Encouragement

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I’m beginning to believe that human to human communication is (almost) ‘ as important a spiritual discipline as prayer or bible study, or the sharing of our faith which, of course, also involves communication. The shepherds of sheep in those lands where it is still common often talk to their flocks and call to individual sheep by name and the sheep are comforted and reassured by the sound of the shepherd’s voice. Many of those shepherds I understand are talking almost constantly as they move and care for their flocks.

Oftentimes it is sheer laziness or preoccupation which prevents us from passing along some crucial piece of information to our fellows, when we were present and had the opportunity to do so. But we have to organize our thoughts in order to do it. It requires deliberate effort. It doesn’t just happen by itself, because not all communication is spontaneous. This is a learned discipline that often spells the difference between victory and defeat, winning and losing in life.

The best athletic teams ate those that are continually speaking among themselves encouraging one another and alerting each other to the other’s blind side, or reminding each other of things. A quarterback changes a play at the line of scrimmage informing the linemen of the adjustments that the defense has made. One baseball player guides another to the ball when that one is momentarily blinded by the sun. The infielders are trained to “talk it up” to encourage their pitcher and distract the hitter, so that the chatter in the background becomes a confidence builder for the pitcher.
It’s not necessarily that we’ll be saying more as we cultivate the art of this discipline of communication in our everyday lives, it’s that what we do say will count for more strategically in the Master’s overall plan and purpose for our lives and the lives of others around us. And with each day that passes the need for encouragement grows deeper in the fellowship of believers. In fact, that need is deeper this moment than it was moments ago when I began writing this….

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