The Power of Encouragement

Tom Shrader explores the transformative power of encouragement, drawing from James 3 to illustrate how the tongue can either build up or tear down. He emphasizes that encouragement means coming alongside to make someone courageous, commending people for their past performance, present proficiency, and predicted potential. Tom challenges listeners to become intentional encouragers rather than falling into patterns of discouragement or indifference.

“People are empowered when they are commended for their past performance, present proficiency, and predicted potential.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: Power Broker

Recorded: May 04, 2006

Duration: 47 min

Themes: encouragement, words, speech, building up, stewardship, potential, tongue, courage, struggling with discouragement, parent, mentor, workplace challenges, family relationships, pastor, leader, new believer

Scripture: James 3:1-12, John 14-17, 2 Timothy 1:3, 1 Thessalonians 1, 2 Timothy 1:5-7, Philippians, Mark 6

Theological Themes: biblical stewardship, christian character, speech ethics, sanctification, spiritual gifts, edification, christian community, spiritual maturity

Full Transcript

Session five of our ten-session series, and we need to spend a little time each week connecting these because they really do build on one another. The topic is power and we titled the series Power Broker. A broker is somebody who says, "Here's a need and here's a supply," and hooks those together. Power flows from God. He gives it to us. In fact, it's the subtitle of the series: to get it and to use it and to give it away.

The first week we talked about power and did an overview. Then in these last three weeks, we've talked about proficiency—right person, right place. They're wired to do it. Get them there. Get out of their way. Let them do it. We talked about ownership, and that is everything you have is in your possession, but it's not yours. God has transferred possession to you, but not ownership to you. So you're a steward, not an owner. That changes your relationship to everything—your time, your energy, your work, everything.

Last week we talked about work and we said you need to have a meaningful assignment in your work. Doesn't mean we're all working on the cure for cancer, but it means that I have something that I'm about. I understand it. I'm engaged in this. I'm pursuing it. Remember what we tried to do? We tried to pull some things together and say, if you can really get somebody who has what they can do and what they want to do and what they're being paid to do, you've got something real special. That overlap is in the zone. The same works in a volunteer organization, at a church. If I get somebody who can do this and they're paid to do this or they're volunteering to do this and they want to do it, that's somebody very special.

The Challenge of Encouragement

Today, in session five, we talk about encouragement. I get a little nervous at this because I'm not the greatest in the world. I wanted to almost begin today by saying "I'm Tom and I'm a discourager," but I decided not to do that. I probably am more gracious to myself than I really deserve, but I feel like I'm getting better in this area.

What I find particularly frustrating is that I'm getting better with most of you, but not with the people I love the most. I don't know why that is. Why is it that I can be this person out here, but I get home and for whatever reason, that's the last thing.

Years ago, early 40s, the Mills Brothers had a song, a really popular song. I was raised on a lot of different music, but I loved the Mills Brothers. They were like my favorite of the groups. I loved the Mills Brothers and Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller. Those were the three I really liked. The Mills Brothers used to have a song that went like this: "You always hurt the one you love, the one you shouldn't hurt at all. You always take the sweetest rose and crush it till the petals fall. You always break the kindest heart with a hasty word you can't recall," and then this total disconnect sentence: "If I broke your heart last night, it's because I love you most of all."

But that's kind of true. I don't know why that is, other than if I could venture a guess, with the ones we're closest to, we let them see what we're really like. So you're not near the pro you thought you were, I guess, is the announcement of that.

The Duty of Encouragement

William Barclay writes this: "One of the highest of human duties is the duty of encouragement." There's a regulation in the Royal Navy which says no officer shall speak discouragingly to another officer in the discharge of his duties. Abraham Lincoln once began a letter by writing, "Everyone likes a compliment." William James said, "The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated." He didn't speak, mind you, of the wish or the desire or the longing to be appreciated, but the craving to be appreciated.

Dale Carnegie said, "Here is a gnawing, unfaltering human hunger, and the rare individual who honestly satisfies this heart hunger will hold people in the palm of his hand," and I love the next phrase, "even the undertaker will be sorry when he dies."

So that's what we're talking about, this power of encouragement. I'll go ahead and tell you up front, I'm not talking about blowing smoke at somebody. I'm not talking about lying to them. I am talking about consciously making an effort to commend them.

The Three Dimensions of Encouragement

When we talk about the power of encouragement, here's what we're talking about. People are empowered when they are commended for their past performance, present proficiency, and predicted potential. Past, present, future.

