Join us in June as we unpack stories of ordinary people in the Bible displaying Unexpected Courage.                                                                                

You can also download and print a copy HERE: unexpected courage spiel pdf.

Life is filled with unexpected twists and turns. Often, it’s during these unplanned moments that the true essence of human nature revealed. An unexpected request, even as mundane as asking someone to pick up your mail, has the power to transcend the boundaries of casual acquaintanceship and open the door to genuine friendships. Three benefits are experienced.

1. Acts of Kindness: Seeding Friendships

 When someone asks for assistance with a simple task like collecting their mail, it presents an opportunity for kindness, empathy, and trustworthiness to shine. The person making the request…you, or your neighbor, demonstrates vulnerability, while the person accepting the responsibility for the task responds with compassion and willingness to help. Both parties will experience the value of mutual support. Isn’t the essence of true friendship?

2. Shared Responsibility: Building Trust

Entrusting someone with a task that affects their personal belongings, home or dear ones, neighbors forge a bond on built trust. A connection based on dependability and trust begins to grow, laying the ground work for a deeper relationship.

3. Unexpected Connections: Discovering Common Ground

 Just this past Sunday my father was attending an anniversary celebration of a church in the city of Milwaukee. Having recently been struggling to recover from a knee injury he has been using a cane to support him. As is often the case with new “cane users” on Sunday he left the cane in the car. On his way walking back a few blocks from the church to his car to go home, his knee gave out on him and he was trapped on the sidewalk unable to take another step. Two men drove by, saw him struggling, stopped and helped him into the car and got him to his car. These men happened to be men of color. I wonder what common ground was discovered in that moment.  Maybe, just maybe, with this greater awareness we will continue to grow in seeing these unexpected requests not as distractions, but actual Divinely appointed interruptions helping us connect with others in more meaningful ways.

Last month my husband and I attended the Weekend to Remember marriage conference that makes its way to Madison every year. That time together to do a “marriage check up” and be reminded to make our relationship a priority is always such a blessing. We learned many nuggets of wisdom that weekend. The first was that if we are not intentionally growing towards each other, we will drift apart. This surprised me. I always thought that if we just chugged along, we would at least stay on a parallel course. The truth, though, is that we will actually drift apart. The same can happen with God.  If we are not energetically nurturing our relationship with the Lord, we will drift away from Him (but He will never drift away from us)! Another golden nugget was that we need the Holy Spirit to love our spouse (or anyone) well. We need God (specifically the Holy Spirit) to empower us to love when our human nature says to run or fight, to see our own sin and forgive others’ sin, and to do the right thing. How do we become aware of the Spirit’s presence so we can be so empowered? We purposefully depend on God and invite Him into all of our interactions and decisions. It just so happens that our church has created a series of Life Marks to help see where we may need to make changes to grow closer to God.  You can read all four of them on our church website, but I’d like to highlight the “I AM Dependent on Christ” life mark, which is made up of these four attributes:

• Grace: Have I received Jesus by faith and do I allow Him to love and accept me in spite of who I am?
• Surrender: Am I giving up my idols to give Jesus center stage in my life?
• Focus: Do my calendar, relationships, and checkbook display that I am fully relying on God?
• Prayer: Am I pursuing a more intimate relationship with God by allowing time for conversation with Him?

How are you doing in each of these areas? We have been reflecting on these Life Marks at each board meeting and these questions have been quite convicting for me. I know I’m often guilty of scrolling through Facebook before I’ve spent time in the Bible. And there are days that I don’t talk to God until it’s time for bedtime prayers. After reflecting on these questions, I have scheduled a specific time to spend reading God’s word every morning. And before I open Facebook, I first make space for conversation with God so I can hear from Him before I hear from the world. Are there any changes these questions challenge you to make? By being dependent on God, we can rely on him to give us the wisdom we need to flourish in our marriage, faithfully raise our kids, and interact with co-workers, neighbors and friends.

