Conquer discouragement

February 26, 2020 | 13 comments

Discouragement comes from looking at things from a material point of view.

Encouragement comes from looking at things from a spiritual point of view.

Seek the encouraging view!

13 thoughts on “Conquer discouragement”

  1. I recently had to apply spiritual encouragement to a very discouraging picture, involving another who isn’t open to “prayer”. (this had been a phone call)

    Disappointed and tearful, I prayerfully sought inspiration.

    The lines from a Hymn came to me, “Pilgrim in earth, home and heaven are within you. Stranger, thou art the.guest of God.

    I felt such a sense if relief and gratitude, that this dear one is dear to God.

    The situation resolved the next day and continued to unfold in other ways too.

    1. Shelagh, I do understand why you felt as you did. Yet had a wonderful turnaround in your thinking. I had a recent experience that felt similar to yours. I’ve corresponded for many years with a man who lives in NSW, Australia. His house and adjoining family farm were severely threatened in the recent fierce fire season. So I thought it appropriate to email him and his family a number of encouraging Biblical quotes. However his response was kind of “Thanks but no thanks,” stating, “we are not religious.” I was surprised since that did not match my previous impression of him. Oh well!
      Thinking it over – I decided that my prayers, acknowledging God’s presence where they were, would help anyway. And he and family did manage to save their properties, with the result, as he wrote, that they now have an “island of green” amid the surrounding destruction.

  2. Shelagh, thank you for your precious account of turning to God. I love. your comment:”…that this dear one is dear to God.” What a truth to see for our friends, family, and all. A line from Mrs. Eddy’s poem comes to mind: :”His arm encircles me and mine and all.”

  3. Sunday, a member at church whispered to me she’d received word that morning that a beloved family member was in hospital and could possible pass on. Sitting at my seat, the thought came, and I opened my hymnal to read hymn number 148:
    “In heavenly love abiding,
    No change my heart shall fear;
    And safe is such confiding,
    For nothing changes here.
    The storm may roar without me,
    My heart may low be laid;
    But God is round about me,
    And can I be dismayed?

    Texting that hymn number to my friend, brought an immediate response, “AMEN”

    While this thought came so naturally, I’ve applied it also to my family situation, where I’m trying to lift up my family, and my son, in particular who is struggling to find employment. He worked a day job, and he has been very helpful, but all his hopes and plans to be employed full time have not unfolded yet. The change is coming in moments we share knowing that all is well, and that his turning away from discouragement will bring an answer to his prayers and desires.

    1. Dear Chilesands, it might help you to know and affirm that God is the only employer and your son is God`s employee. And that God surely will give your son the right fulltime job in which your son will be very satisfied. Full satisfaction is the nature of God. Much Love to you and your son!

  4. This evening while driving home from our Wednesday Testimony meeting where I had the reading, I had a seeming negative experience. I had to drive a little onto the pavement to let our organist out of the car. A black dressed woman was angry that I drove so near to her. It was already dark outside, and I saw her in the last moment. I said that I stopped aright and in time. During driving to my home I was discouraged about this negative incident after such an inspiring reading in church and wonderful testimonies. I tried to see her as a child of God.
    Back at home the encouragment came through listening to the Online Testimony Meeting of The Motherchurch this evening. And my encouragment grew after I read Shelagh`s comment, saying that this dear one is dear to God. I can apply this sentence from Shelagh to this seeming angry woman, whom I now see as dear to God.

    I am also grateful for the other helpful comments and for Evan`s so loving advice to seek the encouraging view. During my drive home I asked God to please give me a spiritual idea which heals this situation in my thoughts. Am grateful that God did it! 🙂

  5. Thank you Evan. With the news this week (and the past couple of months about Wuhan), it is easy to look at the “material point of view” or opinions circulating in the news and be discouraged. I have to remember they are only opinions and opinions that are citing mortal mind’s law, not God’s law. I have found some things in Science and Health that are very encouraging since they are looking at the spiritual point of view. And, I want to share them; (I especially love the last two sentences)

    “By universal consent, mortal belief has constituted itself a law to bind mortals to sickness, sin, and death. This customary belief is misnamed material law, and the individual who upholds it is mistaken in theory and in practice. The so-called law of mortal mind, conjectural and speculative, is made void by the law of immortal Mind, and false law should be trampled under foot.
    If God causes man to be sick, sickness must be good, and its opposite, health, must be evil, for all that He makes is good and will stand forever. If the transgression of God’s law produces sickness, it is right to be sick; and we cannot if we would, and should not if we could, annul the decrees of wisdom. It is the transgression of a belief of mortal mind, not of a law of matter nor of divine Mind, which causes the belief of sickness. The remedy is Truth, not matter, — the truth that disease is unreal.”
    S&H 229:15-32

    I was thinking that by breaking the First Commandment and acknowledging a power apart from God, we are in a sense sinning/believing a lie and need to expose that lie and correct it. Here is another passage from Science and Health I have been working with;

    “If you believe that you are sick, should you say, “I am sick”? No, but you should tell your belief sometimes, if this be requisite to protect others. If you commit a crime, should you acknowledge to yourself that you are
    a criminal? Yes. Your responses should differ because of the different effects they produce. Usually to admit that you are sick, renders your case less curable, while to recognize your sin, aids in destroying it. Both sin and sickness are error, and Truth is their remedy. The truth regarding error is, that error is not true, hence it is unreal. To prove scientifically the error or unreality of sin, you must first see the claim of sin, and then destroy it. Whereas, to prove scientifically the error or unreality of disease, you must mentally unsee the disease; then you will not feel it, and it is destroyed.”
    S&H 461:16-30

  6. “Thank you, Evan, for the daily inspiration! And to those who comment, Thank you!

    Kirsten’s references as they relate to the Wuhan virus
    are very helpful. I have been holding to “Truth handles the most malignant contagion with perfect assurance.” Science and Health 176:31
    The truth is God holds man forever pure and free!
    As his reflection, what else can we be?
    I sometimes get discouraged that the world does not
    not have a keener sense of this fact.
    With Love we move steadfastly onward❣️

Leave a Reply to Josef Pfister Cancel reply

Keep the conversation going! Your email address will not be published.

*