“BE OF GOOD COURAGE”
Jeremy Brien
Mark 6: 47-50; 10: 46-52; Acts 6: 5-8
I feel very challenged, and yet encouraged to share an impression that I have had throughout the day. I felt challenged by the word previously as to substance. In days of reduction there is smallness, but at the same time God’s work is not limited. My impression is, “be of good courage”. I would love to learn from the older brethren what it is to have courage in times of discipline, what it is to have courage in times such as the disciples here, where they are out rowing in the middle of the sea. There were winds and they were challenged and seemed to be going away from the Lord. The thought struck me that, as we go through exercises, and the brethren could share their experiences, it is the Lord saying, “Be of good courage: it is I”. I would love to have the impression in my soul and in my heart of the Lord saying, Be of good courage: it is I. It is the Lord Himself who is reaching out to us. I was thinking of Peter, when he went to walk on the sea in a different presentation, he began to sink and he said, Lord save me and the Lord put out His hand and pulled him up. I was wondering whether these experiences of having spiritual courage and knowing the presence of the Lord saying, “it is I” would help us grow in the way of substance. Is that how our hearts are to gain experience and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, to gain knowledge of God and His thoughts? To gain knowledge of what God’s thoughts are in purpose. How wonderful His thoughts are and how far beyond each one of us they may be, but we can enter into them in some little way. “It is I; be not afraid”.
I was impressed with the section in Mark 10 and was wondering whether as we go through our experiences and go along in our Christian pathway we have points of time where we are afraid. The common definition of courage may be that you go forward in the face of fear, but I wonder if God would want us to have a spiritual thought of courage in that when the Lord asks you to do something you go and do it. This man, in one sense, had courage. He was saying, “O Son of David, Jesus, have mercy on me”. What a wonderful thing it is to be able to reach out to the Lord, whether we are going through extreme discipline or whether we are in times of joy, and to have the sense of freedom that we can reach out to the Lord at any time and say, “O Son of David, Jesus, have mercy on me”. I am sure all here can say a little of their experience. I know a little in my own experience to be able to reach out to the Lord and say, Jesus have mercy on me. (What a thing that is to be able to have the Lord come and say, “it is I; be not afraid”). It is wonderful that Bartimaeus was able to reach out to say this, and I think in the context of courage, people were rebuking him here and telling him to be silent, but he continued to call out. It is a wonderful thing when you want to reach out to the Lord and you do not stop. When you want the Lord Jesus in your life, and you want to work out things in your own life according to God’s will, nothing can separate or stop you from that. What a wonderful thing that must be and I would love to learn more about that in my own life. The brethren here have so much experience that I could learn from. “And they call the blind man, saying to him, Be of good courage, rise up, he calls thee”. What a wonderful thing that it is to be able to rise up and go to the Lord.
In Acts 6, I was asking myself the question, how do these things work out? How do we have spiritual courage? I wondered whether Stephen tells us exactly what it is, “and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit”. I would like to learn more of being full of faith and the Holy Spirit. A brother once told me, it is an amazing thing that the Holy Spirit lives in you! What a wonderful thing that is to be full of the Holy Spirit and full of faith. I wish I knew more about that.
These are my simple thoughts. How do I have spiritual courage? I would like to know more about it so that I would be of more substance, and be of use to the Lord. Perhaps something simple or great. We do not know what the Lord has ahead for us, but I do know that He wants us to serve Him. I entrust these simple thoughts to the brethren for His glory.
London
14th December 2004