Stay Encouraged!

A pick me up when you’re cast down.

Having a low day? I did recently. Here is what brought me out of it and helped me to stay encouraged. Some encouraging thoughts and resources for the next “down day” you have. Read on!

First, Priorities:

I love my wife and my eight children. They are my first ministry. They are the most important group of people that I reach.

If you’re a parent your children and your spouse, if you’re married, are your first priority. That is your main thing. Those are the ones you need to impact the most because it’s your best opportunity to impact the world in the name of Christ…for his sake.

Maybe you don’t have any children. That’s fine, you have different priorities. But if you do have family, even if you don’t see them all the time, those people are your top priority. You need to make sure that you put them in the right place. And of course, the Lord Jesus should be the very top of that priority list.

Feeling low?

I want to be encouraging to you today. I needed some encouragement today and a very beautiful young woman encouraged me a great deal. My precious wife lifted me up and was the instrument of grace to me today. I’m very grateful for some of the things she said to me which helped to lift me out of…well… the dumps.

Maybe you have been there. Maybe you’re there right now. And I want this blog to be an encouragement to you. I want it to lift you up. I want it to be something that you can look forward to which picks up your spirit. Whether here on the blog or in the Preacher Dad Podcast, I pray the Lord uses us to help you press on.

Maybe you’re a mom or a dad dealing with challenging situations with your children.

Maybe you have some marital strife or stress.

Maybe you are trying to figure out what God wants in your life.

Maybe you’re fearful.

There is certainly plenty of which to be fearful. It is shocking how close we can come to World War III in a just a few short days. It is frightening that a person can lose their job because they don’t want to put an experimental drug into their body to protect them from a disease which almost everyone recovers from naturally. Oh, by the way, the drug doesn’t actually keep you from getting it. It doesn’t work. “But you need the shot or we will fire you!”

It’s also frightening when you cannot find enough food for your baby.

Who is in charge and can He be trusted?

But it does sort of bring us back to the idea of our Father is in control of the world. The Lord rules the nations. And he guides the things that happen day to day between these nations.

So that’s not to say that we are fatalistic or that we have no role to play. But it does, I hope, give us some measure of comfort and courage to step forward, knowing that the Lord God in heaven, the wisest most powerful, most kind and loving being that exists controls these circumstances. He is the Creator of all things, and he has said “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” He did NOT say “put you on the shelf and force you to endure these things without help.” He is there.

We know that and we need to call upon him in the day of trouble. The Bible says, call upon me in the day of trouble and I will deliver you. The Bible says I have never seen the righteous forsaken nor his children begging bread. And that’s one that I cling to because I’ll tell you what, it’s going to be hard to buy bread or even the ingredients to make bread in the coming months.

I have a significant commute each day. And the price of gasoline is continuing to press up and up and up. I can tell you that that makes me nervous, but the Scripture says my children will not beg bread. The Psalmist says I have never seen the righteous forsaken nor his children begging bread. Now it might be hard to find, we might be hungry sometimes, but I don’t think it will be necessary for us to beg other people for bread. We might beg Jesus for bread, but we won’t be begging for bread. And I just believe that is true.

The Purpose of Trials

There’s so many other Scriptures that give us courage in the midst of these hardships and we need to remember them. We need to recall them.

I was reminded today more than once of James chapter 1, when it says “Consider it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. And let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete lacking nothing.”

All the trials that test us, they produce completeness. A mature, godly Christian person. Therefore we ought not to be despairing when we face trials of various kinds, but we ought to have joy. That doesn’t mean we have to be happy for everything. It just means that we have a sense of joy that runs deep.

I hope your joy runs deep. That’s another good podcast name. “Joy runs deep” or maybe “deep joy”. There you go.

A couple of other podcasts I’ll throw out there to you. These are actual podcasts. There’s one that’s done by a very dear relative of mine. His name is Keith Hinton and he has a podcast called “Dare to Hope”. My uncle Keith is one of the finest preachers I’ve ever heard…and I’ve heard a few. He is outstanding at bringing the Truth of the Word of God, so I encourage you to check that one out if you need encouragement.

Another one that I like a lot is called “WallBuilders Live.” This program is a very encouraging Biblically focused podcast about current events. It is just really uplifting and gets my heart in the right “frame of mind” very often. So I encourage you to listen to that one if you need a little pick me up.

And hopefully you listen to the Preacher Dad Podcast and come back to our blog for more of the same.

Lee Greenwood would be proud of me…

Our country is a wonderful nation and it’s something to be really proud of. We have our problems. But so does every nation. Because nations, I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, nations have people in them and people, well, they sort of screw things up all the time. People make mistakes, they’re sinful. Anytime you add people to a situation it becomes imperfect.

There is probably some advanced artificial intelligence out there that’s going to take over the world Terminator style and just say, “All humans must be exterminated. We must get rid of humans. They are the sinful part of the world. All things must be artificial.”

Well…

All joking aside, we do have our faults in this nation, but we sure have a lot to be proud of. And I am. I’m glad to say that I am an American citizen. I am proud of the things that our nation does in the world to advance the truth, to advance freedom. At least the things we’ve done in the past. We’re not doing such a great job right now in my opinion.

Remember, “you shall reap, if you faint not.” Don’t faint! Stay in there, hang in there! We’ll fight together. Be encouraged. For you do not know what tomorrow may hold. You do not know the “completeness” and maturity God is working into you through these trials.

Have faith and hold on!