Encourage this!

Monday morning came and . . . I was feeling preetttty good. I had survived the chaos of the weekend and if you asked me I had just knocked another solid talk out of the park the morning before. I was returning to my old element of teaching and I liked it and realized I had missed it and . . . . oh yeah, I was good at it. I was feeling a lot of gratitude towards my good friend Jonny K (PS I am really glad you are still alive!) and wanted to thank him for inviting me to his youth group again.

Perhaps it was at that moment God decided to let reality set in for me. "I was completely lost on what you were talking about yesterday." That was almost the first thing said to me. Oh NOOOO!! I knew I had been avoiding the truth that I took the fact that I was entertaining as success instead embracing the fact that I had never really explained my point on what I meant by "Having the courage to stand". I could say it was because I was pressed for time or that is was my third talk that week or that I really, really have no idea how to explain encouragement. Nope, the reality is that I wasn't sure what to say and I was taking a stab in the dark. It was like I was playing Pictionary and I drew the card that said The Theory of Relativity. WHAT? How do you draw that?

So every time I don't think I can get any dumber. . . . .ok, time to totally do a little redeeming of myself. Here is what I really wanted to say sunday morning so if you are Jon or one of his awesome youth kids then believe me this will make sense.

Encouragement is not a luxury for mankind, it is a necessity. Being able to get through this life is hard enough, but without having people to believe in us when we don't believe in ourselves it is impossible. Yet sometimes when we feel our lowest or in our darkest hours then words are not enough. So then the question becomes how do you draw the Theory of Relativity?

It is impossible to always have the right thing to say. When someone is in their darkest moment we have no idea how that truly feels to them. The depth and layers of emotions is more than we can process and find a verbal blessing for. Now that is not to say that our voices carry no weight what so ever but being in the moment with person holds more truth than any iota of wisdom we can come up with. Still how hard is it to actually stand in those moments, to be involved in another's pain or sorrow or discouragement, and take on part of it as your own?

The beautiful part of being in it with someone is that there is a connection. And inside that experience is that fact that we believe that someone else wants us to have a life worth living, to achieve our dreams, or just make to it through to tomorrow. What is most surprising is that when we are in it with those we love . . . . .the right words seem come when you need them because we know what our heart is saying as we live in part of that pain with them and usually that is what they need to hear. We just want to know we are not alone, that God is with us.