I saw an excerpt the other day from Stephen Covey about the 90/10 principle.  It goes something like this: 10% of life is made up of what happens to you, while 90% is decided by how you react to it.  What does this mean?  It means that we have control over 90% of what is currently going on in our lives by our attitudes and decisions from those attitudes.  Here’s an illustration:  You cannot control a red light (10%), but you can control how you react to it (90%).  Just carry that example throughout everything that happens during your day.

What would happen if we did this in regard to how we treat people?  Someone cuts in front of us in traffic (10%) and it ruins our day (90%).  Think what would happen if instead of getting upset, we said, “That person must be in a real hurry, so I am going to pray they don’t get in an accident.” Someone does something we do not like, but instead of getting angry or rude with that person, we are kind and treat them in a manner we would want to be treated thereby making a friend rather than an unwanted stranger.

Philippians 4:6-8 is a passage that encourages and exhorts believers to have a positive outlook on life. Do not be burdened with unnecessary cares, be thankful for the good things, and think on the good report, not the negative one; if there is any virtue or any praise, think on these things. If you need more reasons to not be negative, consider that studies have shown that positive people live longer (on average 10 more years).  Here’s another, positive work environments outperform negative work environments. Positive people attract others to themselves while negative individuals repel them.

Only 2 of the 2 to 4 million Israelites entered into the promise land; those two were Joshua and Caleb.   They saw the difficulties of the land as no big thing for God, while everyone else consistently indulged in a whole lot of WHINE with their cheese. How about you?  Remember, being positive is a choice.  (Tip: negative people don’t think it’s a choice, they think it’s because of their circumstances or someone doing something they don’t like).

Be blessed and be grateful,

Pastor Chris