THE GRACE OF EMPATHY
BREAD
14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are–yet was without sin. Hebrews 4:14-15 (NIV)
17 For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God. Hebrews 2:17 (NIV)
18 Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. Hebrews 2:18 (NIV)
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (NIV)
8 We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. 9 Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. 10 He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us. 2 Corinthians 1:8-10 (NIV)
15 Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Romans 12:15 (NIV)
1 So when we could stand it no longer, we thought it best to be left by ourselves in Athens. 2 We sent Timothy, who is our brother and God’s fellow worker in spreading the gospel of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you in your faith, 3 so that no one would be unsettled by these trials. You know quite well that we were destined for them. 1 Thessalonians 3:1-3 (NIV)
12 See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. 13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. Hebrews 3:12-13 (NIV)
BUTTER
“The Oxford Dictionary defines empathy/empathize as understanding and sharing in the feelings of someone else, relating to and having insight into the circumstances/feelings of another, putting yourself in their place. It is different from sympathy/sympathize which is feeling sorry for someone. Empathy flows from a heart that has walked as the other has walked and has felt both the pain and the joy of the like circumstance and is now on the other side. It comes from one who is faithful to call back from the Valley of Baca (tears) to the one who is still in the midst – helping them to go from ‘strength to strength’. Who has not been exquisitely ministered to by someone who has lived through like circumstances? Isn’t that who we seek out when going through our throes? In God’s great economy it is one way of His making beauty out of our ashes as we walk alongside encouraging others with kindred struggles as our own.” BHY
“In community with other believers, as we humble ourselves and open up to receive from the body of Christ, we will be strengthened to see the full kaleidoscope of His plan and be encouraged in the grace of waiting.” Sylvia Gunter
“Encouragement costs you nothing to give, but it is priceless to receive.” Anonymous
“If you have gone a little way ahead of me, call back – ‘Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track; And if, perchance, Faith’s light is dim, because the oil is low, Your call will guide my lagging course as wearily I go. Call back, and tell me that he went with you into the storm; Call back, and say He kept you when the forest’s roots were torn; That, when the heavens thunder and the earthquake shook the hill, He bore you up and held you where the very air was still. Oh, friend, call back, and tell me for I cannot see your face, They say it glows with triumph, and your feet bound in the race; But there are mists between us and my spirit eyes are dim, And I cannot see the glory, though I long for word of Him. But if you’ll say He heard you when your prayer was but a cry, And if you’ll say He saw you through the night’s sin-darkened sky If you have gone a little way ahead, of friend, call back – ‘Twill cheer my heart an help my feet along the stony track.” Mrs. Charles Cowman
“On Him then reckon, to Him look, on Him depend: and be assured that if you walk with Him, look to Him and expect help from Him, He will never fail you. An older brother, who has known the Lord for forty-four years, who writes this, says for your encouragement that He has never failed him. In the greatest difficulties, in the heaviest trials, in the deepest poverty and necessities, He has never failed me; but because I was enabled by His grace to trust in Him, He has always appeared for my help. I delight in speaking well of His Name.” George Mueller
“If I were a pastor, I would want to preach in the spirit of the New Covenant, inviting everyone in the congregation to see the heart of God revealed in the cross of Christ. I would encourage them to interpret all of life’s hardships not as problems to fix or struggles to relieve or pain to deaden, but as important elements in a larger story that all God’s children long to tell. I would urge them to accept wherever they are on the journey, whether happy or miserable, as the place where God will meet them, where He loves them, where He will continue to work in them. And I would offer my own life as a growing, struggling, sometimes painfully unattractive example of what doing that might mean. I would beg God to deliver me from Calvary-denying sermons, which leave people feeling scolded and pressured….I would ask God to never let me again preach an Eden-denying message where psychological insights replace biblical wisdom in a misguided effort to repair emotional damage when the real problem is a serpent-inspired determination to experience life without God.” Larry Crabb
“One of the highest of human duties is the duty of encouragement…It is easy to laugh at men’s ideals; it is easy to pour cold water on their enthusiasm; it is easy to discourage others. The world is full of discouragers. We have a Christian duty to encourage one another. Many a time a word of praise or thanks or appreciation or cheer has kept a man on his feet. Blessed is the man who speaks such a word.” William Barclay
HEART SAVOR
• I am to comfort others with the comfort I have received.
• I am to “call back” to others telling them of God’s faithfulness through all circumstances He allows in my life.
• Empathy encourages others forward.
Beth Yoe's Sharing Bread 