I'll give you a couple of examples. When Haley—we talked last week about Haley's high school graduation. She went to a Christian high school, and at the end of this, the big award that they give every year, it's always a surprise, is the Christian Character Award. They always give one of those to a member of the senior class, and Haley's senior year, that was Haley. So she got up and did her thing, and you never know who's going to get it.

Afterwards, you've got all the hubbub of post-graduation going on. Kids want to get together, get the pictures taken, and I said, "Hey, I need to talk to you for just a second. I don't need a lot of time, I just don't want to let this moment get away." So I got her over in the corner, where it was just the two of us, and she had her heels on, so she's about six inches taller than me, which is a little bit discouraging. I said, "Haley," and she's just looking. Her eyes are just—I mean, we're connected. I said, "Haley, I don't want to talk about the future. I don't even want to talk about this. I'm proud of you,

that, and I want you to know I'm proud of you. I want to talk about what got you here. I want to talk about how God has given you something very special. He's given you a very sharp mind and a very tender heart. You love people, you love that scripture, you are a very special girl. There's something special and extraordinary about you, and God's done that in your life, and you've been obedient to Him. And I don't want to take any more of your time, because I know you've got pictures you want to get, and all sorts of, and I want you to have fun, but I want you to understand what this moment is about. I want you to understand how special this is, and I want you to know how proud I am of what you've done in your life." And she kind of reached down and gave me a hug, and I said, "Hey, babe, listen, we've got plenty of time together, you go be with your friends."

Well, that was a very important moment of commending the past, and as you talk to her, you could see it put energy in her. It's not just past, it's present.

I have three staff people. I have been so proud of our staff that basically in 14 years, nobody's left. We've had to help a few people make some career decisions, but no one's ever left. People don't leave our staff. And I'm losing three people, three key people right now, and they're all, it's got nothing to do with us, they're all moving out of state, one out of the country. It's just one of those weird deals.

So one of them was leaving, and we had a little get together for her, and I tried to make this moment count. Here's what she coordinates: she coordinates what we call front line, ushers, greeters, making sure you're there. She's been on the job about seven months, and I had the privilege to say to her, "I don't know if I've ever seen anyone come into a job that has such little description, and give it legs, give it description, take a skeleton, put skin on it, and to see what you've done, and the impact that you've had on this church, in seven months, that'll last for a long, long time." And you could just see, by the way, not only hopefully did that edify her, it edified the whole group.

I'm just talking with a guy the other day, and he's always wanted to be a cop, and I told him, "You're going to be a great cop, man." And he now been through school, and he's been on the street a little bit, and I said, "Man, you're going to be great. You're made for this. I said, what do you see in the street?" And he said, "A lot of your church people, sir." And I said, "Okay, well, that's not what we wanted to hear, but hear that you can do it."

So here's our charge: not to lie, not to exaggerate, not to blow smoke, but to commend people, sometimes for what they have done, sometimes for what they are doing, and sometimes for what you can see in their future. Just talking to Sarah the other day, and I said, "You know, Sarah, you're going to be an incredible mom, man. I mean, you're wired. You're wired for this. You will be unbelievable." And she was over last night saying, "Dad, I think I'm going to do a Hawaiian theme for the baby's room," and she's talking about all this thing, and how do we teach him, and what do we read? It's just great moments, and that's the power of encouragement.

The Hallway of History

Let's look at the hallway of history, your history. I got three questions for you. Who are three people who've had the greatest impact on your life? Were they people who practiced encouragement? And will you be impacted in the future by people who don't practice encouragement?

Now, I want to be really fair and honest with you, and tell you, when I asked the question, who are three people who impacted your life, had the greatest impact, I think the tendency of most people is to think positive. I immediately thought negative. I thought about the guy who said to me, "You know what? If that's the best you can do, give up, because if you can't do it right, don't do it at all." I thought about coaches along the way.

We used to have a high school PE teacher. He didn't want to be there. We didn't want to be there. Nobody wanted to be there, and it was the late 60s, and he hated us, and we weren't too fond of him, and he just thought we were nothing. And here's what he would do. He said, "Guys," because we were all boys, our school was co-institutional, meaning we had girls and boys under the same roof, but we never got to see each other, so it's all boys PE. He said, "Boys, you know, and remember now, it's the late 60s. I want to give you something that when you leave here, I think most of you will be using pretty quickly. Line up." He said, "All right. Ready, march. Left, right, left, right," and that was kind of his way of encouraging us in our future. So he wasn't very helpful.

