PEOPLE SKILLS 101

Everyone (especially preachers and parents) ought to read Dale Carnegie’s book How to Win Friends and Influence people. It needs to be priority reading for every Christian. Although there’s no specific acknowledgment of this in the book, it is based on, and constitutes a restatement of biblical principles. Read it as soon as you can with a pencil in hand. Scripture references will come to mind that you may want, and should want to jot down in the margins as you read. In the meantime, ask yourself these three questions:

First: How do you talk to and about people. Parents and grandparent used to admonish children, “If you can’t say something nice about a person, don’t say anything at all.” This is still good advice.

Secondly: How do you think about people? Do you think good and not evil about them when certain people come to mind? People, in time, “pick up” on how we really feel about them.

Thirdly: How do you treat people? In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus has given us priceless counsel on how to treat others: He said: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets” (Matt. 7:12).