God Running is a place for anyone who wants to (or even anyone who wants to want to) love Jesus more deeply, follow Jesus more closely, and love people the way Jesus wants us to.

In our last post from the book of Acts we saw how Gaius, Aristarchus, and Paul were all much better known for Who they were for than for what they were against. If you’re interested you can learn more here: Who You’re For–vs.–What You’re Against–Acts 19:28-41.

In today’s post we’ll notice something else about the personality of St. Paul.

Acts 20:1-2

After the uproar ceased, Paul sent for the disciples, and after encouraging them, he said farewell and departed for Macedonia. When he had gone through those regions and had given them much encouragement, he came to Greece.

Acts 20:1-2

One of The Most Dangerous Words in the World

Let me qualify this blog post as one of those that I write for myself as much or more than I write for anyone else. That being said, if you suffer from a similar personal weakness to mine, perhaps you’ll find this helpful.

One time I was asked to speak at a Saturday Men’s Trap Shoot event and also share the message on Sunday for a church in The Dalles, Oregon. This was a number of years ago and at the time, it had been awhile since I had done any public speaking. I read that a great way to prepare for sharing in front of a group is to learn improv. So I signed up for an improv class with the great folks down at ComedySportz in downtown Portland. We had a lot of fun in that improv class. But also, I learned something surprising.

What I learned is, ComedySportz is in demand for teaching classes to big corporations including Intel, Nike, FedEx, and Coca-Cola. And not just corporations but churches, not for profits, and all kinds of other organizations are seeking out the ComedySportz people to provide them with education and training. An area of primary emphasis in these training sessions is the teaching of the concept “Yes and . . .”.

What these organizations are finding is that their teams perform much better when there’s a spirit of encouragement among the team members. (Gilroy)

On the flip side, it turns out, a performance killer is the word:

“No”

If you were laying inside of an MRI machine and you saw the word “no”, the MRI would indicate a release of stress hormones–a variety of stress hormones–in your brain. As a result your reasoning ability, logic, language processing, and communication would all be compromised. (Newberg and Waldman via Lindell)

So it turns out, the word “no” is a powerful discouraging word as opposed to an encouraging word.

As an aside, let’s acknowledge there are times when it’s appropriate to say “no”. We all need to set boundaries sometimes. We’ll all encounter situations where a direct “no” is appropriate. But the vast majority of the time using the word “no” is one of many options and that’s what we’re discussing today.

So in these organizational trainings, and in our improv class, we were all taught to respond to each other beginning with the words, “Yes and . . .”

Yes, that’s what we were all taught to do, and, it was magical. Something happens when we begin our responses with “Yes and . . .”

“I hate Red Savina Habanero peppers! They’re too hot for me.”

“Yes and they’re too hot going in, and for a lot of people, they’re too hot going out!”

Or:

“How about if we all go to the zoo.”

“Yes and because it’s a hot day, we can bring squirt guns to cool off the monkeys.”

In real life, while driving with my wife Kathy, she might say, “We should take Tualatin Valley Highway because it has four lanes and there are fewer lights.”

My initial reaction might be to say, “No, because the GPS says Farmington Road is faster.”

This might seem like a small thing but what have I done here? I lobbed out the word “No”. And as we’ve seen, when I use that word the person receiving that communication will have a biochemical reaction, and it’s a stress inducing biochemical reaction that’s unnecessary and better avoided.

A better way to respond would be: “Yes and your way is also a more direct route. And it might even save fuel.”

Now instead of starting with “No,” I said something encouraging to Kathy. I made Kathy feel heard and I was affirming and encouraging by building upon what Kathy communicated. And not only does it encourage Kathy, but it also keeps me in a more positive frame of mind.

With some encouragement and affirmation in place, now it’s much easier to say, “But I’m concerned the GPS might be routing us around traffic so I’m going to go ahead and take Farmington Road.”

Or, maybe Kathy’s having a bad day. In that case I would go home by whatever route she preferred, even if it took a little longer. What does a couple of minutes matter anyway?

Paul the Encourager

That’s just one small but important way you and I can become more encouraging. In today’s text we see Paul in verse one encouraging the Ephesians, and in verse two we see Paul giving “much encouragement.”

I think this is likely the general disposition of Paul. Paul was a person of great authority in the church so we see him having some hard conversations with different churches in his epistles. But hard conversations are just necessary for someone in a position of authority like Paul. I think it’s likely that those conversations are disproportionately represented in scripture. I believe Paul was an encourager. In Romans 15:5 Paul even calls God, the “God of endurance and encouragement,” when he writes, “May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus,”

As we see in today’s passage, Paul was encouraging.

And he wants you and I to be encouraging too.

Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another. Because anxiety in a man’s heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.

1 Thessalonians 5:11, Hebrews 10:24-25, Proverbs 12:25

Notes and Resources:

William G. Gilroy, “Encouraging motivation to benefit others can lead to more effective teams”, November 13, 2015, Notre Dame News

Savannah Lindell, “Why Encouragement Counts”, April 7, 2017, James River Church Blog

Andrew Newberg and Mark Waldman, “Why This Word Is So Dangerous to Say or Hear”, August 1, 2012, Psychology Today

Y. Joel Wong, “The Psychology of Encouragement”, 2014, APA.org

Image of encouraging friends by Kamaji Ogino via Pexels–Free to use, no attribution required

Available on Amazon! Love Like Jesus: How Jesus Loved People (and how you can love like Jesus) Love Like Jesus begins with the story of how after a life of regular church attendance and Bible study, Bennett was challenged by a pastor to study Jesus. That led to an obsessive seven year deep dive. After pouring over Jesus’ every interaction with another human being, he realized he was doing a much better job of studying Jesus’ words than he was following Jesus’ words and example. The honest and fearless revelations of Bennett’s own moral failures affirm he wrote this book for himself as much as for others. Love Like Jesus examines a variety of stories, examples, and research, including:

• Specific examples of how Jesus communicated God’s love to others.
• How Jesus demonstrated all five of Gary Chapman’s love languages (and how you can too).
• The story of how Billy Graham extended Christ’s extraordinary love and grace toward a man who misrepresented Jesus to millions.
• How to respond to critics the way Jesus did.
• How to love unlovable people the way Jesus did.
• How to survive a life of loving like Jesus (or how not to become a Christian doormat).
• How Jesus didn’t love everyone the same (and why you shouldn’t either).
• How Jesus guarded his heart by taking care of himself–he even napped–and why you should do the same.
• How Jesus loved his betrayer Judas, even to the very end.

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A life of loving like Jesus. (Kindle, hardcover, and paperback now available on Amazon.)