Encourage Others
1 Thessalonians 5:11 Therefore encourage one another and build up one another, just as you also are doing. (NASB95)
- Encourage – to fill with courage or new zeal; to lift up the low in spirit or despondent; to give strength and hope to overcome and endure
- Exhort – to make urgent appeal; to give advice; to strongly urge or advise
- Comfort – to give strength and hope; to give cheer; to ease grief or trouble
- Lift up – to raise up; to stand up when fallen; to raise to a higher standard; to bring up from lowness
- Build up – to restore brokenness; to add new hope or zeal; to provide additional good
Strengthen and Remind
We encourage each other by systematically and consistently reminding each other of the great truths we already know.
Comfort and Hope
Primarily, our comfort and hope comes from reminding each other of God’s truth.
Listening
How powerful is the simple act of listening? Many times a hurting person just needs someone to stop and truly hear them.
Understanding
How comforting it is to have someone who understands what you are going through; someone who can relate to your circumstances and can identify with the discouragement you are feeling.
Empathy
Put your self in the other person’s shoes and try to feel what they are feeling. Empathy is the effort to be sensitive towards another’s hurts, to take part in the emotions of the situation so that you can relate to the person more closely.
Compassion
To have compassion is to have a sympathy towards another person’s distress, coupled with the desire to want to do something to alleviate it.
It is no accident that compassion is the most
frequently mentioned emotion of Jesus in Scripture.
Prayer
“I’ll sure pray for you about that”…. and then you never do. How AWFUL!!! When you offer to pray, ask SPECIFICALLY how you can pray for them.
Encourage Yourself
Sometimes the reality is that there isn’t anyone around (humanly speaking) to encourage us.
Great hope and joy…
Psalm 16:9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will rest in hope. (NKJV)
Psalm 16:10 For You will not leave my soul in Sheol, Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. (NKJV)
Faithfulness and mercy (Lamentations 3:21-26 NKJV)
Lamentations 3:21–26 (NKJV) 21 This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope. 22 Through the LORD’s mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not. 23 They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. 24 “The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!” 25 The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, To the soul who seeks Him. 26 It is good that one should hope and wait quietly For the salvation of the LORD.
Contemplation: When is the last time you took your time, energy and attention to encourage someone? When was the last time someone did that for you?
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