The Power of Negative Words

The classic, and I've used it in here before, the first person I thought of in this whole thing, and it's amazing because it's 51 years ago, is my kindergarten teacher, Miss Julie. I could take you back to the room we were in. It was probably about half the room, half this size. It was not set up in the traditional way. There were six tables, and they were set at kind of a V, so they pointed to the middle. Her desk was here. It was the end of a day, half day. We went half days. I didn't want to be there. The first day, my mom walked me to school. It was about three and a half blocks, and once she got around the corner, I just followed her back home. I'd still be home with her if she wouldn't have kicked me out.

But we've been at it a few weeks now, and it's the end of the day, and Miss Julie said, "Everybody look up here. Everybody look at this. I want to show you this. Everyone look. You see this? Now, who colored this?" "I did." "Okay, you're Nate." "Tom, okay?" "Tom colored this. Now, everybody look. I want you to learn now," and it was two kids playing in the snow. "See how they have on red snowsuits? Well, he put orange gloves on them. Don't you ever, ever, ever put red and orange together." Now, that's, I'm okay. That's 51 years ago. I have long

Since lost track of Miss Julie. 51 years, and she was not a spring chicken then, my assumption is she's, I would assume, in hell, and if God is a God of justice, and He is, she's forever chained to someone in a red suit with an orange tie. If you had a Miss Julie in your past, honestly, get over it, but isn't that incredible? I think I'm a relatively healthy guy, and that's 51 years ago, and I remember it like it was yesterday.

The Power of the Tongue

See, when you get into this whole thing, you're talking about the power of the tongue. You have Bibles with you? Why don't you open them to James chapter 3? James chapter 3 has in it the longest contiguous passage that we find in all of Scripture dealing with the topic of the tongue, or speech.

There's something else about James chapter 3, because some of you, and there's always people with us who are with us for the first time. There's always people who are also new to the faith, so everything is new, and that's a good thing, and you may, because I remember when I started trying to study this Bible, for me to find a book, I had to go to the index, so I got tabs, you know, spend a couple bucks, get the tabs, and that's easier, and I thought, I'll never understand this.

Well, James chapter 3 is a great chapter. You don't need to have an understanding of Greek. You don't even really have to understand much of the context around it. If you want to be encouraged, and you want to learn how to study, and just see the power you have, take James chapter 3, verse 1 through 12, and just start to make some notes and some observations. It's really a great place to start, and to see how perceptive you are, and how unintimidating a lot of the Scripture is.

James on the Power of Speech

James is talking about the tongue, and he said, "Let not many of you become teachers, my brother, knowing that, as such, we shall incur a stricter judgment, for we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle his whole body."

Now he gives us an illustration. He's talking about the tongue, and he uses two very practical illustrations. This one, especially practical, since the derby is this Saturday. "Now, if we put bits into horses' mouths, so that they may obey us, we direct the entire body as well." Here's what he's saying. Here's this big horse, this little jockey, there's no way that this little jockey can control the horse, except for the bit. When he has control of the tongue, that little thing, he controls and maneuvers the horse.

Here's the second illustration. "Behold, the ship also, though it's so great and driven by strong winds, are still directed by a very small rudder, wherever the inclination of the pilot desires." Here's this massive ship, and literally, I was watching a show the other night on cruises, and the captain's literally steering it like this. He can steer it with just a real easy, but the rudder controls the entire ship.

Small Things with Great Power

"And so, also, the tongue is a small part of the body, yet it boasts of great things. Behold, how great a fire is set aflame by such a small fire. And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity. The tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body and is set on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell."

"For every species of beasts and birds and reptiles and creatures of the rest of the sea has been tamed and has been tamed by the human race." I'm watching a show not long ago, and they're showing how they're training spiders and ants to play roles in movies, how to move the spider in such a way at a certain time. It's amazing.

"But," he said, "no one can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil full of deadly poison." Now, you can go on and read the rest of that. Here's what he's saying. No one can tame the tongue on their own. But, the power of the Spirit is, the fruit of the Spirit is, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control.

The Power to Build Up

Here's what we're saying. All of a sudden, you have this power over this tongue, and you can do great damage with it, just like a little spark can set a forest on fire, or you can do great positive things with it the way you control a horse.

So, positively, and I take my mom and dad and my immediate family out of the equation, you know, Susan's the first person I really ever met that said, "I think you might someday perhaps could be something." Now, there's no empirical data to support that. But, "I think you might be something someday."

