\u201cFor if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father\u2019s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Esther 4:14 NIV<\/p>\n I have been reading lately about the heroes of the Bible.\u00a0 Interestingly, as I read about Esther, David, Moses, Sampson, or any of those heroes, I see that God requires us or at least encourages us to take risks.\u00a0 We have the advantage of reading the stories of these heroes after the stories have been lived and completed,\u00a0AFTER<\/u>\u00a0David slayed Goliath,\u00a0AFTER<\/u>\u00a0Esther went before the king,\u00a0AFTER<\/u>\u00a0Moses went before Pharaoh.<\/p>\n But imagine the courage David needed to face Goliath taking with him nothing but a slingshot and a few smooth stones.\u00a0 Surely, he must have felt fear, but he went anyway.\u00a0 That was a huge risk, indeed about as big a risk as a person can take.\u00a0 And imagine the fear Esther had to overcome to go before a king who literally held her life in his hands.<\/p>\n I tend to read a story like that and believe it was easier than it was because God was with David. God was with Esther.\u00a0 But then I measure that against my own life.\u00a0 God is with me as well.\u00a0 Should I not take risks more often, especially when God leads me to do so?\u00a0 What about my children? What am I telling them about taking risks and trusting God?\u00a0 What are you telling your children?<\/p>\n Perhaps God will not call your son or your daughter to go before a king or slay Goliath, but He may call him or her to volunteer at a camp for special needs kids.\u00a0 He may call them to take a job that they are not sure they can do.\u00a0 He may call your son or your daughter to go speak to an audience when they are nervous about doing so, whether that audience is one person and they are sharing the gospel or the audience is one thousand and they are speaking to gain their support or their favor.\u00a0 Most assuredly, though, God will call your son or your daughter to stretch themselves and take risks.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know and you don\u2019t know what those risks will be.\u00a0 Just make up your mind now that you will encourage your children to take them when God leads them to do so.\u00a0 Make sure they cover themselves in prayer, seek God\u2019s will, and seek Godly counsel.\u00a0 But make sure they remember that God calls us to live life fully or, as the scripture says, \u201cabundantly.\u201d\u00a0 There is a quote partially attributed to and inspired by Henry David Thoreau that reads, \u201cMost men lead lives of quiet desperation and die with their songs still in them.\u201d\u00a0 Encourage your children to live life fully and take some risks. Encourage them to live life to the fullest and sing their song.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Heroes \u201cFor if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father\u2019s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?\u201d\u00a0Esther 4:14 NIV I have been reading lately about the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,65,67,119],"tags":[366,367,368,369,370],"class_list":["post-8759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mentoring","category-parenting","category-role","category-teaching","tag-courage","tag-heroes","tag-live-life-fully","tag-risks","tag-trusting-god"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8759\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Lead by example<\/h3>\n