John 14:16 “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another comforter to help you and be with you forever.”
Dr. Gary Chapman wrote a book called The Five Love Languages, and my love language is “words of affirmation.” Something I need is for someone to come alongside of me and speak words of encouragement, edification and affirmation. If I look to people to give me this, I will be sorely disappointed and left lacking. I am so thankful for the Holy Spirit because God obviously knew how important encouragement is to His children and how unavailable some people are in this area. Thankfully God sent us a Divine Comforter and Encourager when He sent us the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Parakletos, the Greek word for “One Who walks alongside us, giving aid, encouraging, building us up, edifying and comforting us.” He is our Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener and someone who stands by us and will never leave us.
2 Corinthians 1:3-4, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” God comforts us in our time of need so that we might come alongside others in their time of need and He wants us to give away what He has given us. He encourages us and once we have been encouraged, we are to encourage others by the encouragement and comfort that we ourselves have received from Him. You see, the Lord pours into us as an empty vessel and we in turn are to empty ourselves out to others. Unfortunately, there are many of us who do not turn to the Lord for comfort. For so many years, I read His Word like a history book. I believed it was true, however, it didn’t really apply to me. His truth of how much He loves me and how much He delights in me were not really true for me. Yes, He loved you, but really, He couldn’t love me, not after all I had done. So for many years, I turned to the world for comfort, or I looked to my husband for encouragement and comfort, and when that didn’t work out, I spent time with godly girlfriends, but even there, I was left wanting. I certainly was very self-sufficient, so I did a lot of self-care like, getting a massage or going for a walk, but even then, I still did not feel affirmed.
It wasn’t until the death of my son, when the Lord brought me to the most barren place of my life, that He brought me to my knees and to a place where I was so low that no one, absolutely no one on the face of the earth, could encourage me or comfort me. It was in that place that I finally bowed my heart in submission to Him and laid myself at His footstool, and said to Him, I don’t want to do this, I can’t live my life like this, I am empty and there is nothing left in me. I am vulnerable and broken and there is no one on the earth who can understand.
John 21:7 says, “Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, ‘It is the Lord,’ he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water.” As soon as Simon Peter saw and heard Jesus, he recklessly abandoned everything and jumped into the water. He was “all in;” he had come to a point of total surrender. I have come to realize that sometimes it takes a true deep crisis of internal abandonment, or total surrender, to commit completely externally. My focus is now concentrating and maintaining an intimate relationship with my Lord so I never have to live in that shallow place of emptiness, not really knowing His peace and His comfort, ever again.
– Melody
