Skip to main content

(in)courage

(IN)courage (EN)courage (COURAGE)



I have been thinking about these words. (IN)COURAGE was the name of a cute little paper/gift boutique around the corner from the Starbucks I frequented during college. I might have been a bit obsessed with it due to the amount of pink, glitter, and stationary that they carried but lets not get off topic :)


Encourage is defined by my buddy Marriam-Webster as:

     -To make (someone) more determined, hopeful, or confident.

     -To make (something) more appealing or more likely to happen.

     -To make (someone) more likely to do something: to tell or advise 
      (someone) to do something

but being the dictionary connoisseur that I am it really brought me the idea of courage which Merriam simply says: the ability to do something you know is difficult or dangerous.

I think what I am finding is we are called to be all three of these words.

"Be strong and COURAGEous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the LORD your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you." Deuteronomy 31:6, ESV, BibleHub

"That their hearts may be ENCOURAGEd, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ."Colossians 2:2, OpenBible

Which just leaves out the made up word of (IN)COURAGE that can be found in about 99% of womens ministries, Dayspring products, and conferences. Which I feel like wraps the two definitions into a bow- being put in(to) COURAGE. Each day we must face with COURAGE and place ourselves in it.

I say/share all of this to say what? 

Be of COURAGE, or as Casting Crowns would say " We were made to be COURAGEous, We were made to lead the way, We could be the generation, That finally breaks the chains". Know that God has your back, and has made you to face the lions, and tigers and bears (oh my). 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

LIFE: Camp

I have had an awful lot of un published blogs lately. These blogs come from deep routed feelings that have surfaced this year due to one thing or another. Maybe some day these blogs will be unearthed but for today, this blog needed to be written while it was still raw.  I have very vague memories of third or forth grade summer camp at Alto Frio, where I met Nana Pudding ( a christian puppet) and went pogging for the first time in a river. Summer after sixth grade,  I got in church vans and headed to Louisiana for the first time to attend Student Life Camp, then proceeded to go to Angelo State University and Glorieta New Mexico a few times. I spent time serving during spring breaks at Riverbend Retreat Center which lead to an internship over the summer. The week that "Curtis" and I first really got to know each other, we were at Glorieta for Centrifuge camp.  Camp is a special place for me. Camp is a happy place for me.  In 2018, I was able to experience camp through ...
Post a Comment
Read more

REVIEW: Gratitude: A Prayer and Praise Coloring Journal

{necessary information} I received this book as a try-me from Tyndale Publishers and the opinions expressed in this blog are mine alone and not those of the author or publisher {transparency of blogger} I have worked for preschools and coaching facilities and as a babysitter for most of my life. Sometimes you have an extra coloring sheet laying around while the kids are babysitting ( and sometimes it was on purpose) so you have to sit down with the kids and use the best crayons or color pencils available to color the extra page. Okay, okay, I love to color. There is something therapeutic to coloring.  { review Gratitude} I love all things girly, so the fact that this book came with a flowery firm cover- I was giddy. Then you open up to devotion surrounded with black and white images crying to be colored- I was over the moon. After I read the devotional there is room to journal through my thoughts, taking coloring breaks. I highly reccomend this book for all ages and would b...
2 comments
Read more

love is patient and kind

There is a point in your life when you have to accept that your plan for your family( brothers, sisters, moms and dads) and friends is not your own. I grew up in a family where if I had not accepted their changes, I would not have family and would have grown up sad and alone. I grew up in a family where they did not attend church, so they knew that I was not happy about their changes but I still loved them and prayed for them endlessly. I do not have to agree with people or be uplifted by someone to show them Gods love though loving them. God loves us even when we endlessly try to walk away by sinning. These people may not be doing what God wanted for them but it is not our place to throw it in their faces, once we tell them- we pray for them and keep loving them.
1 comment
Read more