I worked for a guy by the name of Jim Wentworth, and I'd been a coal banker probably about a year, a little plus, and I wasn't doing very well, and I couldn't really get my focus. Jim called me in, and he said, "You know, I think you might be too smart for this job." I said, "That's it, I'm too smart." He said, "Tom, look it, you're thinking too much, just go do it. You're going to do fine, just go do it. I know you can do this. You're the guy, you can do this." And, it just lit me on fire.

Larry's Encouragement

But, by far, the guy on the top of the list would be Larry. In the entire time I knew Larry, so 20 plus years, he never said one critical word to me. Now, there's probably some correction that needs there, because you do need criticism. But, once I understood his way of doing it, I understood what he was saying.

So, I would go to him and I'd say, "I'm going to do this," and he would say, "Have you ever thought up," which was his way of saying, "You idiot, you moron, don't do that." But, he sat me down after I'd been a Christian a year, and he said to me, "I don't know if I've ever been around such a natural gift set in a guy, and what a shame to see you not using it. You need to get on the stick."

And, that's that power of encouragement. That's the power you have. You know, we talk a lot in here about lessons and things and say, you

You don't have to wait for someday. You can implement this today. Right now. The essence of encouragement is to come alongside and make courageous. To come alongside someone.

Now, we're talking a lot about human encouragement here, but let me tell you, you're not always going to have that Jim Wentworth or that Larry Wright or Susan there. There are going to be times when you're going to be out there and feeling like you're going all alone.

A Summer Bible Study Challenge

Let me remind you of a great exercise for you, especially with summer coming. Somebody the other day said, why don't you give us a summer reading list? Some recommendations. So, I think I'm going to work on that, but let me give you a Bible summer reading list. Read John chapter 14, 15, 16, and 17.

When I say read them, I mean read them and make notes and study it and go back through it and break it apart. Get online and get yourself some Bible study tools. I can give you a website. I think it's just Bible study tools.net maybe. I'll do a little work. There's tons of stuff. Really study those.

What that is, John 14, 15, 16, and 17, is Jesus saying goodbye to His disciples. He's going to be killed the next day. It begins with, let not your heart be troubled. Well, in the midst of this, the reason He's saying that is, it's going to get a little scary now. It's going to get a little tense now.

The Promise of Another Helper

He says, I'll ask the Father and He will give you another, a helper. He speaks of the Holy Spirit. The word another, like if I say, oh, you lost that envelope. I'll get you another one. It means something sort of like. In the Greek, the word another here means, no, same like, same kind, same substance. In other words, He's going to give you a helper and it's going to be just like me. It's going to be God. This time, God the Holy Spirit indwelling you.

As you work through scripture, there are certain things where you go, I can't believe this is in here. This is an amazing thought. One of them is this. Jesus is walking along with the disciples and He says this. I'm going to leave you and it's better for you that I'm gone.

See, that doesn't compute to me because I'm thinking about the best that can happen is if Jesus walked in here. He's saying, no, I got something better. Rather than have me walk along, I'm going to have a spirit in you. I'm going to have a spirit that's going to come along.

What the Holy Spirit Does

Here's what the Spirit's going to do. He's going to cause you to be born again. He's going to convict you of your sin. He's going to open up the scriptures so you understand it. Here's the term of the scriptures. He's going to seal you for the day of redemption.

Here's what that means. It means if you're sitting here right now and you're genuinely a Christian, it means nothing can break that relationship and you're God's forever and that's sealed by the Holy Spirit. If you're a Christian today, if you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you have an intimate personal relationship with Him today, you're as sure of heaven as the saints that are already there.

I came from a background that didn't teach that. They said, yeah, you may be in but you could sin your way out. Yeah, you may be around but you could screw it up. That's not what the scripture teaches.

Natural man cannot understand spiritual things. In other words, you, me, us, when we're born, we are dead spiritually. But the Holy Spirit comes along and opens our eyes and all of a sudden we're going, I never saw that before. I could never get this before. I never understood why, but this never made sense. Or I spent all these years in this environment or this church and it was dead and I wasn't getting anything out of it, but I didn't have the courage to move or really the reason to move. And then all of a sudden I did.

What happened? I'll tell you what happened. The Holy Spirit opened your eyes to see this truth. In fact, the scripture says in the book of Romans that there are times when we're praying and we're going, I don't even know what to pray about. And the Spirit prays on our behalf. That's really important.

