Encouragement That's Encouraging

A friend of mine use to love to repeat this somewhat less-than-impressive statement:

“Encouragement…must be encourage-ing…to the one needing to be…encouraged.”

As much as he annoyed me, I had to admit that after thinking about it, this statement WAS, in fact, profound!

I mean, how often do we hear someone trying to encourage us when all it does is drag us further down. Recently, someone read part of a blog of mine and wrote me a diatribe of encouragement. The problem was that having read only the first half of the article, she MISSED the entire point where I actually had encouraged myself in the process of reviewing the story (See link below) http://www.rissingerresourcegroup.com/single-post/2019/04/20/A-Matter-of-Perspective )

On another occasion, someone wrote to encourage me, but ended-up making misstatements and partial truths that I found offensive. Rather than encourage me, it had the opposite effect.

The key is to know your audience. Know the person. Then, provide what he/she needs under the guidance of our Lord. This allows for uplifting help…it makes encouragement, well, encouraging!

To that end,

Pastor Joel