What Does Nurturing Include?

Nurturing may not always be easy because it includes being encouraging, supportive, and loving as a natural, spontaneous act. Nurturing is more expansive than providing food, clothing, and shelter. It includes building self-esteem, confidence, and hope as well as consoling those grieving from an important loss.

Nurturing provides reassurance in situations that appear hopeless. It rises above anger, resentment, and revenge-seeking when someone has been physically or emotionally hurt. Overriding the impulse to identify with suffering victims takes strength of character, which will be provided as you permit the Holy Spirit to nurture you.

Colossians 3:5 instructs you to put to death impure thoughts and evil desires so you can permit the peace of Christ to rule your heart. Then you can nurture others as God has nurtured you. Allow the presence of Christ in you to create the courage, desire, and determination to do for others what he has done for you.  

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…Christ himself suffered for you and left you an example, so that you would follow in his steps.

~1 Peter 2:21 Good News Bible

 

…And all of you serve each other with humble spirits, for God gives special blessings to those who are humble, but sets himself against those who are proud.

~1 Peter 5:5 The Living Bible

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How Does God Nurture Us?

Not long ago I misplaced an important book and began searching for it in every nook and cranny. Jesus told of a shepherd who went in search of a lost sheep although he had ninety-nine others who were safe. Consider how we permit temptation to pull us away from the safety and protection of Jesus, the Good Shepherd.

As society advances, stress and worry tend to diminish our readiness to enjoy life. Consequently, time to be nurtured by God evaporates. So how does God nurture us? As we choose to relax and be still, it’s possible to sense his protection, provision, and love. He nurtures us with his comfort and healing presence.

God nurtures us by giving us hope for the present and the future and by giving us strength to resist temptation’s advances. If you are out of touch with God, you can return now by asking him to take you back. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, is searching for you, so open the door to your heart and let him in.                        

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“I, the Sovereign Lord, tell you that I myself will look for my sheep and take care of them…I will give them a king like my servant David, [Jesus,] to be their one shepherd, and he will take are of them. I, the Lord, will be their God, and a king like my servant David, [Jesus,] will be their ruler. I have spoken.”

~Ezekiel 34:11,23-24 Good News Bible

 

Jesus said:…I am the Good Shepherd. I know my sheep and they know me…I give up my life for my sheep.

~John 10:14-15 Contemporary English Version

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