Welcome to the Daily Blade. The Word of God is described as the sword of the Spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

All right, welcome back, gentlemen. This is my third day with you on the Daily Blade. And let me just say, man, it's been an incre it's an incredible honor to begin my day with you in the Word of God to move forward and what it means to be men of God. As you guys who have been hanging out for the last couple days know, my name is Josh Howardton. I'm the pastor of a church in Dallas called Lake Point. And what we're doing this week is we are walking through the five commands the Apostle Paul gives men of God in 1 Corinthians 16, 13, and 14. And each day we're like deep diving theologically and biblically on one of them. So we hit be watchful. Yesterday we hit stand firm the faith. And then he says, act like men, be strong, let all you do be done in love. So today we're asking the question, what does he mean in 1 Corinthians 16 when he says act like men? What does that actually mean? Well, one tip is in other translations it says be courageous, is what it says. Instead of act like men, it just says be courageous. Now, we can debate the translation, but it's actually really helpful because it tells us that courage is one aspect of biblical manhood. What does it mean to be a godly man? It means to be a courageous man. Um, now, uh, I want to talk real quick because there's there's like an enormous misconception about what it means to be courageous, what courage is, uh, that I think honestly, it puts any a tremendous amount of false guilt in the hearts of Christians. And it actually keeps Christians from acting in courage because they have a misconception about what courage actually is. Okay. So let me give an example of of what I'm talking about here real quick. Um, sometimes what you'll hear is you, it's even in like popular worship songs, people will say things like, Oh, faith and fear can't coexist. And dude, I honestly just want to like gently push back on that real quick. Okay. So like I'll give I'll give one example of this. And it, you know, I hope none of you think less of me. I'm I'm just gonna be really vulnerable for a second here. Um when I first came to the church I'm at here at Lake Point, when when I first came here, I followed like a legend of a leader. His name was Pastor Steve Stroop. And church, big church. When I I think when I got here, church was 10,000, 11,000 people. It's a big, big church and uh big, you know, big shoes to fill. And that first year here, I felt a tremendous amount of pressure, especially when I was preaching. And so after I'd been here uh for about six months or so, I experienced eight months of uh of intense, very, very intense anxiety attacks that would happen before and sometimes during when I was preaching. And honestly, before then, I'll just be super honest with you guys. This is a confession. Before then, when somebody would tell me they had an anxiety attack, I would kind of think like, oh, that's a cute way to say you had a bad day. And then it happened to me and it was like, oh man, that's that's legit. Like that's stuff, that's for real. And uh stuff was happening with my body. I was throwing up before I was preaching and all this stuff I a hell that I do not wish on my worst enemy. Well, I would hear this phrase sometimes that so what would happen is I I would be really, I would have a tremendous amount of fear before I was getting ready to walk up and preach. And then I would literally sometimes be singing a worship song, last thing before I would get up to preach, that would talk about how faith and fear can't coexist. And I would think, man, well, if that's true, then I guess I don't got any faith right now because honestly, man, I'm scared. I'm scared I'm gonna get up there and have an anxiety attack in front of 10,000 people, 12,000 people, and that this is gonna be the beginning of the end of my career and I'm not gonna be able to provide for my family and all the things. And so I had a lot of fear. And I would think, man, if I got a lot of fear and fear and faith can't coexist, I guess that doesn't mean that means I don't got faith. But I would get up there and I would walk up and preach anyway. I would do it scared. And one time I was talking to a pastor buddy of mine, I was confessing this to him. I said, Man, I just like sometimes I just feel like God's disappointed at me, in me, because I lack faith and I'm walking up with a fear. And this wonderful man of God said something to me. He said, Josh, I think what God sees when you walk on that stage is he sees a man of courage, and that when you step up there, all of heaven is rejoicing and applauding for what you just did. Now let me ask you this question. When I walked up to preach and I had just thrown up and my nervous system was firing like I was in the middle of a battle and I can't see straight, and my heart's pounding at 240 beats a minute, and I think I'm gonna have a heart attack, but I walk up there anyway. Did I have fear? Yes. But did I have faith? Yes, I did. And what I learned is a very valuable lesson that faith does not eliminate fear. Actually, if you don't have any fear, you don't actually really even need any faith. Faith does not eliminate fear, it overrides it. Faith is not the absence of fear, it's the willingness and decision to trust God in the face of your fear and do it anyway, because you trust in the name of the living God. One of my favorite verses is uh it's the beginning of the book of Joshua, and it's it feels real personal because he was following a legendary leader too. Joshua was a dude that followed Moses to lead the people of Israel. And if you go read Joshua chapter one, three times, I actually heard Joby say this one time. Three times God tells Joshua, be strong and courageous, be strong and courageous, be strong and courageous. And do you know why God told this guy, this battle-hardened guy, Joshua, three times, be strong and courageous, be strong and courageous, be strong, courageous? Because he felt weak and afraid, weak and afraid, weak and afraid. So, you man of God, I want to remind you today that fear is not the absence of faith, it's the ability and decision to trust God in the face of your fear and to act in any way. So I want to finish uh asking you this question. And maybe when this podcast is over, you ask the Holy Spirit to show you the answer to this question. Usually, because Satan is a spirit of fear, usually the thing that Satan will use to keep you from stepping into whatever calling God has for you that day is fear. So, what I've found is if I can answer this one question with specificity, real quick, I can get to what God is asking me to do that day. Here's the question I want to leave you with. What is the thing that you are afraid to do that you are uncomfortable having not yet done? Our Lord Jesus Christ was terrified to go to the cross, so much so that he sweat blood like drops, like tears coming out of his skin pores, pleaded with God, if there's any other way. But he knew he had specificity on what the thing was that he was afraid to do, but that he was uncomfortable having not yet done, and it was to go to a cross to be crucified for your sins and for mine. And today we ought to follow his example. What is the thing that you are afraid to do for the glory of God that you are uncomfortable having not yet done? And today, you move forward and you be watchful, you stand firm in the faith, you act like a man, you be courageous, and you go do that thing.

In Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you for listening to today's episode. Before you go, if you want to help equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five star rating and review. Stay sharp.