Revelation 6:1–2

Jonah 3 & 4

How to Make Sure You Have the Right Shoes On

1- Check the Heart. The white horse and crowned rider looks righteous—but anything that hardens your heart to your neighbor, and doesn’t open your heart to your neighbor, is riding against the Kingdom of God. The reason we like bitterness is it makes us feel like we’re right, even when we're wrong… because bitterness is fake purity and false righteousness.

2- Check Your Posture. It’s hard to walk in grace while dragging resentment, and no matter how much you try to dress up unresolved pain as discernment, to a mature person they see a heart of stone. You might think holding on protects you, but it actually gets you numb to what bitterness is doing… slowly unmasking the reason it's so powerful: getting you bitter at God. Jonah's story ends not with just him bitter at Nineveh, but actually the root of the bitterness is toward a God who doesn't do things how he wanted them done.

3- Check It in the Light. If bitterness is keeping you in the dark… alone and in isolation with your thoughts… it's slowly draining you of the healing power of letting things go and allowing God to redeem and restore. I am not worried about the outside; I’m worried about my inside… and no one has power over that space that I first did not hand that power to. I am not God, and I am not the healer… and in that place of humility, I release people to God and hope one day they find the healing they need as I pursue my own.

Matt 26:51-54

Mark 14:45-50

Luke 22:49-51

John 18:3-11

How to Pass the Test of True Boldness for God

1- Respect Over Retaliation. ‘You may be against me, I'm not against you’. This story is about 3 people Jesus has every right to disrespect and doesn’t. Judas the betrayer, Peter the denier, and Malachus the accuser (high priest servant). In all of these we never see disrespect.. Rather a God who exemplifies humility and holiness no matter where the story arc goes. You can swing a sword for Jesus and still miss the heart of Jesus

2- Engagement Over An Escape Route. Jesus engaged in 4 different ways in each of the stories; one story he engaged his disciples, another he engaged the religious leaders, the other the man whose ear was cut off, even allowing affection (a kiss) from his betrayer… in all of them he didn't even need to engage but he did. Your boldness should lead to a life of engagement of all people, inviting them into the relationship that you share, and that they can have, with Jesus.

3- We Must Practice the Sensitivity Necessary to Be Healing Not Harming. In what ways are we engaging the broken and hurting of society and showing them the healer? When the spirit of God meets someone and heals… we then are given an opportunity to disciple into a relationship. If our boldness is cutting off ears and not healing them, we have missed the example of Jesus. Our theology and relationship needs to be strong enough that when we encounter pain we engage that pain with the power and presence of God.

Acts 19:21

Acts 23:11

Acts 28:30–31 2

Timothy 4:6–8

How to Live a Faith That Engages the Far and Dark Margins

1. Self-preservation hollows out your witness. You cannot save yourself through money, success, influence, or power. Cost-analysis kingdom work will leave you spiritually bankrupt. I bet Paul did not know his journey to Rome would lead not to more churches planted, but to more books written. Rome defined his legacy—but it cost him his life. In all of us, we have to ask the question: What do I want my legacy to be remembered as, even if it costs part of the life I envision?
2. Self-idolization steals potential and robs people of the Spirit flowing in you. How good you are at something doesn’t mean God is in that something. When you measure everything through the idol of self, you miss the sweetness and fullness of the surrendered life. In what ways do we push against a culture that worships self over the Savior? Our Savior was found among those who needed one—are we?
3. Self-reliance won’t get you far in chasing Jesus. If His power is made perfect in weakness, we must embrace weakness in order to understand power. So often we are trapped in training: “I don’t know enough, I wasn’t raised in it, it’s not natural to me…” and we forget that what fueled the move of God in the early church was uncommon, uneducated men who had been with Jesus. If you have truly been with Jesus, you become passionate about Him meeting those around you.