The Power of Our Words
It's actually extraordinary if you think about it. The words you speak have the ability to move people in a powerful way. Whether it is to motivate or hinder, encourage or dishearten, words can push people in a direction (Prov. 18:21). The leading practice of our time spent together in gospel community is to speak words to one another. When you enter a home for an MC gathering, where does the conversation travel? The weather, current events, and distracted drivers you just got done following, are all a part of our daily experience, but as God’s people living in God’s family, the Great Encourager (Rom. 15:5) calls us to speak in such a way that we might encourage one another with words bursting with hope.
Everyone here has received some form of encouragement before. There’s a lot of it flying from the sidelines at the five-year old soccer games to the influencer’s Instagram feed. When it comes to the way that God means for us to encourage one another, we don’t take our cues from what everyone out there is doing.
The apostle Paul writes to a strained church in Romans 15:4,
For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.
Words that radiate with the life of encouragement are truths embedded in the unshakable Word of God. As we labor through life with real tests and trials, we aren’t looking for fluff in the form of small talk. We need supernatural power to dislodge us from the unbelieving thoughts we often carry. Scripture tells us what is true about ourselves, our situation, and God Himself, which is why encouragement established in God’s Word breeds concrete and lasting hope.
Encouragement from the world often fails because it is rooted in empty promises. Cheap encouragement is the result of a desire for people to just feel okay in what they are already feeling.. “You’re upset? It’s ok for you to be upset…” “Not feeling up to the task? Don’t worry, you got this, you can do it!” Whether in the wake of tragedy or in the depths of despair, you’ve probably been on the receiving end of this kind of encouragement. Well-meaning counsel can fall flat if not tethered to objective realities. The sum of the encouragement we speak to one another must be grounded on nothing less than the Word of God (1 Thes 4:18).
Notice in Romans 15, when Paul speaks of encouragement, it is also linked to endurance. Why? Because when we place our confidence in things that cannot hold the weight of what we expect them to be for us—really what only God can be for us—we become discouraged. When you meet up for play dates at the park, you are with other individuals who are most likely tempted to think they are failing as moms. When you are around the table with others enjoying the food that is set before you, you might be with ashamed people battling real sins who are prone to discouraged thoughts that leave them silent. From the employee who has to put in the extra hours, to the pastor moments before preaching to the church, to the guy in his basement writing a post on encouragement, no one is immune to discouragement of some kind leaking into their life.
Like Moses in front of a burning bush, we can be overly aware of our weakness, and blind to the power that is promised to the faint (Is. 40:28-31). And when we are convinced that we don’t have what it takes, that the future is grim, or that the task is too impossible, we are prone to throw in the towel. Discouragement is subtle and dangerous because it threatens our ability to carry on in the places where God has called us. It really is the fertile soil where slothfulness sprouts up. For the sake of the fruit of the gospel displayed in and through our lives, we need endurance, and thus we desperately need encouragement (Rom. 15:5).
This is why Romans 15:4 is so instructive for the chatter that fills our time. We have deep convictions about the way we spend our time together. Every time we meet with one another is an opportunity to encourage others with power from above because our speech has a specific direction.
It is towards Christ and all His fullness for His people. Endurance is given and hope experienced when His people are made more aware of all the benefits they have in Him than what they lack in their trouble. This is how Jesus Himself encouraged two disillusioned disciples on the road to Emmaus. This kind of encouragement has the power to save. It motivates people to look away from self and situation and personal skill and toward Christ as their sufficiency (cf. 2 Cor. 3:5, 12:9-10).
That’s the emphasis of Philippians 4:11–13:
“Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”
There is never a time when we need to be discouraged as if we are lacking in any way. The Apostle Paul is saying what we can all say by faith in any situation, “Because I have Christ, I need not.
As the church, we should both want to be encouraged and want to encourage others in such a way that we can be assured: “My strength, my worth, my hope, is in the all-sufficient One who bought me and claims me.
That’s the kind of encouragement that can free our discouraged souls. That’s the kind of encouragement that unleashes hope-filled people to fruitful and faithful witness in all areas of life. That’s the kind of encouragement the Great Encourager is after in His church (Rom. 15:5).