There is in mankind a tragic flaw of tending to focus on what is wrong. A wise man once taught me that of all the things about your life that you can allow your mind to dwell upon, a vast majority of these, say about eighty percent, are positive, happy, honorable, praiseworthy, noble thoughts. Unfortunately, it is man's nature to allow his mind to focus on the other twenty percent. We tend to focus always on what's wrong with our lives, our circumstances, our marriages, our families, our jobs, and so forth. We thereby empower these wrong circumstances and cause them to be perpetuated until they loom larger and larger and eventually engulf our entire existence. They become mental strongholds which ultimately entrap us in a veritable hell on earth, and sometimes for eternity. Do you know that you have to live in the atmosphere that you create for yourself by the thoughts you constantly allow yourself to meditate upon? If you get hold of what I'm about to say, it will save you from an eternity of the misery of self-pity, depression, anger, frustration, resentment, jealousy, envy, bitterness, and outright rebellion against a loving Father who has prescribed a way to a life of joy, peace and fulfillment.
Let me give you a little scenario to bring this home. I have a wonderful wife. She loves me and has lots of beautiful attributes. She is steadfast, immovable and always abounding in the Lord's work. I am really blessed, and I realize this when I practice gratitude by taking a true and proper inventory. But I have to be honest with you that sometimes she simply aggravates the fire out of me. You see, among other things she has this little thing called Inflexibility. Now if I allow myself to think about the things that are wrong with her, and that lack of freedom I sometimes perceive because of her inflexibility, I can really start getting down about it. If I am not careful I will begin to allow the thought to creep in - "I deserve better." Then the devil sends along some pretty young thing that acts like I hung the moon, and I start thinking, "My wife doesn't appreciate me. She ought to recognize just how hot I really am. Why, I'm some kind of Chemistry professor, I'm some kind of song leader at my church, I ought to be getting more recognition than I have been, not only from her but from that other bunch, too." Before long I would be thinking, "Boy, what I could do if I had a little more freedom in my life." Then comes the endless spiral into self-pity, resentment, frustration over perceived lack of self-fulfillment, and ultimately the sin of rebellion against God's principles for happiness and contentment. What have I done? I have forgotten to be grateful for the tremendous blessedness of my life. I have stepped off into an abyss of unreality that in my own self- deceived way of thinking is the real thing.
Ingratitude caused the tragedy of mankind in the Garden. God placed our first parents into a paradise of blessedness. Everything in that Garden belonged to them. But rather than being grateful for all their blessings, they got their minds set on having that one thing that God had placed off limits. Through the rebellion of pride and self-will, fueled by ego and ingratitude, they were shut out of the garden of God's best, and they brought a curse upon themselves. What a tragedy, and how often it repeats itself throughout human history. What a monstrous thing it is when a husband and a father allows his own ego and ingratitude to cause him to walk out on a wife and children that love him.
Now you may be thinking, "Well that's easy for you to say, brother, because you don't know what I have to put up with. I don't live in a paradise of blessedness. You don't know how bad my life has gotten." Let me tell you something, my friend. You of all people have missed my whole point. You have created that environment you now live in by the thoughts you have been constantly meditating upon. You are self- deceived and living in unreality. Stop blaming everyone else for what's wrong with your situation. Shake yourself and take inventory of your life. Stop focusing on the negative. Get hold of God's Word and begin to change the things around you and take responsibility for yourself and your family. Swallow your pride. It's killing you. The wages of sin is death.
I preach this little sermon to myself whenever it is needful, and I usually answer the altar call. And as bad tasting as it is to take this medicine, it feels so wonderful to wake up in the morning after a good night's sleep to feel God's communion and fellowship, to have a clear conscience that is not condemning me, and to look into the eyes of that sweet little wife of my youth and say, "Good morning, dear. I love you. What's on your list for me to do today?"
@ copyright 1994 by Scott H. Northrup. All rights reserved.