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Filled With the Encourager

Acts 11:23 - Barnabas, when he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. 

 

The Holy Spirit is the Encourager. Anyone who wants to be an encourager of others must be filled with the Encourager as Barnabas was. Because of the Spirit’s presence in him, he could readily yield to the leading of God. Our own ego and drive for self-promotion is so strong that only the Holy Spirit can bring about the transformation needed to accomplish God’s purposes. When we build up and encourage others, we know that God is at work in and through us.

The fact that Barnabas was good, generous, gracious, and godly was not because of his upbringing or his education or his heritage. It was because he was filled with the Holy Spirit. The same Holy Spirit that indwelt Barnabas is the Spirit who is given to every believer in Jesus Christ. We receive the Holy Spirit when we are born again, and we remain filled with the Holy Spirit as we confess our sins and yield to His leading in our lives. God wants every Christian to be filled with the Encourager so that we might become encouragers as Barnabas was. The same glory brought to God through Barnabas’s life can be brought to Him through our lives.

From – “Holy Moments in the Presence of God” by David Jeremiah.