Living Supernaturally

So when we're talking about courage, we're talking about to come alongside, to put courage into you. Now you begin to live, not naturally, but supernaturally. So now when life throws this junk at you that it will, and you begin to not just survive it, but thrive in it, and people are saying to you, hmm, there's something, I don't get it. I don't know how you can withstand that. Then you go, hey, that's not me. It's God living in me.

We've got about 15 minutes. I want to answer a couple more questions.

Why People Are Not Encouragers

If this is so important, why are people not encouragers? Well, four reasons. Number one, they're discouraged themselves. You can't give away what you don't have. Number two, they're indifferent. Don't get it, don't care. Number three, they're ignorant. Don't understand how important this is. And number four, they're sick. They're destructive. They're destructive in their motives.

There are people out there who are bad people. They're just bad people. Their deal is to make everybody else miserable. You know them in your life. They're just bad people. For the sake of this discussion, it doesn't even matter what their motive is. It's just that they get their kicks by tearing down and ruining people around them.

You actually live at a time where the whole idea of really destroying and attacking is really catching fire. Obviously, it's a political year. So no longer is there some sort of a sophisticated discussion. There's just people arguing at each other. Painting the other person as extreme. So one set who wants to raise money are going to send you pictures of Teddy Kennedy running the country. The other set are just going to send you pictures of George Bush running the country. We're going to do all personalities. It's like this immigration thing. I don't understand a lot of it. I've got some

I think most people don't encourage because they're indifferent and ignorant. I think those are the top two reasons. You've lost civility. You've lost just the idea of a kind word.

I need to go to the drugstore today to pick up some things. I can tell you what's going to happen. I'm going to go in and find what I need, some hair products and other things. I'm going to scan my card, hit approve, and sign the thing. The person on the other side is going to give me a bag. And you know what they're going to say to me? "Have a good day." That drives me nuts. I just gave you 15 bucks for 15 cents worth of stuff. Say thank you to me. In fact, it's gotten to where they give me the bag and I say thank you, and they say to me, "You're welcome." I'm thinking, this is all backwards. Why am I saying thank you for the right to shop at Walgreens or wherever? People don't even know.

When Parents Never Said "I Love You"

I want to hang here because we have especially a demographic of people around my age, maybe a little bit younger and a little bit older. I hear a lot about, "Well, I never got this from my parents."

I'm in a group one day, 12 guys. It's early in the year, actually December. We're getting ready to go into a brand new year. There's 12 guys and they said, "Here's what we're going to do. Every month, we're going to have one guy talk about his life, who he is, where he's from, how it's going, what work is, all this stuff." I said, "All right, I'll take December because by then, we'll all lose steam in this." I had zero interest in talking about what I'm thinking and who I am and all this stuff with a bunch of guys I barely know.

The first guy gets up in January and starts talking. He's a pretty successful business guy. All of a sudden, he says, "My dad never told me that he loved me." And then he starts crying. He's crying and crying and crying. Now, I can't handle this stuff. I'm not very good at this.

So I said, "Well, how about you?" "Did your dad tell you he loved you?" "No." They were all guys about my age. "Did your dad? Did your dad? Did your dad?" Eleven guys, never heard from their dad they loved them. They said, "Tom, did your dad tell you he loved you?" I said, "Every day. He said, 'You can eat this and you can sleep here.'" That's exactly what he said to me, which is the way he says, "I love you."

Understanding the Previous Generation

I talk to a lot of guys that are in their late 70s and 80s, and here's what they say: "I really feel like I kind of screwed up with my kids." But here's what they say: "Tom, we didn't have Dr. Dobson. In other words, we didn't know. We're just killing ourselves."

If you want to understand, if you're my age or around and you want to understand the older generation, I'm going to recommend a book to you. It's a great book called "Another Country." Now here's the problem when I recommend a book: you all want to come back and show me all the bad stuff. The only book we wholeheartedly endorse is the Bible. Everything else has errors in it. So don't come running back and saying, "This is really screwed up." There's a bunch of screwed up stuff in there. There's some psychology in there that's really goofy. But if you want to understand that other generation, that book is really helpful.

So if you're one of these, especially guys, walking around saying, "My dad never told me he loved me. My dad never told me he loved me"—here you go. Get over it. Suck it up and let's go. Especially if he's dead. Do you understand? You're never going to get closure on this. He's dead. He's not coming back. He's not going to tell you he loves you or that he's proud of you.