Do miracles still happen today? What is the definition of a  miracle?  I looked it up  and here is a definition according to the Oxford dictionary: “A surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore considered to be the work of a divine agency.” Often It seems that miracles are written off and explained away by science or medicine or just happenstance. Or maybe we are not paying attention and we are missing out on noticing them at all.  How aware are you?  Do you pause at the end of the day or at the end of a week to take note of what took place during your days?  Are you in a rhythm of asking the question of those in your family or close circle of friends, “Where did you see God at work today?”  When you know that you are going to need to answer that question, guess what happens?  You start to notice and become more aware.  You start to see the miracles that are happening! This morning I noticed the bright yellow and purple crocus flowers blooming in the church garden - MIRACLE! The birth of a healthy baby - MIRACLE! A near miss of a car accident - MIRACLE! When someone is in remission from cancer - MIRACLE! Someone in a head on collision suffering only broken legs and a broken arm - MIRACLE! Working your way through a difficult conflict and getting to a place of resolution - MIRACLE! Finding a new job - MIRACLE! Getting along in a family with so many different personalities - MIRACLE! A caterpillar becoming a butterfly - MIRACLE! That God would send his only son to die on a cross to pay for our sin and rise again to make a way for us to live with Him forever and be welcomed into a relationship with him - MIRACLE! One of the blessings of being aware of the miracles that happen all around us all the time, whether we think they are small or huge, is that we can’t help but be filled with gratitude. And gratitude leads to praising God for who He is and all he has done for us.  It keeps our gaze on Him and off of ourselves. It gives us an eternal perspective and reminds us of what really matters.  Perhaps you can remind the people around you of the miracles that are happening and help each other to be on the lookout for them - call them out and give praise to God!  

Accepted.  That’s a beautiful word. It was even more beautiful to Micah and me when we received official pre-approval for a home loan. We have been waiting for a long time to buy a house. The time was right. We decided not to renew our lease for the coming year and all the signs pointed to this being the right time to find that perfect home.  We went into the process with hopeful expectations – tour houses, pick one, submit offer, done.  Maybe we would have to do that twice.  It didn’t end up working out like that.  Our family has loved living in Mount Horeb and we have felt very called to this community. Our top priority was to find a home in Mount Horeb and continue with the relationships and life that we have built here. Our first offer was on a house in Mount Horeb. Not accepted. We then submitted an offer on a house in Oregon. And then another house in Mount Horeb. Both were not accepted.  We were starting to feel slightly defeated. We kept holding on to the hope that God had the right place for us. So, we started packing. We had nowhere to go but a May 31 deadline loomed. We decided to act like God was going to give us a home.  We prayed together. We prayed separately. We asked friends to pray. And we hoped.  It was at that point that I had to accept that God may be calling us to leave Mount Horeb for a new place and a new community. It was also during this time that I really struggled. We had yet another offer turned down and it felt like this new home just wasn’t going to happen.  Micah and I were frustrated and confused. Was God really asking us to start over in a new place? But what about the strong convictions we had that God was using us here, in Mount Horeb? Were we not meant to buy a house? We know that God can work miracles. We have seen it countless times in our lives. And yet, as much as we were confident in God’s power, we were swimming in doubt. We needed a miracle and it just didn’t look like it was going to happen. I began questioning God, and the more I questioned, the less I trusted.  But, we kept packing.  We toured homes in Belleville, McFarland, Oregon, Mount Horeb. We widened our search to Stoughton, Black Earth, Brooklyn and Blue Mounds. Two more unaccepted offers.  After the last offer was declined, Micah and I were feeling incredibly defeated. We didn’t know what God was doing. We wanted to trust. We wanted to hope in that miracle. It was getting increasingly hard to believe that it would happen.  On Monday night, April 17^th, my sister sent me a listing of a house in Mount Horeb. It was a house that hadn’t come up on any of the apps we were using. It didn’t come up in our realtor’s search parameters for us. When I opened the link, I knew why – it wasn’t a fully detached house. It shared a wall, a zero lot line. It was nothing like what we had been looking at. I almost wrote it off.  On Tuesday, April 18^th, at 1:15pm, we toured the home. We left uncertain. We returned home and gathered as a family to pray. We asked God for clarity. We asked for him to give us the desires of our hearts and to unite us a family. And then we packed.  At 5:30pm our realtor contacted us to say there were no offers on the house and we could probably offer less than asking. Until this point, each home we offered on had 6-8 other offers and we were offering far more than the listing price for each one. This one had ZERO offers. The family wanted to close ASAP, and we needed to close before May 31. Every other home we offered on would have caused us to extend our current lease into June. At 6pm we submitted an offer. At 7pm we got the call– accepted! As of May 15 we will be home owners in Mount Horeb.  God heard our hearts. He had something far more beautiful in mind than what we were even searching for. He provided our unexpected miracle.  

