Encourage one another every day, as long as it is called “today…”
Hebrews 3:13a
Those of you who know me personally know how important encouragement is to me. It’s one of those things in life that just grips my heart. I’m a guy who oftentimes walks away from conversations with a marked tightness in my chest, praying that I was able to bring courage to whomever I was just talking with. Encouragement is life – to us, and to other people. But sometimes that’s easy to forget.
I was reminded again this morning.
I was listening to a message by Bill Hybels on my way into work and he related the following story told to him by a football coach friend of his. As the story goes, a former player returned to see this coach more than a decade after he had played for him. The player had never been very good, had not seen much playing time, and was not immediately memorable. However, he told the coach that he had changed his life, nonetheless.
The player talked about a day in practice where he made a foolish mistake and fumbled the ball. Irritated by his folly, an assistant coach came over, red-faced and screaming, and proceeded to dress him down somewhat cruelly in front of his teammates – everyone on the field was watching.
As the situation continued to deteriorate, the head coach quickly made us way over. Inserting himself between this player and the angry assistant coach, he shoved the assistant coach back several feet, quickly gaining everyone’s attention. The head coach then stated,”Coach him up, not down!” turned, and walked away.
That player went on to become the pastor of a large congregation, and has often thought back to that salient lesson when dealing with his people.
As for me, I’m going to file it away. “Coach him up!” I’ll think, when I’m encouraging another guy – even if he has made a mistake…
Paul says that we are to ‘coach each other up,’ every day! Why? So our hearts won’t be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin!
Coach each other up! Not down.
- Jer
Aaron
Jonathan
dsampsel
dwwrobertson
Chris
JJLEE
Jer
jonnythin
juredivino
luuuke
mcrouch10
nateknapper
rivasmd
rloesing
wb233
worldviewbob
Great post. I remember once being discouraged and went to a friend of mine who has been in the gospels for a lot longer than me. This person’s response to my discouragement, “Get over it, and grow spiritually”. As you can imagine, I wasn’t very encouraged with that response. I never went back to that person for encouragement. As you post mentioned, we should be encouraging up. Not down.
Absolutely, and where better do we see this then in the book of Job. His friends suck. They spew religious prescriptions at a man who just lost his entire life, capped with his wife telling him to “curse God and Die.” Moe I hope you and I both have friends that encourage us no mater the struggle. This life is long, the race is hard, encouragement is essential.