Feelings

FEELINGS

A friend of mine recently sent me a Peanuts cartoon. In the cartoon, Lucy comes up to Charlie Brown all excited about her favorite football team winning the big game. She had a great time describing how all the fans were yelling and hugging each other, and jumping all over the place when the winning touchdown was scored. Charlie then replied, “How did the other team feel?”

In sports or in life, there are always winners and losers—there is happiness and disappointment at the same time. Here is the question: What really determines our happiness? Does winning or losing a ball game, making or losing a sale, making the team, or even winning or losing the heart of that special boy or girl we care so much about frame our happiness or disappointment? In other words, is our happiness determined by the outcome of events, or is it determined by our outlook on life?

If we are truly going to experience happiness, our outlook on life has to be positive. If we have true faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His promises, we know that everything on this earth is temporary. We know that there will be a time when we will understand it all. In the meantime, we just have to live life as it comes to us---endure when we have to, enjoy the good times when they come, and most of all, care for those around us. Sometimes we are the body that needs somebody’s help, and sometimes we are the feet, arms and hands that God uses to help someone else in their time of need.

Corrie ten Boom used to say, “When the train goes through a tunnel and the world gets dark, do we jump out?” Of course not, we sit still and trust the engineer to get us through. How do we deal with disappointment? All we have to do is read our Bible—read the story of God. We will be reminded that we are not the first to weep. We are not the first person to be helped. After all, His story is ours.

Jeremiah 32:27: “I am the Lord, the God of every person on the earth. Nothing is impossible for me.”