So encourage each other with these
words.
1 Thessalonians
4:18
By the time the
two Dorley brothers were finally rescued by the Coast Guard, they had been
floating in the Atlantic Ocean for 6 days. Their family’s boat had capsized
during a sudden storm, and both parents were lost. The boys managed to crawl
onto a life raft and bailed out rainwater with their caps until the storm
subsided. Making the situation even more treacherous, Colt, the younger
brother, was blind. “How did you keep going?” one reporter asked. With a
protective arm around his little brother, Calvin, age 12, answered, “When I
felt like giving up, I would look at him. I couldn’t let him give up, so I told
him I could see a boat coming. I described it so well I really could almost see
it myself. I just kept saying it until it came true.”
That’s what this
verse is talking about. The believers in Thessalonica were growing weary of
daily persecution, trouble, and loss, so Paul wrote to them in glorious detail
about the second coming of Jesus. They’d adopted some erroneous teaching about
death and were in danger of losing sight of their purpose. Rather than rebuke
them, the letter encouraged them to refocus on the promise that would soon come
true. Jesus was coming back! It would all be worth it. They were to encourage
each other with those words, and in doing so, encourage themselves. Our minds
start to believe what our ears hear and when we speak truth in love, our
thinking changes. Like Calvin, when we encourage our weary brothers, we
encourage ourselves.
.
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