There is no medicine like encouragement. Its healing powers are able to lift up the discouraged, comfort the grieving, strengthen the weak, and relight the fires of hope within. Yet encouragement is like a vaccine in limited supply for a virulent, debilitating disease – we need a lot more of it.

The world is full of discouragers: Overdrawn bank accounts, poor health, the loss of a loved one, being passed over for a promotion, physical decline with the passing of years, broken vows. You can probably think of some other sources of personal discouragement to add to this list.

Then when we consider the world around us, there always seems to be an abundant supply of other discouraging factors: The economy, global terrorism, wars, poverty, widespread forms of abuse, social turmoil of all kinds.

The danger of focusing on these discouragers is that your perception can become like the eyes of the honeybee – you magnify them voluminously. Everything is distorted and out of whack! Someone has written that, “He that is discouraged measures God by his own little contracted model and limits infinite power by finite apprehensions.”

At a time in my own life when I was singing the blues and feeling “lower than a duck’s instep,” I was given by a friend a “prescription” – four little “pills” to be taken four times each day faithfully, without fail: Once as I was getting out of bed in the morning; once before lunch; once before my dinner and then just before heading to bed for the night. In case of increased discouragement and feelings of failure, I was told to increase the dosage.

Even when surrounded by discouraging circumstances, and there seems to be no one available to offer much-needed words of encouragement, my friend’s recommendation offers a sure cure for what ails you!