by Jerry Senn
The world we live in is a place where ungodliness and unrighteousness prevail, and it is therefore a place where there’s much to discourage us. Sadly, discouragement is not confined to the world, there is discouragement to be found within the ranks of the saved, professed believers in Christ. There are at times within this family of faith, attitudes of self-centeredness, rivalry, conceit, a lack of harmony and in general – a lack of love leading to a lack of concern for one another. Maybe that is why the New Testament writers spoke so often about the value of believers’ being steadfast encouragers.
Note these references:
“Therefore, encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing” … “Be at peace among yourselves. And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all” (1 Thessalonians 5:11, 13b-14).
Members of Christ’s body, the church, are to be in the encouraging business — lifting one another to grow in “grace and knowledge of the truth” (2 Peter 3:18). The New Testament letters give great emphasis to the value of this work of love.
“Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort [encourage] one another every day, as long as it called ‘today,’ that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end” (Hebrews 3:12-14).
Let’s Do This More & More in 2024!