Encourage-[en-kur-ij] to inspire with courage, spirit, or confidence.
The enCourage Blog is weekly dose of encouragement in a world that is often filled with bad news. We offer life-giving entries each Monday and Thursday written by gifted women from across our denomination, the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). You can subscribe below to have them delivered to your inbox. With hundreds of blog pieces, you can search on a variety of topics in the search bar above to read and share with friends. Christina Fox, a gifted author, serves as our enCourage General Editor. If you are interested in submitting a piece, you can contact her at cfox@pcanet.org.
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Why Pray Prayers of Adoration
CHRISTINE GORDON | CONTRIBUTOR I didn’t have much praise in my heart that spring morning, so I went outside to hear the praise of the birds. I was met by their song even before I got out the door. Tweets and trills, melodies and chatters, their chorus was accompanied by swoops across my back yard. I’d walked out into a world where praise was the dialect, and the hymns of the birds exposed my thankless heart. Their energetic tribute to their maker eventually led me to express my own words of praise to God. But my praise was slow in coming. From Lament to Adoration It had been a difficult few days full of pain for my family, and I’d prayed through the steps of lament several times in the previous hours, bringing my anger and questions before the Lord over and over. Each time the darkness would settle again in the back of my mind and attempt to take up permanent residence, I would name my specific frustrations and the details of damage happening in my family. I would end my silent prayers while cutting up vegetables or wiping down the countertops with a weak and forced prayer of trust, trying to remember God’s goodness. But I didn’t want to stay there. I’d been honest with God about my sadness for days and longed for more hope. And so as I listened to the joy of the birds’ chirps and calls, I settled into my plastic Adirondack chair and let the entire spring morning enfold me. Squirrels jumped from one branch to another in the treetops. A rabbit dashed from one end of my yard to the other. The huge oak tree in the corner raised its arms to the sky and the little flowering tree I’d planted three years prior showed the beginnings of leaf buds. Slowly my heavy heart began to match the lightness of the mood in my back yard. I started to see not just the movement of the birds but the color on their wings. I felt the humid breeze on my face and remembered how I love the smell of rain. The old oak tree pointed my gaze up toward heaven as I traced its branches with my eyes. My soul began to enjoy what I saw, felt, and heard, and finally to enjoy the maker Himself. Why Prayers of Adoration Why do we need to pray prayers of adoration? In my unceasing love for efficiency, I’ve asked this question many times. Doesn’t God already know who He is and what He’s like? Why do I need to remind Him repeatedly of His own character? Maybe you’ve quietly asked questions like these at some point in your life with God. When your to-do list includes more items than your day allows, it can feel like spending whatever minutes you have petitioning God for needed help makes the most sense, not naming His many attributes. ...
What I Got Wrong about Gethsemane
LEAH FARISH|GUEST I grew up looking at a lugubrious, Victorian-era painting of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. I knew that as He prayed there the night before His crucifixion, He sweated blood and asked that God “let this cup pass.” But somehow I was left with the idea that He was solely focused on His own upcoming suffering, perhaps doubting and fearing as He anticipated humiliation and torture. Lately, though, I have sensed that His anguish was for us, not so much for Himself. His humanity surely dreaded torture and death. Sweating blood, He showed us the horror He felt as He contemplated His sacrifice. This makes His resolve that much more poignant. Isaiah 50:6-7 prophesied it: “I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting. But the Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame. Perfect love casts out fear; in His perfect love for us, fear did not deter Him. He was Truth; He wasn’t doubting. He must have acutely dreaded the next hours, but He wasn’t shrinking back; “for the joy that was set before Him He endured the cross, despising the shame” (Heb. 12:2). He knew He would be raised from the dead and vindicated (Isaiah 50:8, Psalm 22:29-31, Mark 8:31-2). But the church was just embarking on its path through a dark world, and that night in the garden He must have seen its weakness and vulnerability with heartbreaking clarity. He saw that the church would be on earth for centuries, in our puny flesh and faith “filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.” His followers had proved themselves utterly unready to unite in witness, despite His warnings and exhortations....
