Dave’s Monday Blast – March 25, 2024

Over the last couple of weeks we have been chatting about an epidemic of disappointment and discouragement that has infected our world. Previously, we shared four examples from the Word affirming that these debilitating emotions can infect anyone. Fortunately, there are some steps to take when we feel these black clouds threatening to wash over us.

Last week we shared the first three of five steps to find victory over these emotions:

1. Be honest. It does no good to pretend you don’t feel what you feel.
2. Take care of  your body.
3. Pay attention to your thought life. (Philippians 4:8; 2 Corinthians 10:5)

For this week…steps four and five:

4. Train yourself to “see” life out of two lenses at the same time. When the Apostle Paul counsels us to be transformed by the renewing of our mind (Romans 12:2), he is telling us that our mind needs to be trained to think differently than we have in the past. Part of this training is to learn to see both the temporal (life is hard) and the eternal (God has a purpose here) at the same time. Paul speaks honestly of his temporal pain when he says he is hard pressed on every side, perplexed, persecuted and struck down. Yet he did not become crushed, despairing, abandoned or destroyed. Why not? Because he learned to firmly fix on the eternal perspective with his spiritual eyes. He says, “Therefore we do not lose heart, we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:8 – 18). 

Paul never minimized the pain of the temporal, yet discouragement didn’t win because he knew that God’s purposes were at work. Read Philippians 1:12 – 14 for another example.

5. Press close to God. The truth is life is hard, people do disappoint and hurt us, and we don’t always understand God or His ways. The prophet Nahum talks about a day of trouble and reminds us, “The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble, He knows those who trust in Him” (Nahum 1:7). If we’re not in a close trusting relationship with God, life’s troubles can become unbearable. The psalmist cried out, “I would have despaired unless I had believed I would see God in the land of the living” (Psalm 27).

BibleStudyTools.com shares one more tip. The best way to chase away a negative feeling is with another feeling. The Bible teaches us “In everything give thanks for this is the will of God…” (1 Thessalonians 5:18). Gratitude is a powerful anecdote for discouragement. We may not be able to give God thanks for the difficult situation that we find ourselves in, but we can learn to look for things we can be thankful for in the midst of it.