Find Your Brave: Courage to Stand Strong When the Waves Crash In - Softcover

Wagner, Holly

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1601428812 ISBN 13: 9781601428813

Verlag: PRH Christian Publishing, 2017

Inhaltsangabe

Navigate Life’s Storms and Discover a Courage Like No Other
 
Have you ever found yourself in over your head, wondering how you would possibly get through with your faith and sanity intact?
 
Life seems good and then—BOOM!—out of nowhere comes a storm that threatens to drown your hopes. Your storm might be a job loss, loneliness, a crumbling relationship, financial ruin, a serious illness, or the death of a loved one. Whatever it is, you have a choice: Will you cower in fear or will you rise to the challenge?
 
Holly Wagner has endured her share of storms. In Find Your Brave she examines the dramatic shipwreck faced by the apostle Paul in Acts 27. There she uncovers profound truths that will guide you safely through life’s most difficult moments.
 
Through biblical teaching and personal stories, Holly offers a friendly voice in the midst of overpowering circumstances. She shows you how to anchor your trust in the God who remains faithful in every storm and in whose strength you can Find Your Brave.
 
#RefuseToSink
 
“Find Your Brave is the empowering message your heart needs.”
--Lysa Terkheurst, Proverbs 31 Ministries

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Holly Wagner is an author, international speaker, and the co-pastor of Oasis Church in Los Angeles, where she has served with her husband for more than 30 years. She is also the founder of GodChicks—an organization devoted to encouraging and equipping women around the globe. Her previous books include GodChicks, Awakened, Love Works, and WarriorChicks.

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Rising in the Darkness 

Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside of them was superior to circumstance. 
— Bruce Barton 

And though she be but little, she is fierce. 
— William Shakespeare 

It felt like a bomb was exploding under my bed. Our house alarm system was screeching, and I could hear dishes hitting the kitchen’s tile floor and shattering into a million pieces. The whole world seemed to be shaking. The electricity went out, and I could not see my hand in front of my face. 

You may not remember where you were at 4:31 a.m. on January 17, 1994 (other than in bed), but I will never forget. We were experiencing a massive magnitude 6.7 earthquake in Los Angeles. I had felt small tremors before but nothing close to this. The shaking was terrible, and the noise was even worse. I have since learned that when an earthquake occurs, the first waves to hit are the primary, seismic waves, which cause destruction as they hit various objects. The destruction caused is loud. That explained the bomb-like sound. 

As the quaking continued, my husband, Philip, yelled that he would get Paris, our two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and that I should grab our six-year-old son, Jordan. The house was pitch black. I glanced out our window and noticed that our whole neighborhood was dark, so I didn’t even have ambient city light to guide me. The earthquake still rumbled as I stumbled across our bedroom to get to the hall. A dresser flew across the room and clipped me in the legs, forcing me to my knees. Now I was crawling to get to my son. Panicked, I barely noticed the shards slicing into my hands and legs from the shattered glass of fallen pictures. But I am a mom, and like most moms, I did whatever was necessary to get to my kids! 

When I reached my son’s door, I couldn’t open it. Something had fallen on the other side and blocked it. 

“Jordan?! Jordan, open this door!” 

“Mom, I’m all right!” his scared little voice penetrated the door and pierced my heart. Eventually, we got the door open, and I clutched him close while we stood in the doorway, as those of us who live in earthquake zones have been instructed to do. 

Philip was holding Paris in her bedroom doorway, and we all braced ourselves as the first aftershock hit. It was just a little less intense than the initial jolt, but still frightening. Philip realized that we needed to get out of the house, so we grabbed a blanket and made our way downstairs and out to the front lawn. (It was winter, which in Los Angeles can be tough—sixty degrees or so. Don’t hate.) Somebody remembered to get the dog, and we all huddled under the blanket. The most important people—and animal—in the world to me were under that blanket on the lawn. 

A few houses near us exploded when their gas lines burst. We were afraid and anxious as burning embers flew over our heads. 
Finally the sun began to make its way over the horizon, and we could see the devastation around us. Blood oozed down my leg where the dresser had hit me—I hadn’t noticed the injury until that point. I carry the scars still. 

I entered our house and was stunned to see the chaos. Every wall was cracked, the chandelier had swung so hard it had broken a wall, the television and computer had been thrown across the room, all the plates and glasses were crushed into thousands of tiny pieces, and the kitchen appliances were no longer in the kitchen. In the light of day, the scene was shocking. The damage came to around seventy thousand dollars. At that moment, I wasn’t sure what to do next. I just knew that I wanted our nightmare experience to end. Right away. 

You may never face an earthquake like the one I experienced. I certainly hope not! But I’ve found it isn’t only the literal earthquakes that can tear us up. Figurative earthquakes can rock our lives with chaos and fear. And the aftershocks can feel just as devastating. 

At some point, the unfortunate reality is that we all will face some kind of earthquake, our own dark, scary challenge. The decisions we make during those difficult times are crucial; they determine whether or not we’ll make it through with our faith, relationships, and sanity intact. In the midst of our earthquake, Philip and I made some good decisions that led our family to safety, and we almost made some that I believe could have brought more damage (more about those later). 

The Bible tells us not to think it strange when a “fiery ordeal” comes our way.1 Just so ya know, I always think it is strange. But perhaps we need to make the decision not to take personally every challenge we face. Some trials might be of our making—our own bad choices, which we’ll discuss later—but plenty occur simply because we live on earth. God is not mad at you or me, and He is not punishing us. Challenges come to the good and the bad, to the just and the unjust . . . they come to us all. They are not those elective courses we get to choose in college, but rather they are part of the core curriculum of life. 

We Need Those Challenges? 
We face troubles of all kinds in our world, our country, our cities, our friendships, our families, and within our own hearts. Jesus promised us that in this world we would have trials, distress, and frustration—but that we should be at peace, because He has defeated the world for us and shown us how to overcome it as well.2 

When my daughter, Paris, was in middle school, we had to participate in the school’s science fair. The teacher’s instructions stated that parents were not supposed to help. I was happy about those directions; I had already graduated from middle school and felt no desire to do another science project. Paris was interested in horses, so she chose to build a papier-mâché horse, or what vaguely resembled a horse, which leaned significantly to the left. I helped her carry her project to the fair and was interested in seeing all the other sixth-grade projects.
After we set up Paris’s horse display, I looked around the room. I saw some amazing projects, including a giant set of lungs that breathed and a map of the United States that lit up according to how much power each city used. I looked back at Paris’s unique leaning horse and quickly realized that either some parents cheated or we had somehow ended up at a university science fair! 

After I reassured Paris that her project was interesting, I began to walk around the room, mainly to give myself time to forgive all those cheater parents. As I perused the submissions, I encountered the most amazing project: a miniature re-creation of the Biosphere 2, which I am so sure was built by a sixth grader. But I’m not bitter. 

In 1991, eight scientists lived for two years in an artificial environment in Oracle, Arizona, called Biosphere 2. (How they did that without a Starbucks is beyond me!) Inside the three-acre closed system was a small ocean, a rain forest, a desert, and a savannah grassland. The scientists produced every kind of weather pattern except wind. Eventually the...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: PRH Christian Publishing
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2017
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1601428812
• ISBN 13: 9781601428813
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 192
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@phaidon.com; gpsr@phaidon.com; ; Zähringerstraße 24; Berlin; 10707; Deutschland