In the northern hemisphere we are caught in the throes of winter and most places I go, I see hand sanitizer dispensers to help all of us stay healthier. Ads abound about risks of flu, washing our hands, not coughing around others, and more.

Disease is contagious and can be easily spread from one to another. We see that in epidemics and rare but dreaded pandemics. As a result, the question about contagiousness suggests a caution about taking a risk of being around anyone who is labeled as such.

As a result the word contagious shows up in a pretty negative light oftentimes, but is it really always a “bad actor?”

Can it ever be positive or a gift?

The dictionary speaks of something (usually disease) that is “spread from one person to another by direct or indirect contact.”

I confess that I initially ascribe the worst sort of view to the word, but I am rethinking my evaluation because there are other things that can be decidedly positive that are also contagious.

It’s been said that we tend to become like the people with whom we spend our time. In most cases it isn’t that they are directly teaching us something (even though sometimes they might be). Most of the time it is because we “catch” whatever it is that emanates from them – good or bad.

If we are around people who tend to be highly critical and judgmental, then despite our best efforts we will often develop more of those characteristics as well. If we are around people who are joyful and positive much of the time, we will find it more difficult to see our glass as half empty.

I have often shared that I am less concerned about what I taught my children or students or clients and more concerned about what they may have “caught” from me that I surely did not intend.

A cursory study of history will show what happens when in the midst of a fierce battle someone steps forward with courage and against all odds. Soon others join in…the courage is “caught.” It happens in every war and battle.

In the movie “Glory” whose theme is centered in the U.S. Civil War, the final scenes involve the Massachusetts 54^th being asked to assault a position of the Confederate Army that is impossible and sure to result in great bloodshed. The Union unit is made up of African-American soldiers led by Caucasian officers. The task is one that would cause the bravest to shudder and give in to fear.

Colonel Shaw is the commander of the unit and he knows that everything is stacked against them. As an officer he could choose not to lead the charge and bring up the rear, but instead he steps to the front and leads the men up the hill. It would appear to me that his courage was contagious.

It’s an example of how contagion can be a gift. We can “catch” something, some good quality from someone else, that spurs us forward and buoys up our own reluctance and fear.

If we consider the spread of the Gospel by a rag-tag group of disciples who were largely uneducated, ravaged by grief from the death of their leader, full of weaknesses of various kinds, and not known to be consistently brave, we see as the Holy Spirit filled them they gained courage. They stood “with” one another in the face of persecution and their courage was contagious and spread far and wide.

Ponder how many lives were changed by the courage of 12 men whose love and passions were contagious.

What happens in our relationships?

If we play it safe and keep things on the surface, there is little growth in deepening the relationship. We can make that choice and some of our relationships will be much like that, but if we long for friendships that are deeper, richer, and spur our thoughts, behaviors, attitudes…our character…to higher levels, then we will need to challenge ourselves to risk being more courageous.

Experience teaches us where and with whom we can move in greater openness and vulnerability and be used to spread the fruit of the Lord’s light and love within us. That kind of contagion is a gift indeed. It is absolutely necessary if we are to be channels of his love.

“Vulnerability and courage are contagious and can be caught by those we love if we can first boldly blaze the trail.”

Andrew J. Bauman

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket − safe, dark, motionless, airless − it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”

C.S. Lewis from The Four Loves

Crunch time happens to all of us at various points in our lives. We can usually identify courses and term projects when we were still involved in being educated that can cause us to shudder. I get a close-up view of those with my grandchildren who are at various stages of academic pursuit, but crunch time doesn’t end when we leave the classroom or lecture hall.

Crunch time…it’s that time period when there is great pressure to succeed or handle something unexpected. We feel it when we are running out of time or the task seems to be too big for us. It’s when our mettle is tested and we will be judged by the outcome of our efforts. We can get caught when our efforts slacked off. Maybe we wait till the last minute to get the work done or have failed to study.

Crunch time also happens when a sudden illness strikes, we are in an accident, our job disappears, or a temptation crops up when we were sure we had that thing defeated.

A lot starts happening during crunch time. We feel the stress building up inside of us and our blood pressure may jump up. We might develop a headache or migraine. We tend to be irritable with anyone and anything. Our sleep gets disrupted.

What happens next will generally go in one of two directions. We will dig in and summon up something from somewhere deep inside us and face the challenge head on or we will cave in, give up, try to run from it or withdraw with a certainty we are not only failing but are also a failure.

That decision will largely be determined by the habits we have practiced all our lives up until that point. These are not only behavioral habits, but habits related to how we communicate, habits about what we believe, and habits about our value for relational connection.

Developing good habits is not something we get excited about. They require discipline and practice over time…even when everything is going well. Ugh! They also chafe at our desire to be free to do what we want when we want while believing we will always be able to do what is necessary when the time comes. How the enemy of our souls delights in such folly.

Good habits, healthy habits, don’t just happen. They always require something of us.

Think about the challenging training Navy Seals, Marines, and other service members go through. Many do not make it.

Why is it so tough? 

Their leaders know the training must bring these individuals to the end of themselves again and again so the training in good habits kicks in automatically when they are in actual crunch time situations.

Bad habits are quite the opposite of good. They require no practice and initially they may appear to cost us nothing.

There is a snare with them, however. Unlike good habits requiring time and practice to become part of us, bad habits seem to adhere to us almost right away and the longer we practice them the more deeply embedded into the core of us they become. Then they are so entwined within us they are usually hard to break. We discover we are not free at all as we first thought.

Make no mistake: the habits of a lifetime show themselves at crunch time or in extreme circumstances.

The book of 1 Samuel gives us a contrast as we hear the story of two leaders: Saul and David. Over and over again we see David has learned to “strengthen himself in the Lord his God.” It’s what he draws upon when he faces Goliath and when he faces the unexpected attempt by Saul to take David’s life. Over and over again in the book of Psalms, in good times or bad, David calls on the Lord. Sometimes he rejoices. Sometimes he laments. Sometimes he shouts in anger. He could do none of those if he had not first practiced strengthening himself in the Lord and laying a sure foundation of what he believed about the Lord.

David also listens to and humbly accepts encouragement to stay steady in his relationship with the Lord. That is evident in his close covenantal friendship with Jonathan as one example.

Saul doesn’t appear to think of God a great deal and gets caught up in situations and circumstances as they are happening. It doesn’t show evidence of developing discipline and training in good habits. As a result he goes ‘with his gut’ and loses the position of the first king of Israel as a result. As we go through his story, we see him on a roller coaster of emotions depending on those circumstances. He can be prideful and threatening or quickly fearful and rash in decisions.

The Bible God gave us leaves us plenty of clues on what habits to develop so we are prepared for crunch time. You can find them on every page from Genesis to Revelation. They are not there to deny us anything, but to help us navigate through whatever life or the enemy may throw at us knowing with certainty what we believe, whose we are, and who will be with us.

It can be easy to balk when someone exhorts us to practice these things, to make time each day to read in the Bible and pray, to take our thoughts captive, to love others and forgive quickly, but those who do so are those who love us. They want us to be ready for crunch time.

Are you ready for crunch time?