The best time to help someone who is hurting is when you are hurting yourself.
Okay, this isn’t exactly groundbreaking and I am definitely not suggesting that you go and find some problems just so that you can help someone else. However, in my life's experience, there is something powerful about going beyond yourself and looking beyond you own needs to minister healing, hope and help to somebody else.
 |
| Credit :www.freedigitalphotos.net / Sira Anamwong |
I think about Ruth in the Bible. She was a young widow. She might have been like you or I. She was
young and in love and her husband had just died. It mustn't have been an easy
time for her at all. Like any one of us, she had two choices: curl up in a ball
and succumb to severe depression or rise up out of her circumstances and FIND
SOMETHING TO DO.
In Ruth’s case, she chose to stay with her equally , if not more
devastated mother-in-law who had lost a husband and both of her children in the span of 10 years. Naomi was living in a foreign country, she was poor and she was bitter. She needed help and Ruth recognized that.
When Naomi decided to
leave Moab, Ruth decided to go with her and we have her famous words as reminders of what it means to be loyal even if it means death.
“Please don’t tell me
to leave you
and
return home!
I will go where you go,
I
will live where you live;
your people will be my people,
your
God will be my God.
I will die where
you die
and
be buried beside you.
May the Lord punish me
if we are ever separated,
even
by death!
Ruth 1:16&17
When we rise up out of our own worlds and look around us, we will find many people who are in pain and who desperately need to be loved.(Click to Tweet this) That’s your cue to rise to the occasion
and minister the healing, hope and help that lies in Jesus Christ to these
people. It’s amazing what can happen when we do just that.
I remember reaching out to a single mom sometime back. She had a child with a chronic condition. I had my own issues and problems and I could
have minded my own business and paid her no attention. One of the prominent
things I can remember from those times is how grateful she always was when I
would speak to her over the phone for hours sometimes just encouraging her and
praying with her.
It made me forget I even had any problems !
It’s not denial. It was me saying that I had committed my
challenges into the hands of the Lord and now I was going to be His hands and
feet and help someone else.
Here are the words of Jesus :
I have told you these things, so that in Me you may have [perfect] peace andconfidence. In the world you have tribulation and trials and distress and frustration (I know right,LOL); but be of good cheer [take courage; be confident, certain, undaunted]! For I have overcome the world. [I have deprived it of power to harm you and have conquered it for you.]
John 16:33
What a powerful Scripture !! Jesus has already overcome each
and every issue or challenge that will ever rise up against us in an attempt to
destroy us. Now since we know this, let’s leave behind our obvious pains and go
and minister this powerful truth to others.
You are loved relentlessly by a powerful Savior !
4 comments:
Just watched your video on Google + and I love your message that we should be seeking the help of God. And then to read your words here--help someone else--we can empowered to do that when we let the Lord help us do that. Thanks for this encouraging note. I plan to go help others this afternoon, and I know I can do it because the Lord will help me.
Like your words! Reminds me of the Prov. that says he who waters is watered himself and also this one from 2 Cor. 1:4 ...who comforts us in our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God :) Plz send your email to me again :)
Hi Sydney !! My email is gertrude.oppong@gmail.com. I hope you're doing great :D God bless you.
Hi Lisa ! I am so glad you could stop by and so glad that the video and the blog post were helpful to you ! Blessings.
Post a Comment