Find Your Own Sunshine

Find your own Sunshine

I’ve struggled to stay positive lately.  My habit when I rise is to pour a cup of coffee, check my texts and emails and listen to the morning news.  With seven grown kids, I like to start the day by staying in touch.

So, the news.  Fresh problem.  I refuse to listen to a string of negative swill.  I am aware we have had a Covid situation.  I know there’s an election coming.  I’ve heard we have a problem with unrest, protests and riots throughout our land.

What I do not need are Covid body counts. Every twenty minutes. In case we’re not nervous enough, they offer new case numbers, for the county and the state.  The nation and the world.

When they take a break, networks are able to air political ads.  I decided who I would vote for some time back.  Political stories from Seattle firmly cemented my decision.  We don’t fix injustice by simply changing the victims.

I stopped listening to the news.  Then talk shows and the rest of programming began to sound like the news.  We were left with movies and Christian music.

But I’d lost something, the white noise I’d listened to my entire life.  Ever notice how movies represent homes by inserting sounds of television or radio?  That’s so you’ll believe it’s real.  Still, my mornings felt incomplete.  Coffee seemed off.   I knew I couldn’t  go back to the incessant manipulation offered by the networks.

And then in the silence I heard a voice. “Talk to me.  I’ve missed you.  You read my Book everyday.  You can pray.  Do you remember all those people you promised to pray for?  I know you don’t mean to but sometimes you forget.  Another thing, your country, your President, they can use all the prayer they can get.  You can trust Me.  You know that.  Take an hour, maybe two.  Read the Word.  I’ll help you understand it.  We can sing.  Look at all those CDs.  Blow that dust off your music.  Come on.”

I did it.  God is amazing.  Never negative.  He’s got Covid in the palm of His hands.  He knows whose going to win this election.  He knows What we don’t know and He is not worried about tomorrow.

It helps. Singing Hillsong and old Gospel stuff from the 50s.  Reading the Bible and keeping a list so I remember every promised prayer.  I read more.  I write more.

Once you realize you’re being numbed by negativity, God expects you to fight back.  Positive words and activities still abound. It’s a matter of where you look.

I’m reminded of flying to Hawaii one winter.  After weeks of rain and gray skies, my plane took off.  In mere seconds we broke through to dazzling sunshine.   It had been there all the time.  I simply couldn’t see it.