I was asked a question in an email about an apparent discrepancy in the Bible. I answered it. And then I got to thinking:  Is that the best way to teach? How did Jesus teach? Something unexpected emerged. Instead of answering it, what might have happened if I would have led my friend to some resources and supported him as he searched for the answer himself? Now, I’m not suggesting that every time someone asks me a question, I should avoid answering it, and put the onus back on them.  However, often we fall into the role of “answer guy” or “answer girl” and in the process keep people from owning their own journey to discovery. If our goal is to encourage, empower, and equip missionaries, to help people own their own faith story, we need to grow in our ability to discern when to simply answer people, and when to lead them to discover for themselves. Here are four thoughts to consider as you decide whether you will answer or not:

1. Adults learn when they have to.

Let our first inclination be that of providing support for people where they show a passion to learn.  Let’s not take the growth that comes in the journey away from them.

Ask:  Is this question I’m being asked a Divine moment full of growth potential, or is it a simple question with little real upside for growth?

2. People grow as teachers when they put effort into their own learning.

Retention is more probable if I go through the journey myself.

Ask:  Is the person asking me the question likely to share the answer I am about to give with someone else?

3. To give a simple answer is often easier.

I’m busy.  Sometimes it’s just simpler to give the answer and move on.

Ask:  Am I tempted to give the answer because I need to move on with my day?

4. If I work harder to find the answer for someone than the one asking the question does, something is wrong.

The way we handle these situations can either reproduce consumeristic dependency or personal ownership.  I realize that people like to be needed.  But, God calls us to make disciples.  This is our missional calling.

Ask:  Is there value for the person who is asking the question to engage in their own learning and discovery?

Here are a few of my favorite questions to help people experience an unexpected discovery:

Tell me more.

What have you tried before?

What are you willing to try?

What is your gut telling you?

What is your head telling you?

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

What about this has you the most curious?

Here’s to your unexpected discoveries, teacher!

Super Bowl Sunday! Imagine getting to help lead a team onto the field for this game - what kind of a coach would you be? Are you a no-nonsense inspirational leader (Vince Lombardi)? Do you have an infectious love for what you’re doing and those around you (John Madden)? Are you just a grump who prefers to wear sweats (Bill Belichick)? No matter the coaching style, the one thing all teams must have is a strategy. We know that our goal (how we define “winning”) is “connecting people to life in Jesus.” Our strategy details how we go about achieving our goal. Here at the Church, we’ve broken this down into three components:

• lifeWorship - Whether in person or online, each we get the opportunity to worship together - as a team. And extending an invitation has never been easier thanks to our streaming capabilities. And if 9:00 AM on Sunday doesn’t work in a particular week, don’t forget we have past sermons available on our website (www.livelifetogether.com/video).
• lifeGroup - From our website: “At the Church we really do ‘live life together.’ In lifeGroup, we meet weekly in each other’s homes to share a meal and share our lives as we grow in Jesus. Our connection to other people is at the heart of our Christian experience. Authentic connections happen most effectively in smaller groups where there is opportunity for dialogue and relationships, and our primary place for these authentic connections is lifeGroup.” If you haven’t given LifeGroup a shot (ever or in a while), now is a great time to start. A new year can bring new habits! To learn more, contact Amy Meyer at [email protected].
• lifeServe - Great teams don’t just show up on Sunday - they’ve been practicing. God gives all of us gifts: talents, interests, time, finances, etc. We have the chance to gratefully give back and serve communities both near and far. We spoke a lot about generosity last year, but serving never goes out of fashion. Remember that Jesus didn’t just talk for an hour or two once a week - he actively practiced what he was preaching.

Our strategic pillars don’t operate in isolation - they work together and often can overlap in service of our goal:

• Our services operate with the assistance of many fine volunteers
• lifeGroups occasionally choose to serve together
• Looking for more learning than just the traditional “church service”? NeighboringLife.com and our rotating 2*22 sessions provide a chance to dig in and apply our knowledge.
• The list goes on!

The possibilities are endless when these three items work in harmony. Whether you’re watching the big game or not (I get it, go Packers), think about how this strategy guides us in our walk with Christ - together.

Create a Comic from one of this month's stories of Unexpected Power.  And design your Household Well Superhero Badge.  We want to see your creativity!  Email [email protected] with your creations or bring in a copy.  You can print these copies here: powerpage1, powerpage2