Encouragement, Part I
May 2025: A letter for people who don't understand encouragement and discouragement.
Dear family, friends, and Internet strangers,
My sleep has been a mess, which happens from time to time. It’s rarely due to one clear factor; instead, it’s night after night of something not working—stayed up too late, had to rise early to be somewhere, couldn’t fall asleep, was awake in the middle of the night (for various reasons, including stormy weather), woke up too early, or—this happened last year—a bird screaming (“singing”, I would have said at a later hour) before dawn daily, somewhere very audible from bed.
(A roof inspection mysteriously coincided with the end of that bird noise; I’m guessing a nest was involved.)
One exhausted morning this week, I woke up extremely grumpy at how tired I was, how little I expected to get done, and my apparent lack of control over my own rest. I was discouraged.
I had planned to use a new recipe for breakfast that relied on leftover vegetables I didn’t want to go bad, and I’d been looking forward to it, so I made it despite my tiredness.
Not only was it delicious, it was so delicious it actually encouraged me to go and have a better day. One slice of a small egg casserole led me to believe my day could be better, even though I was no less tired.
How does an egg casserole encourage me? Is it just the magic of melty cheese?
What is encouragement, in general, and how does it work? It seems almost too ordinary to ask about, but I have found myself noticing situations like this one, where I feel tangibly encouraged or discouraged, and I realized I didn’t understand encouragement any more than I understood how an engine works (some cylinders and fire, I guess). So I began to ask.
How do people and situations influence my hope and confidence, and how can I rightly encourage others?
I receive much encouragement when my work goes well, especially when my efforts yield more than I had expected. I am discouraged when new tasks pop up like weeds (including new actual weeds in the flower beds), and my effort seems to be nowhere near enough to combat disorder.
At its roots, the word “encourage” has to do with “putting the heart (or courage) into” another. I think of encouragement as someone saying, “Keep going! Don’t quit!” Discouragement is the opposite; it’s encouragement to stop.
Encouragement is not the same as persuasion, motivation, or manipulation. It seems to have a component of hope, of heart, of confidence.
Psychology professor Y. Joel Wong, PhD, has defined encouragement as “the expression of affirmation through language or other symbolic representations to instill courage, perseverance, confidence, inspiration, or hope in a person(s) within the context of addressing a challenging situation or realizing a potential.” (“The Psychology of Encouragement: Theory, Research, and Applications”, The Counseling Psychologist, Vol. 43(2); 2015.)
In the beginning of that article, Wong notes the relative absence of study on the topic of encouragement, suggesting I’m not the only one to take an understanding of encouragement for granted.
Wong strictly uses an interpersonal definition of encouragement, in which one person intentionally communicates encouragement to another, though he acknowledges it’s possible to feel encouraged without the involvement of others. Since much of my experience of a sense of encouragement or discouragement has been unrelated to direct input from other people, I do not include that same requirement.
I feel encouraged when I feel like what I’m doing is working, or worthwhile. I feel discouraged when my efforts seem to yield little to nothing, or are being thwarted even if I do achieve results.
Apparently, something as small as delicious food can lead to a temporary sense of hope.
I can be physically discouraged. Migraines used to be a regular occurrence for me, and they not only made it nearly impossible to write or edit while I was having one, but they also left me feeling like I didn’t have the ability to do the things I wanted or needed to do. Exhaustion creates similar discouragement.
All of this raises a question: are encouragement and discouragement only about action, or can one be encouraged or discouraged wholly in the abstract?
As I worked on this letter, I quickly became convinced that encouragement is necessarily toward action. This agrees with Wong’s definition, at least somewhat.
I’d even argue that real hope always spurs one toward action, unlike a “wish”, which seems to require neither action nor hope. (Science supposedly agrees with this: Maya Shrikant, “The science of hope: More than wishful thinking”, ASU News, 15 June 2021.)
That is, to despair is to quit. To hope is to continue—working, playing, doing, being, living. To encourage is to instill hope; to discourage is to destroy it.
A Biblical Look at Encouragement
For this letter, as I often do when I’m trying to understand something, I looked up the relevant word in the Bible. There are many, many passages related to encouragement.
Most are about encouragement for good reasons, and a few, not so good—it is possible to encourage someone to commit evil, or for evil reasons.
There are descriptions of people encouraging and being encouraged (e.g., 2 Chronicles 30:22, 2 Chronicles 32:6-8, Ezekiel 13:22, Acts 15:32, Romans 1:11-12). There are directives to certain people to encourage specific other people (e.g., Deuteronomy 1:38, Deuteronomy 3:28, 2 Samuel 11:25—the context of this last one is not so good). Exhortations to take courage are written throughout (e.g., Joshua 1:9, Psalm 31:24, John 16:33, arguably Romans 15:4-6). A few verses mention discouragement.
In the New Testament, we are told to encourage one another (e.g., 1 Thessalonians 5:11, Hebrews 10:24-25).
