A doctor wrote a letter of thanks to a schoolteacher for having given him so much encouragement when he had been in her class 30 years before.

He later received this reply: "I want you to know what your note meant to me. I am an old lady in my eighties, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely, and seeming like the last leaf on the tree. You will be interested to know that I taught school for 50 years, and yours is the first letter of appreciation I have ever received. It came on a cold, blue morning and cheered my lonely old heart as nothing has cheered me in many years."

Take time today to say thank you to someone who has blessed your life. You will never know what a difference you can make in someone who needs a word of encouragement.

– A Treasury of Bible Illustrations.