Take a good, long look at the
What do you see? A sad sack,
of the Hee-Haw song of
and agony on me. Deep
misery. If it weren't for
Gloom despair, and agony
Missouri who has a vivid
describing long-faced and
(and the church) who sit
and stay down on everybody
unwilling to fmd anyone or
About such people he would
gopher's basement." In case you

lady in the center of this page. do
 you agree?! She reminds me
yesteryear – "Gloom, despair,
dark depression, excessive
bad luck, I'd have no luck at all
on me. " I have a friend in
and unforgettable way of
sad-sack people in the world
and sulk and sour and get down
and everything and seem
anything to be happy about.
say, "He/she is lower than a
don't know, that's pretty low!

But wait a minute. Look at her again. Stop reading for a moment and turn this paper upside down.. . Now what do you see? Wow! What a difference a change of perspective can make on what we see! Ask yourself, "What changed?" Answer: Not her or anything about her! What changed is the way you looked at her! Do it again. It's the angle or attitude. It really does make a difference! C. S. Lewis reminds us that often the difference in the way we see things is more in us than it is in the things we see. He said, "What you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing; it also depends on what sort of person you are." In Philippians 1:12-23 we read about a faith-filled man who is unjustly in prison, on death row, and facing a very uncertain future. But he is not sad and sulking and singing the "woe-isme-blues!" No sir, no ma'am. And he is not moaning and groaning and whining and wasting his breath about how unfair life is and laying the blame for a rotten attitude on someone else. Those who oppose him have taken away almost everything he holds dear and are threatening to take his very life. But there is one thing they cannot take from him — his freedom to choose a faith-filled attitude! From a prison cell he writes words that have encouraged millions surrounded by painful, uncontrollable circumstances for two thousand years — "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!" (4:4-8). How do you do that? How do you rejoice in the midst of circumstances and people who put the hurt on you for days on end? How do you keep from getting sour and sad and stuck? Take another look at life. Change your perspective. Realize realities you enjoy in the Lord" are constant and don't change, no matter what happens "out of the Lord" (that is, physically). Bring the Lord and His promises into the picture. He may not change your circumstances, but He can change your attitude and how you see things. Think about it.