Courageous Faith—by ADCS Bob Flynn, USN (Ret)

All of the heroes who have served before us have already defined, with the last full measure, what courage means.  One need not venture past the Quarterdeck of the San Diego Naval Hospital to see its cost.  Therein you will find the names of the Hospital Corpsmen who were awarded our country’s highest honor.  If you ask a warrior, he will tell you that courage is NOT the absence of fear, but instead, the substance of one’s convictions.  Even in recent days we see the newspapers full of the accounts of heroes.  Our history is rich with those days where uncommon valor was a common virtue.  So the question is NOT what is courage BUT rather, from whence does it flow?  This is an important question for everyone who wears the uniform of our country!  In light of the fact that “Him who brings everything into conformity with His will” has, by an act of His sovereign will, made you a warrior, it would seem to me that courage would be an important virtue and courageous faith an absolute necessity!

Those of us who live in Colorado have been experiencing a drought for some years now.  This brought to my mind the question: Where does water come from?  In Colorado, it comes from the rivers.  Question: From where does the river get its water?  Answer: From the snow.  Question: From where does the snow get its water?  Answer: From the sky.  Question: From where does the sky get its water?  Answer: From the sea.  Question: From where does the sea get its water? Answer: From the river!

“Then the man brought me back to the entrance of the Temple.  There I saw a stream flowing eastward from beneath the Temple threshold.  This stream then passed to the right of the altar on its south side.  The man brought me outside the wall through the north gateway and led me around to the eastern entrance. There I could see the stream flowing out through the south side of the east gateway.  Measuring as he went, he led me along the stream for 1,750 feet and told me to go across.  At that point the water was up to my ankles.  He measured off another 1,750 feet and told me to go across again.  This time the water was up to my knees.  After another 1,750 feet it was up to my waist.  The he measured another 1,750 feet, and the river was too deep to cross without swimming….All kinds of fruit trees will grow along both sides of the river.  The leave of these trees will never turn brown and fall, and there will always be fruit on their branches.  There will be a new crop every month, without fail! For they are watered by the river flowing from the Temple.  The fruit will be for food and the leaves for healing.” Ezekiel 47:1-5, 12 (NLT)

I was absolutely awestruck the first time I read this passage in the New Living Translation.  Sometimes the changes in the phraseology and the unfamiliarity of the keywords will shock this old mind into seeing what was once hidden.  Here we have this magnificent description of the river of healing.  I believe (and many distinguished and learned minds before me) that this is really an illustration of prayer.  The water that finds its beginnings at the Temple threshold are the prayers of the saints offered in the Spirit. The threshold of the Temple is where we are encouraged to enter into the throne room of Grace.

“In the same way the Spirit also comes to help us, weak as we are.  For we do not know how we ought to pray; the spirit himself pleads with God for us in groans that words cannot express.  And God, who sees into our hearts, knows what the thought of the Spirit is; because the Spirit pleads with god on behalf of his people and in accordance with his will.” Romans 8:26-27 (TEV)

The prayers transformed by the Holy spirit into something worthy of entering into the presence of the Father are now omnipotent as they flow by the right-hand of the altar (where our Savior is seated) then to continue swift and deep as eternal blessing of provision from the Father through the eastern gate toward us.  We are somehow miraculously included as part of the process.  Our courageous faith then is but one of the wonderful blessing of Christ Jesus that were planned before the foundations of the world.  So then, courageous faith is really God’s omnipotent peace (the substance of our convictions) “like a river that attendeth our way,” provided of course the we are not just involved but led in prayer lest the river be empty.