The Courage to Stand Still

When Branch Rickey recruited Jackie Robinson to break baseball's color line in 1947, he didn't ask for the fastest runner or the strongest hitter — though Robinson was both. He asked a question that cut deeper: "Do you have the courage not to fight back?"

Robinson endured what no athlete should. Pitchers threw at his head. Opposing players spiked him sliding into base. Fans hurled slurs and death threats arrived in the mail. His own teammates on the Brooklyn Dodgers initially refused to take the field beside him. And through it all, Robinson had promised Rickey he would answer hatred with excellence, hostility with restraint.

That took a kind of courage most of us never consider. We think courage means charging forward, raising our voice, swinging back. But sometimes the bravest thing you can do is absorb the blow and keep walking.

Jesus understood this courage intimately. "When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate; when He suffered, He made no threats" (1 Peter 2:23). Before Pilate, before the soldiers, before the cross — the Almighty held His peace. Not because He was weak, but because His mission was bigger than His pain.

Some of you are enduring something right now that makes you want to lash out, quit, or hide. The Holy One is asking you the same question Rickey asked Robinson: Do you have the courage not to fight back — and to keep showing up anyway?