To Encourage You

2 Corinthians 1:3-4 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

Are you thankful for the many ways in which God has blessed your life?  Maybe you have a wonderful family, a wonderful wife, and great kids.  Perhaps it’s good health, or enough money to not only meet your own physical needs but to enjoy other blessings like travel, or hobbies, or entertainment of various kinds.  Good friends are another great blessing of God.  Then there are the blessings of the inner man, things like joy, and peace, and hope. All of these wonderful gifts are rooted in a relationship with God.  Comfort, which is mentioned in 2 Corinthians 1 above, is like this.  How often, when you’ve needed comfort, has that comfort come to you through the encouragement of a friend, a Scripture passage you’ve read, or just someone’s touch, unexpected but so necessary at that moment in time.  

Well, in all of this, God would have us to know that we are not to be a reservoir where all His blessings are just stored up to be enjoyed, but we are to be like a stream, from which the blessings we’ve received are to be passed onto others.  We are to comfort others with the comfort we have received. We are to love, with the love that we’ve received from Him (1 John 4:19).  The wonderful things God has taught us from His Word we are to pass on to others, who in turn are to teach others still (2 Timothy 2:2).  Our homes are to be used for the hospitality of others (1 Peter 4:9).  The Bible makes it clear that all the things we possess are things that we’ve been given, “For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive” (1 Corinthians 4:7)?  Elsewhere we are told that “we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out” (1 Timothy 6:7).  Of course, that’s how God designed it all and how it should be.  So, if we know that we can’t take any of it with us, why not make sure to give it away now, when we have the choice as to where it goes?  

Jesus told us that such giving is the means by which we lay up our treasures in heaven “where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal” (Matthew 6:20).  So, what are we doing with the gifts God has given us – whether physical, or spiritual?  If we have financial or other physical gifts, are we giving of them to others?  If we have been comforted, loved, or encouraged in the past, are we keen to comfort, love, and encourage others when the opportunity presents? If we are gifted in preaching, teaching, evangelism, or some other spiritual gift, are we using those gifts to help others?  

May God help us to live out the purpose God has for us. Jesus told us that if we thirst, we should go to Him and drink, for He is the source from which God has met all our needs.  But beyond this, He has told us that His intent for each one of us who have received that living water, is that from us, in turn, “will flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38) that will bless the lives of others.   His water of life – it is meant to flow not into reservoirs, but through each life as a stream of blessing to the other people He has placed in our lives.