There are so many hurting people in this world who need to be shown unconditional love and care that is pure and without motive or pretense. When we love one another and treat others as we would want to be treated we will be loving as Jesus loved, caring as Jesus cared and welcoming as Jesus welcomed all who came unto Him in need. We don’t have to have a special degree to take an interest in someone else and offer a listening ear, an available shoulder to lean upon and an open heart that is willing to help brighten someone else’s day even if it’s in the simplest of ways. The Lord Jesus declares in John 13:35 “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” Love is what differentiates us from everyone else. When we show love in our interactions with others we will break down barriers, help to heal wounds, encourage the discouraged and be the hands and feet of Jesus who is our example of how we are to treat His people. (Luke 6:31) (Philippians 2:2-7)

No matter what you may be going through I wholeheartedly encourage you to make yourself available to lend a helping hand towards someone else who is going through a hard time. It is when we help to bear someone else’s burden that we will find our burden become lightened as well. That is how God works in our lives. When we help to do for someone else what they can’t do, God will do for us what we can’t do for ourselves. The Bible declares in 1 Peter 4:8-11 “And above all things have fervent love for one another, for love will cover a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without grumbling. As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. If anyone speaks, let him speak as the oracles of God. If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” (Galatians 6:1-4) (Colossians 3:12-17)

I encourage you again to slow down from the busyness of life and make yourself available to listen to someone else’s troubles and be there for them helping to make a bad situation just a little bit better by your positive words of affirmation over their life. In the end you will be proud that you allowed the Lord to use you to be someone else’s visible Angel even if it was for a little while. (Isaiah 6:8)

I hope this message inspires and challenges your heart to be one who is quick to be helpful to someone else even if it’s in the simplest of ways.


JUST LISTEN

I suspect that the most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen. Just listen. Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention and especially if it's given from the heart. When people are talking, there's no need to do anything, but receive them. Just take them in. Listen to what they're saying. Care about it. Most times caring about it is even more important than understanding it. Most of us don't value ourselves or our love enough to know this. It has taken me a long time to believe in the power of simply saying, “I'm so sorry,” when someone is in pain and meaning it.

One of my patients told me that when she tried to tell her story people often interrupted to tell her that they once had something just like that happen to them. Subtly her pain became a story about themselves. Eventually she stopped talking to most people. It was just too lonely. We connect through listening. When we interrupt what someone is saying to let them know that we understand, we move the focus of attention to ourselves. When we listen, they know we care. Many people with cancer can talk about the relief of having someone just listen.

I have even learned to respond to someone crying by just listening. In the old days I used to reach for the tissues, until I realized that passing a person a tissue may be just another way to shut them down, to take them out of their experience of sadness and grief. Now I just listen. When they have cried all they need to cry, they find me there with them.

This simple thing has not been that easy to learn. It certainly went against everything I had been taught since I was very young. I thought people listened only because they were too timid to speak or did not know the answer. A loving silence often has far more power to heal and to connect than the most well intentioned words.

By Rachel Naomi Remen


Read and meditate on these scriptures:

1 John 4:7-9 “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”

Romans 15:1-4 “We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification. For even Christ pleased not Himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on Me. For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope.”

Galatians 6:9-10 “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.”

Philippians 2:13-15 “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure. Do all things without murmurings and disputings: That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.”

1 Peter 3:8-11 “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous: Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing. For he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile: Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it.”

All of these scriptures can be found in the King James Version Bible.


Today’s Selected Poem: THE POWER OF ONE
Click here to read --- http://www.Godswork.org/inpoem125.htm

Today’s Selected Testimony: THE PINK BIRDS
Click here to read --- http://www.Godswork.org/testimony155.htm


In Christ’s Service,

Dwayne Savaya
God’s Work Ministry