Ima­gi­ne yo­ur­self at a nor­mal week­day meal. You hear the clat­ter of spoons and smell the aro­ma of hot soup. There is the hum of con­ver­sa­ti­on with oc­ca­si­o­nal si­lent mo­ments. And then, all of a sud­den, you feel small arms around you and see the sun­ny face of a child. “She is so nice. This mom­my is so sweet. I love you very, very much.”

We all need to hear such lo­ving words on­ce in a while. Words than come from deep in the he­art and sur­round us like a hug or a warm blan­ket, wit­hout any con­di­ti­ons. Words that make us feel all hap­py in­si­de, hap­py and deep­ly gra­te­ful.

Words have enor­mous po­wer. They can be used to up­lift but al­so to press down. They can wound and dest­roy, but they can al­so heal and make one whole.

It seems to me that pe­op­le who have light in their he­arts shine that light around them through their words. Those pe­op­le want to en­cou­ra­ge ot­hers and say things that make ot­hers feel good. The words used to pre­ach the gos­pel have a spe­ci­al po­wer. They can work mi­rac­les, heal the wounds of the soul, and help pe­op­le con­ti­nue on their jour­ney.

A long time ago I qu­ar­re­led with a per­son. Soon af­ter­wards we set­t­led the mat­ter with the gos­pel, but I still felt I had not been ab­le to pro­cess that event. My pre­vi­ous ex­pe­rien­ces had woun­ded me so deep­ly that it was dif­fi­cult for me to let the new wound heal. That qu­ar­rel had made me feel worth­less in the ot­her per­son’s ey­es, and the me­mo­ry of that fee­ling kept hur­ting me for a long time. It see­med to me that the ot­her per­son had not un­ders­tood what I was trying to say.

God took care of that mat­ter in His own time. Ye­ars la­ter I came ac­ross that per­son again. We had an op­por­tu­ni­ty to dis­cuss the old mat­ters. I felt it was qui­te safe to dis­cuss them. I was ab­le to tell the per­son how dif­fi­cult it had been for me to get rid of that pain.

The er­rors due to sin had been wi­ped away by the gos­pel a long time ago, but it took me lon­ger to re­gain con­fi­den­ce. The He­a­ven­ly Fat­her, ho­we­ver, was awa­re of the si­tu­a­ti­on all the time. He saw that we would need some more dis­cus­si­on for me to feel free again. We nee­ded gent­le, un­ders­tan­ding words. I felt that our dis­cus­si­on took place un­der com­for­ting and ab­so­lu­te grace.

I have al­wa­ys been sen­si­ti­ve to words and ges­tu­res, pro­bab­ly too much so. A safe en­vi­ron­ment is com­for­ting in that it al­lows us to be simp­ly what we are, wit­hout any need to try to be so­met­hing more or bet­ter. And that free­dom helps us to gra­du­al­ly be­co­me more to­le­rant and to le­arn new things.

I hope we all have pe­op­le that we dare to meet just as we are. That there is so­me­o­ne to en­cou­ra­ge us, so­me­o­ne with good and mer­ci­ful words.

Have you met the kind of pe­op­le who are ab­le to heal with their words or have a spe­ci­al skill to en­cou­ra­ge ot­hers?

I re­mem­ber one of my te­ac­hers warm­ly. She hel­ped me re­cog­ni­ze my spe­ci­al skil­ls. When we were close to the end of our opis­to ye­ar, she wrote a long and en­cou­ra­ging text in my gu­est­book. It en­ded like this: ”I wish God’s bles­sing to yo­ur life. If you have that, you will not need anyt­hing el­se.” Those words war­med my he­art then. They still do.

Some time ago I was as­ked if I would like to con­ti­nue wri­ting this blog. I tur­ned the mat­ter in my mind, fee­ling ti­red and un­cer­tain. But God sho­wed me that this mat­ter was in stron­ger hands. All of a sud­den I re­cei­ved sup­port and en­cou­ra­ge­ment from many di­rec­ti­ons. Pe­op­le wan­ted to tell me they had been touc­hed by one or anot­her of my posts. They wan­ted to tell me they were loo­king for­ward to my texts, my ac­counts of dai­ly life or spe­ci­al pains and joys. And while tel­ling me that, their words shed a light on my path and hel­ped me walk on.

My ex­pe­rien­ce has been that the He­a­ven­ly Fat­her sup­ports me by gi­ving en­cou­ra­ging and ca­ring pe­op­le in­to my life. Some of them have sta­yed on­ly for a short time, while ot­hers have sta­yed lon­ger by my side. I find God’s bles­sing in that. He gi­ves me sup­por­ting and bles­sing words at exact­ly the right time. He gi­ves me words that bring light to my day. And to my he­art.

Text: An­ne Lind­fors

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

You will find the ori­gi­nal fin­nish blog post here.