Encouragement

 

God has been good to me, meeting me at the point of my needs. Recently, I found myself needing an encouraging word and God sent his word to me several times. These words encouraged me and bolstered my faith and was also able to use the same words to encourage others.

In the past week, I experienced back ache that made me very uncomfortable, felt like there was a heavy load on me and could not even bend my neck without experiencing pain. I started praying for healing and also asked other people to pray for me. Early on Tuesday morning, God brought to my attention a verse  I had never seen before or taken note of. Psalm 41:3 " The LORD sustains them on their sickbed and restores them from their bed of illness". Meditating on the verse encouraged me greatly and I was able to remember a testimony of a healing that happened several years ago.

When I was in Senior Secondary School, I experienced back ache /pain over several months, the pain made doing any chore that involves bending down a nightmare. The pain was right in the middle of my back around the waist line, but because I was in a boarding school, I coped with occasional pain reliever which only gave temporary relief. On a fateful Sunday, we had a guest minister for Sunday service in the school christian fellowship, he was also a father to one of my kids in the school. After the preaching, Reverend Ajolore made an altar call and also asked that those that need a special touch of God to come out to the altar. I decided that I want the special touch of God because of the back ache I was suffering from. When the Reverend came to me, he asked me what I wanted and I told him about the backache. He laid one hand on my head and the other on my back and prayed for me. As he was praying, I began to feel myself turning round and round from my head to my waistline, meanwhile my feet was stationary in one spot. I don't know if my turning around was physical but my eyes were closed and I felt the going around in circles, It was like my waist was being screwed back to the top of the hipbone. That was the end of my backache and I have not experienced such type of back ache again.

On Tuesday afternoon, I went to the my K-LOVE app on my phone as I occasionally listen to music on it, but more often than not pray on some prayer requests. One of the prayer requests was from someone who was suffering from depression and anxiety attacks and whose spouse has just being deployed. Immediately, Psalm 46 came to my mind, I went ahead to read it from beginning to the end and it was an apt chapter for the prayer request and went ahead to share it with the woman. A few minutes later, I got a response that gladdened my heart, She said " Thank you so much! That literally put me in awe!". Why am I mentioning this? It's because God is opening my eyes to the fact that we are to keep encouraging each other, be it with Psalms, a song, a word of wisdom, knowledge or with prayers. God has equipped us with so many gifts not only for our use but for the edification of the body of Christ. 

Sharing our testimonies is one way we can encourage others, the testimonies tell others about who God is and opens the door for the inquisitive to say ' I want to know more about this God'. This week, I have been in sore need of encouragement on this blog because no one is testifying about what God is doing in their life or has done in times past. I know for fact that testimonies abound because God is good and his mercy endures forevermore. But God has encouraged me to forge ahead, if there is a testimony, I will publish it, if none, you may find just a song testifying to God's glory on this page. In the light of this, I decided to share a dream with you.

September 2015

The vision for this blog came originally in June but I shoved it to the back of my mind, but during service sometimes in early September, the instruction to have a place where testimonies will be shared came again. As I slept overnight that day, I had a dream which pressed that instruction home.

In the dream, I found myself telling three people that God told me to start a website where testimonies will be shared, after telling these people, I found myself on a field, it was initially small and was being plowed. As I kept on looking, some of those I had mentioned the website to joined me and the field became bigger , till it stretched far beyond what my eyes could see. The field was already plowed and prepared for planting, the soil looked dark and rich like a loamy soil. I expressed surprise that how did the field become so big in a short while and that who prepared the field for planting? As I was looking around, started seeing quite a number of people working on the field and planting. And I woke up. 

A crucial detail that I had forgotten came to remembrance when I was fretting on this blog and that is, there were other people with me on that field and quite a lot of people started working on the plowed field. Based on this, am throwing the blog open to as many as God as called to work in His vineyard. Are you a writer who can write better than me? Come on board! Do you have an amazing testimony of one thing you know has God written all over it? Share it! Are you an intercessor who can stand in the gap and believe God for breakthroughs? Then pray! Do you consider yourself a Barnabas? Then start encouraging others around you. We must unify together so that the aroma of Christ can permeate this present world and people can be prepared for the second coming of Christ. I encourage you to join hands with me to declare the glory of God.

1 Thessalonians 5:11" Therefore encourage (admonish, exhort) one another and edify (strengthen and build up) one another, just as you are doing."

 

 In light of the above, if you want to respond in one way or another, send me an email either via the contact form on this blog or directly to itestifytoyou@gmail.com. I covet your prayers so please pray for me. Thank you.

Background of picture 2 and 3 from Pixabey.com