We're back to talk more about the nine ways to build others up. There's a  learning, to building others up to learn the spiritual discipline of encouragement.  If an encouraging thought comes to mind share it, it may not have the same  effect. If you wait. Don't let shyness hold you back. Instead, form a new habit  encourage one another daily as long as it is today. So let's talk about this way of building someone up. Discipline. Do you think that discipline and being an  encourager go together? It does. To change how we talk means to change how  we think if we have been one who's been passive aggressive, if we've learned  bad habits, habits of not noticing, when someone is excelling, not paying  attention to the positive traits of others, what happens is, we go through our day, we do our work, and we just fixate on an internal way that we have learned how  to think about positive views in ourselves, and in others. I know that even now,  and I have been praying about this, working on this as a spiritual trait. There are  times where I just get caught up in my own agenda for a day in the Lord bring  someone to my life. And if that discipline is not in my life, often, the moment  goes by, and I missed the opportunity. Let's talk about those opportunities. You  know what I'm talking about? Someone said something did something that  warrants an encouraging word. But then you missed that moment, because well, you didn't really want to interrupt a flow in I understand that. But the danger is  often that when the impulse comes to share an encouraging word, we let it go.  Now we can go back and we say, you know, I noticed back then this happened,  and so forth. And that is effective if you miss that moment. But discipline is  actually looking and finding and developing a sense for appropriate  encouragement So I want to talk about appropriate encouragement. I'm not  saying that you go around in life and become an expert at flattery, flattery, where you just gush out positive things. And I'll tell you right now, if that is what you  understand by this, become an encourager in a discipline and encourager  people see right through it, they will believe that you have an angle? No, I'm  talking about appropriate encouragement that you notice them as people. How  does appropriate encouragement as a discipline come into your life? It comes  out of learning to be a listener, learning how to not talk, but see what someone  else is saying. And listen to what they are saying before you say something in  return. And then noticing when even words are used. Sometimes what you will  notice, if you really listen, is you'll notice that somebody uses a word that's even  a key to their soul. And you as a minister can come alongside and give  encouragement there. Discipline. How do we become disciplined? Well, it is a  prayerful act. But this has something to that we actually learn about, we actually  look for internet links. We take classes like this right here. We talk to mentors.  We actually ask them, How do you become an encourager, one of my mentors,  Rich DeVos. When I was in my 30s, we would go to various events and so forth.  And I always noticed that even though he was a billionaire, and now the Lord  has taken him to be with Him in Heaven. Even though he was a billionaire. He 

made it a point to stop and talk to people. And he saw in moments, positive traits that people had, and he wanted to encourage them to be who God has made  them to be. So the word for today is discipline, getting into learning, learning, the art of encouragement, learning to be bold in being an encourager. So if you want to be one, who is a person and a minister who lifts others up, It means actually  working at the discipline of being encouraged. Thanks for stopping in. This is a  big task. Each of these tasks in this mini course are things to pray about to write  down and even to research, but I know that you can do it 



Last modified: Thursday, August 17, 2023, 8:04 AM