The Blessings of Encouragement: Seek to Encourage Others

Barnabas, aka “the son of encouragement” is our role model here on encouraging others. Encouragement is as “oxygen to the soul” as John Maxwell once wrote. It revives the downtrodden and the lowly in spirit - breathing life into the hearers heart in lieu of death. And who hasn’t experienced that low? Our world is woefully short of encouragers. We all appear so busy, so self-consumed, we rarely even look up much less out. And our world is needy and wanting and wasting away. What costs us nothing but our attention, is priceless to the hearer.

As believers in sweet Jesus we know the answer to the world’s need and that is always Him. How did our Lord react to people who were constantly holding out the empty cups of their lives for Him to fill? Oftentimes, we seek to place many other things in these cups to satisfy those in need but they will always come up wanting as they cannot meet every need or scratch every itch. It is only the Living Water of Jesus that totally satisfies the human soul, filling and even overflowing those empty cups of ours to the fullest with no space left. All else is merely a cherry on top – nice but not necessary. Oftentimes, those in such need have no “ears to hear” as they remain so downtrodden from all the world has offered them. A word of affirmation often gets their attention to be able to hear of the Living Water. Most people do not care how much we know unless they know how much we care. 

Our encouragement costs us nothing but our attention. God places people in front of us all the time and one of the best ways to reach those in our spheres of influence is a word of affirmation or encouragement. It costs us nothing – except for our awareness - yet it is richly valuable to the hearer. Remember, our words can breathe life or death. It has been said that more people fail for lack of encouragement than for any other reason. Sometimes a kind word can help keep another from falling or keep them keeping on. Pay attention to whom God places on your path before you – as nothing is chance or happenstance - seeking not to miss an opportunity to be a blessing to someone else.    

William Barclay wrote: “One of the highest of human duties is the duty of encouragement…It is easy to laugh at men’s ideals; it is easy to pour cold water on their enthusiasm; it is easy to discourage others. The world is full of discouragers. We have a Christian duty to encourage one another. Many a time a word of praise or thanks or appreciation or cheer has kept a man on his feet. Blessed is the man who speaks such a 
word.”