If someone wanted an ordinary hero, would you be up for the job? Could you put your fears aside and respond to the call? To qualify for the position, you don’t need special abilities or a tight-fitting suit, you just need a willing attitude and an audacious faith… …Oh, and no cape is required.

ORDINARY HERO WANTED.

When we think of the word hero, we attach other words to it like; strong, confident and daring. And so, not thinking that we qualify for such an honour, we shrink back, unable to step up to the task because we believe that we are not cut out to become someone’s hero. We hold onto the belief that in order to become a hero we need a cape because having a cape makes you bold and fearless, right?! But what if to become someone’s hero, you didn’t need a cape?  What if Edna was right in The Incredibles movie?

NO CAPE REQUIRED

Capes are not required to become an ordinary hero. Remember the rescuers who helped save all those children that were trapped in a cave in Thailand or the emergency servicemen and women when September 11th happened? In all the news footage I watched, not once did I see a cape on any of those people. But what I did see was a determination to get people out of danger with no thought about their own safety.

What about the solider in heavy enemy fire takes the full force of an explosion for his comrades? Leaving him maimed for the rest of his life. I doubt the soldier’s uniform came with the option of a cape. He didn’t need one to have enough boldness and nerve to make sure his friends went home to their loved ones – even if it’s without him.

Maybe you have to get through yet another chemotherapy session? Your resoluteness and courage require no cape as you become an ordinary hero when you will finally be cancer-free. Or what about the person who sits in a café and listens to someone who shares their secrets? Secrets that are so painful to talk about, it’s hard for them to breathe afterward? That ordinary hero, who doesn’t care about the stares from other people, prays quietly with her friend. Her cape isn’t hanging up on the cloak rack in the café, as she believes in the sureness of her faith, who’s reliance and backbone helps her to hold her friend’s hand through the struggle.

Is each ordinary hero’s story any less courageous than the next?

ORDINARY HERO WANTED –  NO CAPE REQUIRED.

God reminds us over and over again to be strong and courageous in our walk with Him. He says that He will make us brave enough to move mountains. I don’t read about cape-wearing people in the Bible when God needed someone to become an ordinary hero. He singled out the unadventurous, cowardly and afraid, to show you and me that capes are not required. God needed to remind us that we only have to be a little bit brave when He asks us to become someone’s ordinary hero.

When we stop over-complicating our faith and show the world that we are just ordinary people who follow an extraordinary God, then we will make a difference. God can take our meek, mild, cowardly, unadventurous self and turn us into someone’s hero. We just need to trust Him. I don’t know about you, but I want my life to go way beyond the epitaph on my gravestone. I think it should just have the words, “An ordinary hero lies here. No cape was required” carved into the stone. 

So, look around and find people to help because everyone needs an ordinary hero. And remember, no cape is required!

Wendy xo