The Courageous Life - part 2

The Courageous Life - part 2
Genesis 50:15-21

The Call To Divine Leadership
We are challenged to live courageously:

• Submit to pressure from peers and you move down to their level.
  
• Speak up for your own beliefs and you invite them up to your level.
  
• If you move with the crowd, you'll get no further than the crowd.
  
• When millions of people believe in a dumb idea, it's still a dumb idea.
  
• Simply swimming with the tide leaves you nowhere.

When God gives His Word, His dream, our responsibility is to work with God and not for God!

Psalm 37:23 “The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD, And He delights in his way.”

Even in the face of opposition, continue in obedience to the will of God.

• Recognize that the Lord is with you irrespective of our situation.
  
• Genesis 39:2-3
  
• We don’t need to compromise our position to fulfill the dream, regardless of the cause.
• Isaiah 30:21 “Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” Whenever you turn to the right hand Or whenever you turn to the left.”
  
• I Thessalonians 5:21 “Test all things; hold fast what is good.”

Strive to live a courageous life. Confess Christ before men. Whatever station you occupy, in that station confess Christ. . . . Strive to live a joyful life. Live like men who look for that blessed hope, the coming of Jesus Christ.
--- J. C. Ryle

Pushing Back the Fall

• We live in a fallen and fractured world
  
• In a fallen world, things fall apart
  
• In nature, the inexorable law of entropy moves all things continuously backward, reverting in the direction of disorder and chaos
  
• Life requires constant upkeep

Missio Dei

• This is our mission, the purpose of God in our lives, a moment by moment, day by day, walk with the Holy Spirit.
  
• When we find mission and purpose, even in the lowest tasks if life, we can endure any circumstance of life.
  
• True joy, happiness is not dependent on circumstances.
  
• We need to place our lives, our work in a broader perspective.
• Denis Haack wrote: “Every legitimate vocation and trade pursued as a service to God is part of the spiritual task of pushing back the fall.”
  
• We are not just making a living, we are making a life!

Courage To Take a Stand

• Genesis 50:24-25
  
• Great Leaders:
  
  • Trustworthy in nature
    
  • Decisive in action
    
  • Visionary in purpose
    
  • Wise in counsel
    
  • Humble in achievement
    
  • Prayerful in courage

Revelation 21:7-8 He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

Proverbs 4:18 But the path of the just is like the shining sun, that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.