before us, His Spirit within us, and the church around us to help us overcome those difficult situations. My prayer is that as we make this journey together, we would lean into these things to give us courage to overcome any challenge we may face.