These are all associated with action, as far as I can tell. The Book of Acts mentions lots of encouragement without directly describing the action, but the title is no misnomer; the whole context is the actions of the Apostles and other early Christians.
I am also convinced that encouragement requires evidence. I came to this conclusion as I considered what does and does not encourage me personally, but I have a secondary reason for it. In the New Testament, the typical Greek word for “encourage” is parakaleó. Three things stand out about this to me:
The same word is translated in other places as “beg”, “beseech”, “implore”, and other urging words I think of as very different in meaning.
It is definitely related to paraklétos, “the paraclete”, a term for the Holy Spirit that is generally translated “helper”, “comforter”, or “advocate”.
Both “parakaleó” and “paraklétos” have a legal sense, according to the notes by HELPS Word-studies:
[…] parakaléō (“personally make a call”) refers to believers offering up evidence that stands up in God's court.
[3870 (parakaléō), the root of 3875 /paráklētos (“legal advocate”), likewise has legal overtones.]
and
paráklētos […] properly, a legal advocate who makes the right judgment-call because close enough to the situation. […] paráklētos (“advocate, advisor-helper”) is the regular term in NT times of an attorney (lawyer) – i.e. someone giving evidence that stands up in court.
I now believe that encouragement uses evidence to infuse a person with hope that spurs them to action.
My nice breakfast gave me evidence that my day could be better than I was expecting, which led me to go try to do more than I might have otherwise. If I’d messed up the recipe, the outcome might have been discouragement, as I may have interpreted that as evidence my ability to act effectively that day was truly ruined by lack of sleep.
In truth, I should be seeking hope from God, and not be tossed by every temporary circumstance. But this letter is about how encouragement in general works, and also, I do not live perfectly every moment. In short: just let my little illustration on the mechanics of encouragement do its job for this letter.
On Encouraging and Taking Courage
I believe Christians, at least, have an ability, even a requirement, to encourage others (given the “encourage” directives to believers in the New Testament). The Bible also refers to a spiritual gift of exhortation (ESV) or encouragement (NIV), which I assume is a supernatural ability by the Holy Spirit to spur people to righteous action.
I do not appear to have this gift.
How do I encourage appropriately (not like the false prophets in Ezekiel 13:22)? How do I show someone valid evidence for hope that leads to right action? And how do I take courage? How do I remember and use the evidence I already have access to?
I had intended to write a single letter on the topic of encouragement, but it grew into two. Part II should arrive in subscribers’ inboxes around mid-June, with some ideas related to these questions.
Some Hope for Today
All of my hope for seemingly hopeless situations is found in the Lord, the Living God.
He continues to be the answer to every worry. I hope because of the Lord’s presence. I know this hope cannot be put to shame (Psalm 25:3, Romans 5:5). I hope, knowing my reward will come (e.g., Galatians 6:8-10), and because the Lord is Himself my reward already (e.g., Psalm 73:25-26).
Hope is always right there for the people of God. Don’t give up, for He is with us.
If you are not yet a Christian, I exhort you to seek the path of life—Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God. Pray. Ask Him to reveal Himself. Find your hope in the Lord who is eternal, whose goodness never quits. Hope is in Him.
Yes, we find temporary sources of confidence and courage, like a delicious breakfast. What I’m talking about here is the hope that doesn’t end, which does not put us to shame, Who walks closely with His people always—Jesus, and through Him, relationship with God the Father and the indwelling Holy Spirit.
There is no substitute. “God-free” promises of hope also boast a God-shaped hole. When walking with Jesus Christ—the only way to God the Father—along with the solid hope of salvation from sin and death, there is much, much more hope for life generally. I have no other source of hope, at least nothing better than a general platitude, to offer you.
Please see the rest of the Gospel (literally “good news”) spelled out clearly on my friend Tina Marie Cox’s website: Let’s Be Real: Real Good News. I also recommend reaching out to a Christian friend, or, if you are subscribed, you can reply to this email. I intend to respond to whatever replies I can.
Writing Updates
I have been working on a white paper for a client, and I’ve had little time for personal writing projects. I did manage to write this letter.
Rabbit Trails I Had Little Time to Follow for This Letter
The Hebrew word often translated to “encourage” in the Old Testament, “chazaq”, is also translated “strengthen”. The word seems to appear a lot in the Book of Ezekiel, which is not so obvious in the English, and the use as a pattern in that book looks rather interesting. If this rabbit trail interests you, see not only Ezekiel but the rest of the uses in the OT: https://biblehub.com/hebrew/strongs_2388.htm
In the beginning of Job chapter 4, Job’s friend Eliphaz accuses Job of being discouraged despite having encouraged others in the past. There’s some stuff in there about the mechanics of encouragement that I found interesting, as well as a tie-in with Hebrews 12:12-13.
That’s it for this May! If any of this was valuable to you—interesting, useful, or beautiful—share it with someone:
To truth, love, and adventure,
Rae
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