There are times in our lives when discouragement seems to take over, when we just don’t know what to do. We’ve lost our job, lost a loved one, financial troubles seem overwhelming, or maybe a political change. God’s Word has some encouraging words for us in times like these when it seems maybe all is lost.
We first need to realize that our discouragement is not a lack of faith. Paul was discouraged at times, but he never lost sight of God working in his life:
2 Cor. 1:8-10 (ESV) For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. 9 Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. 10 He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.
David handled discouragement by returning his attention to God and reminding himself of the great hand of God in his life, the things God had done in the past:
Ps. 42:5 (ESV) Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation
God has not abandoned us (Heb. 13:5). He will never leave us or forsake us. That’s a promise we can take to the bank.
Discouragement is almost always temporary. Dwelling in it is pointless. Our pastor once told the congregation that almost everything we worry about is out of our control. We can only really deal with about 8% of the things we worry about.
Why is this important?
There’s a story of a man who went to his pastor depressed and discouraged. He didn’t know what to do, and, after listening to the man’s extensive list of problems, the pastor couldn’t think of anything to say that might help. The next week, the pastor ran into the man on the street, and the man was humming and smiling. The pastor was shocked and asked how he had escaped his deep discouragement. The man said, “I’ve hired that man across the street to do my worrying for me,” at which he pointed to this deeply depressed man slowly shuffling down the walkway.
The pastor asked the man, “How much did you pay him to worry for you?”
The man said “$2,000 a week.” “But,” the pastor said, “You don’t make that much.”
To which the man replied, “That’s his worry!”
Wouldn’t it be nice if we thought of God that way. If we had a 2 Chronicles 20:15 attitude:
15 And he said, “Listen, all Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem and King Jehoshaphat: Thus says the LORD to you, ‘Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed at this great horde, for the battle is not yours but God’s.
I think the lesson of Scripture is that discouragement is a common factor in the Christian’s life, but not a sign of a lack of faith. We need to turn our eyes off our circumstances and back on God who is in control of what’s going on. He has not abandoned us nor forsaken us. He is standing in the midst with us, and the battle is not ours but His.
Pray for peace. Remember God still has a purpose for you. Don’t isolate yourself from your friends, family, brothers and sisters.
Most of all, let’s be Christians in all of this. Those with whom we disagree are people for whom Jesus died.
2 Tim 2:24-26 (ESV) And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.
Our behavior is what tells the world who we are. We must show the world Christ in us:
John 17:23 (ESV) I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.