For the Glory of God
KC JONES | GUEST Some of us are old enough to remember Michael W. Smith’s popular song, “Above All.” Smith’s soft, mellifluous tones, coupled with his worship of God made for easy listening on the ears and edified believers far and wide. While this is still true of many and has even moved into the realms of warm and fuzzy nostalgia, it wasn’t until hearing the song again recently that I stumbled across a core memory of mine; a simple conversation of a theological nature between my father and me regarding the song and the nature of our worship. It pertains to the refrain of the song, Crucified, laid behind a stone You lived to die, rejected and alone Like a rose, trampled on the ground You took the fall and thought of me Above all As I considered Jesus' posture during His incarnation and even more specifically before and during His crucifixion, it was impressed upon me that Jesus' chief consideration; His highest priority, as it were, was not of us, in fact, but of the Father Himself...
Easter: An Eternal Plan
SHARON ROCKWELL | CONTRIBUTOR A nearby freeway has a new billboard that simply says “God is One. Not three-in-one.” Our first-grade granddaughter was able to read the short message and exclaimed to her mother “That’s not right! God is three in one—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And Jesus is the Son. He died on the cross but now He is alive!” What joyful words to hear from a child whose parents and Sunday School teachers have poured into her biblical truths in ways she can understand and even differentiate false doctrine when she sees it! All for His Glory That anti-Trinity billboard is sponsored by a group focused on correcting what they see as biblical errors. But their beliefs contradict doctrinal truths and distort the gospel. The truth of the gospel should be clear and close to us all “in our mouths and in our hearts” (Rom. 10:8). This is especially relevant in the Easter season. This is a time to strengthen our understanding about God’s plan for our salvation. God created this world for His glory. This is a remarkable precept to remember: everything exists for the glory of God. This one truth will dictate how we think and behave. “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31)...
Strengthened in My Weakness: Why I’ve Already Saved the Dates for Next Year’s Leadership Training
I had done all the things, packed up my car, checked my list twice, and I was finally headed to LT! On the way I stopped to have lunch with my daughter, an LT alum. She wanted to know the theme and who was speaking. When I told her it was “Clay-like Calling,” and that Vanessa Hawkins was one of the speakers, she shared a story I had never heard. As a women and children’s ministry intern at First Pres. Jackson while she was at RTS earning her counseling degree, my daughter was privileged to attend LT several times. At one of the conferences, she heard Vanessa teach on the book of Ruth. She told me, “It was largely because of her teaching on Ruth that I gave Augusta (their two-year-old) the middle name ‘Ruth.’” Wow! I sat in awe at God’s goodness and the legacy LT had left in my daughter’s and granddaughter’s lives. I imagine many women would tell similar stories about LT’s impact on their lives, ministries, and families. This amazing conference is a non-negotiable on my calendar every year (unless of course, a grandbaby is being born!). This year’s LT, with its theme of God’s strength in our weakness, met me and hundreds of other women right where we needed it—with the hope of the gospel for the weariness and weightiness ministry can bring....
The Lord Set His Heart in Love on You
Editor’s Note: the following is an excerpt from Sarah Ivill’s new book, Heart Matters: Teaching with Purity and Purpose, used by permission. The book of Deuteronomy mentions the heart often. Perhaps most striking is the truth that “to the LORD your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it. Yet the LORD set his heart in love on . . . you” (Deut. 10:14-15). Ponder that for a moment. We are “a people holy to the LORD . . . his treasured possession” (Deut. 7:6). Such status is not because of anything good in us, but “because the LORD loves you” and is “the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments” (Deut. 7:8-9). This status with God is an important truth for us to hold to not only for ourselves, but also to share with others. There will be times when we are tempted to fall into the performance trap. We may think we have to be perfect to be approved, by God or by others. We may be tempted to envy another’s capabilities or opportunities. We might compete with or compare ourselves to others. So, it does our hearts good to return often to the truth that the Lord set His love upon us, even when we were His enemies (Rom. 5:10; Eph. 2:4-5). Even if we do not measure up to our own expectations—and we seldom do—or even the expectations of others, the Lord is faithful to love us...
