Last week, my 12 year-old daughter, Anica, and I set a “new world record” for hitting the ping pong ball back and forth 52 times!  We laughed, high-fived and ran to tell Mom.

It’s taken a lot of courage and years of practice for Anica to get his far, especially considering how, when we first started to play, she could not return the ball even once.   I would have to say that our secret weapon to success has been to encourage, encourage and to keep on encouraging her.

You’ll notice that inside the word, encourage, is the word courage.  Encourage means to inspire, support, cheer and embolden but what it really means is to speak courage into someone else.  So how do we find encouragement for ourselves when we are truly down, feel broken or worthless?

Perhaps at times like this, we need to choose to allow God to speak courage into us.  After all, his book is filled with despair turned to hope, losing transformed into winning, defeat followed by ultimate victory.  The Bible’s pages have story after story of struggling people who found hope, joy and courage with God’s word.

Yes, God himself told Moses, “Be strong and courageous.” Dt31:6   Years later, God told Israel’s leader, Joshua, the same words:  “Be strong and courageous.” Joshua 1:9. Then 1000 years later, King David told his son Solomon the same words again!  “Be strong and courageous!” 1 Chronicles 28:20

And if any man in history lived courageously, it was certainly Jesus.  Jesus, the one who willingly died for us who also said, “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do.” Luke 12:4.

Yes, it’s absolutely certain that God wants to breathe encouragement into our lives, if only we will let him.  Some refer to the book of Philippians as a book of joy and encouragement.  Now know that Paul wrote this while he was in jail!  Clearly his source of encouragement came from God and not his circumstances.

God wants to speak encouragement into you.  When you miss the ping pong ball, he’ll serve you another for as long as you’ll let him.  He is the ultimate Father, who loves to encourage us over and over again!  And by the way, when Jesus rose from the dead, he broke the most important world record!