By Doug Creamer

Most of you know that I have retired from teaching full-time but I have not retired from teaching. I still teach part-time at the community college. It is such a great, low-stress job. There are so many things you are required to do in a full-time job that are not required in a part-time job. I get to spend most of my time actually teaching. There is such joy in helping someone learn something that they did not know how to do.

In my career I have worked with many different people; some I enjoyed and some I do not miss. The people you work with can make or break a job. I know people who have changed jobs because they did not enjoy working with their co-workers. I can think of at least one job I left because of the people.

I love the people I am working with on my current job. We get along, see things alike, work hard to do an excellent job, and we laugh all the time. I have always been a jokester at work. We have to spend so much of our lives working, why can’t we have some fun and laugh while we work?

One of the best parts about my current job is that we are there for each other. We work well together to accomplish our goals. If one of us has to be out, we all pull together to get the job done. We are a team. Our supervisor and her supervisor strongly encourage us to be there for each other and they demonstrate that by their example. I feel their support every day at work.

I feel that same support in my church. My pastor and the whole leadership team at our church are there for each other. It doesn’t matter what any of our members are walking through we are all there to love, support, and encourage each other. Jesus never intended for any of us to walk out our faith alone. He intended for it to be a team effort.

The enemy wants to convince us that we can walk out our faith alone. His plan is simple because it is easy to pick off people who are alone. If we are alone, the enemy will fill our minds with all kinds of doubts, worries and fears. It is easy to get our mind focused on negative thoughts. When we are alone there is no one there to help us turn our thoughts around and focus on the positive.

I always have areas of my life that need to be worked on. There are times that I see great victories and I am moving forward. Then there are other times when it seems like I am losing more battles than I am winning. It is easy to get discouraged when the battles seem intense. We often lose sight of the previous victories. We don’t realize that we are about to break through.

Those are the moments when we need each other. I need you to look in my life and say, “Hey, don’t give up! Keep fighting! You will overcome and win!” The truth is we need each other. When the battle is raging and we feel overwhelmed that’s when a brother or sister in Christ can make all the difference in the world. They can encourage us to keep pressing on because a breakthrough is just ahead.

It’s powerful when we pray quietly and out loud for each other. The enemy wants us to stay apart so he can pick us off. Coming together and sharing each other’s burdens is how we succeed in the battle. We have to be careful who we share our struggles and worries with because we want to find those who believe in us and will fight with us to overcome. We need people who will build us up.

We are in a fight. It is important who we pick to be on our side. Knowing that I have your back and that you have mine makes us pretty hard to defeat. We will all get knocked down. It’s critical that we surround ourselves with people who will pick us up and fight with us.

I want to encourage you to consider carefully who’s on your team. Are they speaking words of life and hope to you? Are they praying and believing for your best? Are they there for you? Choose people who have faith in you. It is a team effort. Be there for them too! We are in a fight together. If we stand together we will see the victory.

Contact Doug Creamer at PO Box 777, Faith, NC 28041 or doug@dougcreamer.com.