Encouraged
The enemy is most encouraged when believers are discouraged. So, the question is, how do believers stay encouraged despite the attempts of an enemy to discourage them?
I’m sure many could offer a diverse set of answers to this question. However, I wonder how many of those answers would touch on the need to gather with other saints regularly, with a commitment to both bring something to that gathering and receive what others bring to it. You see, the enemy likes to isolate a believer in order to discourage them. He wants to keep them away from others because he knows the danger that they can pose to his agenda.
1Corinthians 14:31 For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged.
Colossians 2:1 For I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh, 2 that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, and attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
Hebrews 10:23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, 25 not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.
Being committed to a fellowship of believers for the purpose of mutual encouragement in the Lord is of great significance to being and staying encouraged. More than that, it is a matter of being equipped as a disciple of Jesus.
Ephesians 4:11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
I’ve never heard of a five-fold ministry gift that goes to individual believers’ homes to fulfill this calling to equip. They do this equipping in the gatherings of the saints, and it is of great importance to Jesus. The goal of this equipping is to believers in their calling and empower the commands that Jesus gave to be a blessing to one another—commands such as love one another as I have loved you, do good to one another, care for one another, and share with one another.
Romans 12:5 so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another.
Romans 12:10 Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor, giving preference to one another;
These cannot be fulfilled from home, separated from the fellowship of believers to which God desires you to belong. The online church cannot facilitate these very important interactions and needed equippings. The in-person gathering is a very important part of that very important process. If you want to really stay encouraged, stay connected in person, and bring whatever you’ve received from Jesus with you.
