(53) Defeating Discouragement With Others - Conclusion

It’s a fact of life . . . people let us down! We rely on them for things and they don’t come through. They make mistakes, do annoying things, they blow it. They don’t keep their promises, forget, fail and frustrate. They don’t do things the way we would like them to do them. They don’t think the way we think.

And so we can become frustrated by other people . . . irritated . . . impatient . . . discouraged. Sometimes we feel like it’s no use trying because other people just keep seeming to blow it.

There’s another fact of life . . . we let people down! People rely on us for things and we don’t come through. We make mistakes, do annoying things, we blow it. We don’t keep our promises, we forget, fail and frustrate others. We don’t do things the way others would like us to do them. We don’t think the way they think.

And so others can become frustrated with us . . . irritated . . . impatient . . . discouraged. Sometimes they feel like it’s no use trying because we just keep seeming to blow it?

We live in a fallen world with people just like us who are imperfect. If we will just be humble enough to see our own faults, we won’t be as quick to take note of the faults of others. And we won’t be discouraged with others nearly as much.

Victory over discouragement with others is not a matter of change in them. It is a matter of me changing. If the people around me have to change for me to gain victory over discouragement, I will probably never have victory. We have seen three important steps we must take if we are going to live in victory.

First, we have learned that I need to remember my calling in Christ. I need to remember that all I am and all I have that is of any true good or value is a gift of God’s grace. I also need to remember that I am called to be God’s representative to others to help them grow to become like Christ by serving and ministering to them.

Second, I need to focus on my responsibility to reflect the character of Christ. If I am intent of demonstrating Christlikeness to others, I will see how much growth I need. Then, I will grow in demonstrating love, patience, and forbearance. And, I will find that I’m not so frustrated and discouraged with others.

Finally, I need to respond with the conduct of Christ. This means that I will focus to acting in kindness, gentleness, and forgiveness. Instead of putting people down because they get me down, I will concentrate on finding ways to build them up. Rather then getting discouraged with them, I will seek to encourage them.
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Next: (54) Dealing With Discouragers - Introduction