Health Food for Your Soul-Day 9

Where do you find strength when you feel weak? When your hopes grow dim? King David faced a traumatic crisis—his village was plundered and all the wives and children taken captive. The Bible tells us he “strengthened himself in the Lord.” God filled him with strength and empowered David and his men to recapture all that had been stolen(1 Samuel 30).

So glad you’ve dropped by for 21 Days of Strength. I hope you’ll find a word or a suggestion that encourages your heart and helps you grow strong.

I asked several friends for practical tips on how they strengthen themselves in the Lord. All agreed on the importance God’s Word as a means of encouragement.

But their answers for what this looked like were as varied as their personalities. As on friend put it, “I like to read and meditate on God’s Word. But with my creative and artistic side, I find it helps to actually draw the verses. Sometimes I embellish them with designs and colors. I meditate on the words of Scripture as I do this.”

Another has a more musical bent. Listening to worship music feeds her soul. After all, many worship songs are simply the words of Scripture put to melody. One young man prefers to hear the Word of God through preaching. Still another friend feels especially close to God through nature. So she likes to meditate on a special promise from Scripture as she walks outside. You get the point. God has wired each of us in a unique fashion—so it helps to experiment to learn how best to nourish our soul.

My friends all stressed that encouragement from other believers is vital. One confessed that sometimes he tries to find strength on his own. “Finally, after going around in my head, I realize I need to get perspective from somebody else,” he admitted. “And after a few minutes of talking things over with a friend, I realize that this was what I needed all along.” The Christian life, we agreed, is not to be travelled alone.

Each has discovered that giving hope to someone else who is hurting brings strength. One friend sends encouraging notes to those whom God puts on her heart–she’s done this for years.   Writing notes, she admits, always lifts her own spirits.  I’ve personally been on the receiving end of some of her beautiful words of encouragement.

God’s economy is upside down. We give life away, only to get it back in return. We grow strong as we pour out our strength to others. I’ve discovered that encouraging the broken hearted brings strength and even healing—both emotional and physical. So Isaiah 58:10 has become one of my life’s verses: “If you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday” (Isaiah 58:10 NIV).

How about you? What brings strength and healing, to your soul?