When You Go to Encourage and You Leave Being the Encouragee

It was a warm evening, the sun leaving leftover warmth that permeated from the wood of the pavilion. A sun peered golden pink just above the mountains. It was the kind of evening perfect for sitting next to the love of your life while watching the flames of a campfire dance...

Only he wasn't there again. Through out the evening I wondered why had I even bothered to come to this event...but something had drawn me and encouraged to me to get out of my tendency of self pity, to indulge less in my constant sorrow of my husband always working...serving the less fortunate and the sick...to just go and see who I could listen to or encourage.

Truthfully, my self righteous thoughts of encouraging others felt hypocritical. I had already totally blown it in my spirit. I knew that the right thing to do was to show up and "Smile, tho your heart is breaking"...

 I was bone tired of smiling and giving and doing the right thing. I wanted a gold medal award for how long and how hard I had been doingtherightthingregardlessofhowIfeel thing.

We sat and drank coffee, an old friend and I, in a dark corner of the pavilion. We both ended up sharing a bit of the sorrow our hearts were feeling...two different pieces of living yet the need of letting go of control and the seeking for joy and the wanting of peace for what we don't understand...

We reminded each other of the memorials we have built. Of the times we did come through. How always, God showed Himself strong on our behalf. We can see it later, but have trouble trusting He is there when we are so exhausted from the constant testing of our faith.

  Still...I came away with the thought that God teaches us and moves us gently into deeper faith through our exhaustion and sorrow. It may not always be light and dancing joy. It's an older joy.

 Joy can be re-establishing that God is doing something far bigger and better than we can ever  ask or imagine. Ephesians 3:20


Neither one of us said beautifully structured sentences that were cohesive and easily understood. There was stumbling and groping for a clearer way to explain ourselves. But do you know what God did? He used those broken humble confessions to encourage each other. It was a moment of worship.

His divine power has given us everything we need... 2 Peter 1:3