I can’t afford to wait for my circumstances to be perfect. I will never have enough experience. I will never have the resources I need. I need to stop whining and just do it! Someone else is waiting for a hero. I may be the best opportunity they have. I may be their answer to prayer.

Be in the moment and act.

Erin couldn’t get the school to give books to her students. So, she got a second job and bought the books herself. The students wanted to bring Miep Gies, the Dutch woman whose family hid Anne Frank and her family, to the school to lecture. The school didn’t have the budget, so the students held a series of fund-raisers to come up with the money.What’s my excuse? No matter what my station in life is, it’s easy to think I don’t have enough resources. Resources are never the problem. The biggest challenge is simply my will to act.

Stop complaining about your lack of resources.

Every time I used to encounter a homeless person, I would go through all kinds of mental gyrations. If I give money to this person, will they just use it to buy alcohol or drugs? Why don’t they just get a job? Maybe it would be better if I offered them some work rather than just give them money? Then I read the words of Matthew 5:42, “Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.” I then decided to make a deal with God. Now, whenever I encounter a homeless person or a beggar, I give them all the cash in my pocket. The money I give is my gift to God.

Stop over-thinking your response to it.

Let’s face it. The world needs heroes. It needs people who will be courageous and act on principle. But where can we find such people? Maybe the answer is closer than we think. The truth is it can start—and must start—with us.God has providentially put each of us exactly where we are. We need to ask, “Why am I here?” “What does God want me to do in this situation?” “What is the right thing to do?”

Start asking, “What is the right thing to do?”

The older I get, the easier it is to close my eyes to poverty, pain, injustice, and evil. I can order my life, so that I am never put in a position of seeing anything unpleasant. I can look without seeing. I’m continue to pray daily that “God gives me eyes to see and ears to hear.” You can’t be a change agent if you don’t perceive the needs around you.

Stop ignoring the evil you encounter

You have more power than you can imagine.

You have have more power than you sometimes give yourself credit for. Here are five ways to express it and become an everyday hero.