Let me be your dad for a minute. He's proud of you and he loves you. Get over it. You can't be carrying this around. You can't get it fixed. And for goodness sake, if you understand the pain of what it means to never hear that, you better make sure that your kids are hearing from you all the time: "I love you. I love you. I love you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you." Because if you need it, how much do they need it? And if you know what they need and you're not giving it to them, you've got issues. You've got sin. So do it.

Breaking the Cycle

I understand how hard it is. I really do. I understand the power of words. I understand how it can percolate for 51 years from a kindergarten teacher. But you know what? I can't fix it. And I'm not going to let some goofy kindergarten teacher from 51 years ago run my life now.

If your dad never did it, maybe he wasn't confident. Maybe he didn't love you. Even then, whatever. I mean, honestly, it doesn't matter at this point. They can't fix it. Write him a letter. Take him to Starbucks. Tell him you love him. Then you've done everything you can. But you can't let your life be ruined by what your dad didn't do out of either ignorance or indifference.

He didn't know. They didn't know. They were busy trying to make a living. Banks were crashing. Two months ago, when I had that meeting with John Wood and we were talking about life, he told me about getting married August 8th, 1932. He had saved up $909.05. On August 6th, 1932, his bank crashed. He lost everything. It's really a compelling story. But you know what? That was everybody's story. They were busy getting eggs and a little bread. Not even wheat bread. They didn't even love you enough to give you wheat bread. They gave you Wonder Bread.

That's just the way it is. Roll on with it.

Let me tell you where you aren't going to find encouragement. You aren't going to find it in your circumstances. You aren't going to find it in your accomplishments. No one cares. When you get the award for the greatest blim-blam and you're walking on the stage, everyone in the room hates you because they wish they had it. And the minute you're home and alone, it's hollow and it doesn't matter because you busted your pick to get the award, and now you got the award. Nobody cares.

You're not going to find encouragement from your assets. I remember a couple years ago, we painted the house. I pulled into the garage. I didn't hear the house say, "My, we feel well today. We have a new coat of paint. I don't know if you noticed." You might get a bill for $28,000 or something for this stupid thing. And you're not going to get encouragement from your discouraged friends.

The Economics of Encouragement

I'm going to give you a couple of principles. One of them is a basic 101 economic principle. It's a philosophy behind encouragement. What you tax, you discourage. What you feed, you encourage.

I remember hearing Barry Asmus one time, just talking about money. We're at breakfast talking about money, and he's talking about how global it is and billions are moving around the world. He said, "It's real simple. Capital goes where it's welcomed and it stays where it's treated well." So you tax, tax, tax, tax, tax - it's going someplace else. You're going to find a new way around it.

You're going to be either an encourager or discourager to someone. And you're going to find this encouragement as you become more really the person that people want to be around.

Drains and Energizers

You've got people in your life. You can see them coming. Here they come and you can feel your stomach turning. You know what this is going to be - this is going to be a giant drain.

I see them this way. They'll come at me with some inane Bible question that I've never heard of or couldn't care less about. Or they'll come with some "don't you feel this?" or "how about this?" Or parsing some verb I don't care about. I'm going to have to listen to 20 minutes of this and then have somebody give me a book this thick on something I don't care about and say, "Will you read it?" And I'm going to say, "No, I don't care about it."

When they're gone, I feel - my best description - like a car whose lights have been left on all night. I can't wait to see them go. If I could hide, I will. That's not a very good confession, is it? But it's true. None of them in this room, but you know what I mean.

But I've got other people that when I see them, I'm afraid they aren't going to see me. I'm afraid that I want to say, "Hey, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait - they're bothering me! Talk to me! I want to spend time with you!"

If you don't have any friends, all you've got to do is figure out what do you want in a friend, and then do that in your life. And you'll have plenty of friends. They'll be all around.

Biblical Model for Encouragement

Here's the Biblical model. I'll give you five things here.

Number one: Tell people you're praying for them. 2 Timothy chapter 1, verse 3, Paul is just commending Timothy, talking about him, and he said, "I constantly remember you in my prayers." In 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, he does the same thing: "I constantly remember you."

Well wait a minute. Why wouldn't he just pray for them? Why does he tell them? Because something happens. Something happens when you hear that. There's a connect.

