An encouraging word

The written word is a mighty thing. Jesus stymied Satan with the words, "It is written..."

An encouraging word that is written has a great deal of power.

Photo graphic from Encouraging Words

I reached in my bag to grab my Sunday School book to study and a blue piece of paper came out with it. “What in the world?” I thought as I opened the folded note.

Suddenly, I was transported back a couple of years to a happy Sunday morning. The note was from my pastor’s wife encouraging me and telling me something to make me smile. Just a little three inch by three inch scrap of paper and a few words from a beloved friend lifted me out of the humdrum onto a floating blessing. It wasn’t much effort on her part. It was all the gold in the world to me because it came at just the right time that Sunday morning. Yet, it performed another blessing as I read that note again two years later.

I have a Blessing box that I keep in a not-too-handy place for those times when I fall into a black funk. My whole family is prone to depression. My dad fought it all the time after he retired, especially during the winter when he couldn’t get outside and do Tim things. So, I have the problem, too. Thus, I have kept a blessing box where I put all the notes of encouragement I’ve received down through the years. I guess it’s about twenty-five or so years old.

I don’t have to get it out much anymore because I’m so familiar with those notes from my bosses and clients and friends over the years. But, it helps to remember what people have written to me and about me when Satan zings that depression arrow at my heart.

Yes… I know the classic cure for depression is to quit thinking of one’s self and to get out and help others. Focus outwardly instead of inwardly. It doesn’t take long to break those bonds of darkness. It truly works.

But, what happens when you feel so worthless that you just know there isn’t a thing that you can do to help a soul? What happens when God has been silent for so long you think perhaps He’s forgotten about you and your big (little) problem? You start worrying that there’s no place for you in society. You start to feel like you are a millstone and everyone would be better off if you weren’t around because of _______________ (fill in the blank with whatever problem in your life.)

God uses His children to help each other and to lift each other up. It is a family dynamic that God designed. He has not forgotten you and your little (big) problem. Most of the time when He is silent, He is working in your behalf. That is when those little notes of encouragement and those notes of praise, God sends your way through friends, bosses and clients to let you know you are a crown of great honor and immense worth to Him. It is imperative that we all understand this. Once we were worms and worthless to Him, then we were metamorphosed from ashes into great beauty and worth far more than the pearls used for the gates of Heaven all because of and through Jesus Christ.

So I think of those precious notes and gifts from my friends when I was going through trying times of testing. It is as if God Himself has picked me up and settled me on His lap of comfort saying, “Yes, my Beloved, you are worthy to Me. My work I prepared for you to do in My name cannot be done exactly as I have designed, for My glory, without you, without those trials you learn from, or without Me. We are a team. We are Hand and glove.” Then He sets me back on my feet, straightens my collar, kisses my cheek and encourages me to get back into the fray. It is one of His ways. His strong arm is not a hammock, but a safety net.

So when you feel a little nudge to write a note to a friend or someone in your family, a collegue or even your boss, never waste a minute before you do so because you'll never know how many years of encouragement that note may bring to the recipient.

(Taken from a 2010 column of mine at LiveAsIf.org)