Three Benefits of Encouraging Words -

Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. Proverbs 16:24

One of my favorite movies is The Help. A story that takes place in the 1960’s set during the racial turbulence of America. A young journalist interviews the help, the black maids of Jackson, Mississippi. The maid, Aibileen, inspires me with her wisdom in knowing the benefits of encouraging words. Aibileen attends to the needs of a young girl whose own mother often ignores her. Aibileen speaks life into a tender, impressionable heart of a little girl by telling her: “You is kind. You is Smart. You is important.”

Perhaps you will forget tomorrow the kind words you say today, but the recipient may cherish them over a lifetime.
Dale Carnegie

The Powerful Weapon

Words. A potent weapon we have at our disposal. Their power arises from our emotional responses when we read, speak, or hear them. They can pierce like a sword or bring healing to the soul. Words can crush our spirit or become a tree of life.

The words of the reckless pierce like swords, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.
Proverbs 12:18

I have a friend who inspires me, much like Aibileen from The Help does. She speaks life to others in a beautiful and meaningful way. I recently saw another person acknowledge her on social media for being a cherished friend whose life-giving words, from a decade before, continued to feed her soul. My friend has been done this for me also. Many years ago, she wrote words to me that remain cut out and glued in a journal I visit often.

The soothing tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit.
Proverbs 15:4

Three Benefits of Encouraging Words

In my book, A Warrior of Hope, I write about how words of hope can bring light to your life circumstances and places of discouragement. We can lose our way when we recede into the dark places of our minds. But encouraging words provide a light of hope to draw us out of discouragement. Words that illuminate the path of hope leading us to places of peace, love and joy.

The phrase, “Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear,” is a warning that appears on passenger side mirrors of cars. It means our perspective, as seen in the mirror, is not accurate. When we are discouraged, our view is skewed. This is because we tend to focus on false information that appears more prominent than it is. As Aibileen tells Mae Mobley in the movie, The Help, how important she is, she corrects the young girl’s perspective.

The Bible tells us we have the power to make a permanent difference in somebody else’s life with our words. Proverbs 16:24 tells us, “Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.”

With the help of grace, the habit of saying kind words is very quickly formed, and when once formed, it is not speedily lost.
Frederick W. Faber

Once we recognize that encouraging words can bring us hope, change our perspective, and make a permanent difference, we may ask ourselves how to use them? How can we give and receive the words that are a gracious honeycomb, so sweet to our soul?

Three Ways to Find Words of Encouragement

The Bible is full of verses to help us in almost every need and emotion we experience. When we open up His Word and read the pages, it will seem as if Jesus is sitting right there with us, speaking life into our hearts. I have linked below a list of 100 Bible verses about who God says I am.

How we speak to ourselves matters. I am learning how to be more patient and kind to myself. I am transforming my mind to hear God’s truths and, in doing so, diminishing the voice of the enemy. Now, that is encouraging!

In my devotion, Family Life, I wrote, “If one brother has fallen, we should consider it an honor to pick him up.” We are made to minister to one another. As we surround ourselves with people who speak life into our lives, we will also become the voice of kindness and encouragement to others.

If I can end with one last word of encouragement to each of you, I will tell you this: YOU is kind. YOU is smart. YOU is important.

Our Father in heaven, I ask you to place in my heart and upon my lips words that are like a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.