One day Susan's at Costco and she's checking out, and somehow she has something that says East Valley Bible Church on it. The gal checking her out says, "Do you go to East Valley Bible Church?" And Susan said, "Yep, I do." The gal said, "I've been praying every day for the pastor's wife, because I know she's sick." Susan said, "Really?" She said, "Yeah. You know what? I've never met her. If you go to church there and you see her, would you tell her that the girl at Costco is praying for her?" Now, that has a whole big effect on Susan.

There's nothing wrong with praying for somebody, and there's nothing wrong with telling them. In fact, it seems to be Paul's model. He even drops them a note saying, "Hey, I was thinking about you today."

I've got a couple of guys, and I'm on a wavelength with a guy right now. I don't see him much, and every time he calls - he called the other day and he said, "I don't know why, I don't understand it, but I've been thinking about you all day and praying for you and Susan." It was the very day we found out the cancer was back. I just called him, and we don't have a really close relationship. I called him and said, "Hey, you left a note. I want you to know what's going on."

He called the other day, and he said, "Tom, I wanted you to know, I'm praying for you today." It was the day that Susan had surgery. He had no way of knowing. There's something powerful about that.

Affirm People's Uniqueness

Here's the second thing: Affirm people's uniqueness. Second Timothy, chapter 1, verses 5 through 7, Paul's talking about Timothy's uniqueness. "I remind you to fan the flame of the gift that's in you, which is in you through the laying on of hands. God didn't give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, love, and self-discipline."

I can't stand it when somebody gets up and says - they're evolutionists, they believe everything's an accident, and we're going nowhere - and they say you're special. How can I be special if I'm an accident?

You are special. God made you unique and different. Every one of you will have a unique expression of how God works in your life. Every one of you have a unique background. And let's be honest, some of us yucky. Some of us got a lot of stuff in there that we're not proud of, we're not happy about, we didn't want to go through it, but we went through it. Didn't even understand why. All of you have been placed by God sovereignly in a job

You have a home and a place, and you have a constituency, meaning you have people around you. That's how special you are. You have a special background and a special giftedness. God has sovereignly placed you. You may not understand why, but He's placed you in this office, or He's placed you at that club, or He's put you in that foursome, or He's placed you in that neighborhood for a reason and for a purpose.

That's not to blow smoke at you, that's to remind you that each and every day is a gift from God, and God has you here. There's really only a couple of reasons you're here, frankly. One is to praise and worship Him. The other is to encourage and equip the body, and the other one is to share with lost people. There's not much left to do after that.

The Priority of Evangelism

If you really want to get down and dirty about it, everything you're doing here on earth, you'll do better in heaven, except one thing. What is that? Evangelism. Everything else you'll do better in heaven. My praise is better, my worship is better, my life is better, I'm holier, all this stuff, but there's no evangelism there.

So I would say of those things I'm being about in my life, evangelism ought to be at the top of the list. I don't say this to be harsh, I don't say this to put guilt on you, but I think you ought to take a look at your life and see if in the last six, nine months, God has used you to bring somebody to understand who He is. Has God given you opportunities to share the gospel, and have you taken them? And if not, something's really wrong with you.

He's given you a background. It may be really goofy, but if you have a goofy background, it means you have goofy people around you, and goofy people really need to hear the gospel. It may be a family, it may be a workplace, He may have given you great wealth, and so you have a unique kind of entree into a demographic. He puts you in a job.

Express High Expectations

Here's the third thing: Express to people high expectations of them. Paul's writing here to Philemon, and he's talking about a slave that's run away, and Paul doesn't tell him what to do with the slave. He just simply says, "I know you'll do the right thing." And there's a great burden in that.

Haley came to me one day in high school, and she said, "Dad, I don't want to go to school tomorrow." I said, "All right, stay home." And she said, "Do you want to know why I want to stay home?" I said, "Not really." And she said, "Well, why don't you want to know?" And I said, "Haley, you've never, in I don't know how many years, whatever you've got, 12 years of school, you've never asked to stay home. So for whatever reason, you feel like you need to stay home tomorrow. You feel like you're going to get sick, or you've got something, I don't even care. Haley, I trust you. You're not going to do something stupid, and if you don't want to go to school tomorrow, don't go to school tomorrow."

You could see in her eyes the burden of that. The heaviness of that. Now, if you had said that to me when I was a kid, I'd go, "I don't want to go tomorrow, I don't want to go the next day, I don't want to ever go again." So you've got to build a little relationship here, but we've got to let them know the bar is up here.

