Doses of Hope

Doses of Hope

The difference between celebrating the life we've been given and struggling through each day has many cause and effects but at the base of it all will all lead back to the condition of our hearts. For our hearts are the filters, the process centers of our lives. A happy heart thrives and celebrates life, and it treats each day like a continual feast. But a heavy heart, one full of much trouble, can't celebrate --- because it must focus on merely surviving each day because of all the "dreadful" and "wrong" [things] that comes their way. Some people need medicine to help them... even to help them laugh at life, others do not. Think about it... this is one the reasons that the Bible teaches that a merry or joyful heart is like good medicine (Proverbs 17:22). Some people need assistance and help to celebrate and others see everything as a feast worth celebrating.

Are the circumstances different for them who thrive and those who survive... sometimes they can be, but most of the time they're not. The difference is how each one sees their day or the events they must endure --- or celebrate. And how an individual views life and all the things associated with it, will always be filtered through the heart. And God is in the heart and heart shaping business.

I love how this is illustrated in the life of Hannah --- we see the before and after with her in the first two chapters 1 Samuel. When the Lord does a "make over" of the heart, circumstances may not change but how the heart reflects and responds to what it faces will change.

"And Hannah prayed, and said, "My heart REJOICES in the LORD, my strength is exalted in the LORD: my mouth is enlarged over...