Refresh Yourself by Refreshing Someone Else

Do you ever just feel like you’re in a sort of slump?  It’s kind of a blah-ness about everything, if you will.  There are lots of reasons for the feeling, but there is one sure cure!  Proverbs 11:25 says,
 

He that waters shall be watered also himself. 

In other words, when you do something for someone else, you reap the benefit for yourself too! I’ve found that when I have the “blah” feeling, if I stop thinking about me and start thinking about someone else, I end up more encouraged than the person to whom I’m reaching out.

I love reading in Genesis 40 about Joseph who was locked up in prison after being wrongly accused, yet he noticed the sad faces of the cupbearer and baker one morning and stopped in inquire. That’s thinking of others instead of yourself! What a wonderful challenge it is to my heart that is often so selfish and self-focused!

Here are some suggestions of ways we could reach out to someone else this week:

• Invite a child over to help you bake cookies.
• Take your Bible with you and go pay a visit to someone in a nursing home or hospital.  Read them some of their favorite passages.
• Bake some small loaves of bread and deliver it to your neighbors.
• Call or Face time a friend you haven’t talked with in a long while.  Don’t share details of your own life; seek to encourage them by listening.
• Have a friend over for afternoon tea or coffee.  Set the table.  Make it special.  
• Buy a small gift for your husband.  Hide it in his dresser drawer with a note of appreciation.
• Write a card of encouragement to someone at church whose ministry is a blessing to you.

Refresh yourself by refreshing others today!