I can tell you at church, and I can only speak about mine, I don't know about any others, I'm not sure we have the bar high enough for people. If you say you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, there ought to be a bunch of things. Number one, there should be people working all over the joint. We should have more money than we know what to do with. Honestly. I don't talk about it, never work you all in here, never talk to you about money. I'm just saying that ought to be the most natural thing in the world. You ought to be giving away money at the speed of light. Once you figure out how much you need, the rest of it ought to be going right out that door into whatever God is doing. Start at church, and God's doing a whole bunch of other stuff as well. But that's the expectation. The bar is very high. Be holy. Be perfect. That's a pretty high bar for me to try to get over.

Focus on What's Important to Them

Here's the fourth thing: Focus on what's important to them. Mark chapter 6, we won't turn there, it's a great scene. Jesus has sent the disciples out two by two. Now they come back to report to Him. And there's so much going on that they can't even have a chance to eat. So He says, "Come on, let's go away, we're going by ourselves," and they get in the boat and they're going to a quiet place.

Now why are they doing that? Well, they need rest, and I've got to tell you, if you're a hermeneutic guy and homiletics and all this, you're going to have a problem here, because I'm going to move away from the text a little and go into what I think is human nature. I can't imagine that these guys came back two by two and said, "It was really exciting. We cast out demons. All sorts of things happened. Wow, wow, wow." And Jesus said, "That is really special. I must go and suffer and die and rise again." I can't imagine that.

I've got to believe these guys are coming back, and the guy's going, "Hey, you're not going to believe what happened." And his partner is going to go, "But remember that." And then these two guys are going to say, "That's nothing." And I'm thinking, Jesus is in the middle, stoking this all the way along, going, "Wow, what about you guys? What about you? What about you?"

You have people in your sphere of interest or influence, and you need to be interested in what they're interested in, even if it's just to have a relationship with. I've got a guy who's into NASCAR. I couldn't care less. If they ran the race in my backyard, I wouldn't go out. All I would do is call the police and say, "Why is it so noisy?" Couldn't care less. Don't know anything about it. I don't understand it. The guys that I'm with get into it, but this guy—

Finding Common Ground

I bump into him every once in a while, and my brother's into this too. With a guy here, I'll say to him, "Hey, how about that race?" I'll try to know who won the race. I couldn't care less, but I know it's important to him. The fact that it's important to him establishes a conversation so that I can get in what's really important in life.

Commend Them to Others

Here's the last thing: commend them to others. Paul writes in Philippians, and he says, "Listen, I'm sending Timothy to you. I'm sending Timothy so I'll be cheered up by the news." He's on a reconnaissance mission. "I have no one else like him." And he just talks about Timothy.

One night—absolutely true story—I'm speaking at this deal. I'm a guest. Here's the introduction: "Our speaker tonight is Tom Schrader. We're happy to have him here. We invited three other men to speak. None of them could accept. Would you welcome Tom?" That's what he says.

I got up, and I said, "Wow. Can I ask you—you don't need to answer now, but I want to know at the end, because I want to know what everybody else wants to know—who are the other three? And why did they have something significant to do tonight, and I could only be here?" It was not an overwhelming, at least in my mind, introduction. But when you commend somebody, the expectation goes high.

Key Principles Summary

Let's put a bow on this and get some things of what we talked about. Number one, don't waste the rest of your life trying to get better at something you'll never be good at. You got ten things you do, three you do well, seven you do poorly. Don't go take classes on the seven. Focus on the three.

We come back to that again and again and again. Some of you are in places where you're doing jobs for which you've been trained, but you don't have any appetite for them, so you need to quit. Now, it's going to take some time for that, because you've got to get what you can do with what you want to do, and what you're charged or paid to do can't necessarily happen, but you've got to have an exit strategy.

What's Still Missing

Now, I want you to understand where we are. We're now talking about people who understand power. We've got the right person in the right place. They understand that they own and steward this mission. They have meaningful assignments, and they now have the courage put into them. We're ready to go, right?

No. There's one thing that's missing. One more thing you need to do to that person. You now need to release him and give him the permission to go.

You're going to have a guy that's all charged and everything else, but if you haven't released him, you've got problems. You've got this kid and he's all ready, but you haven't released him. That's what we'll talk about next week.

Father, help us see this truth, apply it to our heart. God, that You made us in a unique, special, different way. Father, thank You for that. Thank You that You affirm us in Your word, that You point out our uniqueness, that You have high expectations of us, that You care about what we care about, and You love us. Father, thank You for that. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.