Half Full, or Half Empty?

When you see a glass that has liquid halfway up. Do you say it is half full or half empty? I automatically say it is half full. I’m sure that there are some who automatically say it is half empty. That one statement probably says a lot about your focus in life, and in turn says a lot about how you feel every day.

There are two kinds of people in this world, and no matter what else, they either focus on the fullness or the emptiness. I choose to focus on the fullness. Life is good, and it is full. I want to live life to the fullest and go down in flames going full speed. I never, well hardly ever, focus on the negative. I always try to focus on the positive. Most of the time I don’t have to try, it just happens. I guess that is why it is easy for me to focus on what God is doing instead of what He is not doing. By focusing on what He is doing, I wind up happy and carefree most of the time. Does that mean that I don’t have problems? Of course not. I have more than my share of problems. Things that if I focused on them would put me immediately into the pit of despair.

By focusing on the good things, I am able to rise above all the things that try to take me down. Things that if I focused on them would bring me down. I don’t hide from them or pretend that they don’t exist, no I deal with them, but they are just not my focus. My focus remains on all that Papa is doing in my life. By focusing on what He is doing, I can rise up above all the circumstances that life brings. We are not defined by our circumstances. We are defined by how we react to the circumstances.

God is so good. As I look back over the last 485 days, I could probably think of 485 different ways to talk about the goodness of God. I could probably do this and still think of more ways to reach others. But when we focus on what He is not doing, we begin to lose the perspective of how He really is. Instead we look at the pain around our life. As we focus on the pain it grows exponentially. It’s like the little boy who told his dad that he had two dogs, black and white. The black one continually told him to do bad, while the white one continually showed them how to love . The parent asked the little boy which one was winning? The little boy stood for a second, shrugged, and said this: “Which ever one I feed.”

Isn’t that just like the good God that we know? His love is everlasting and He never fails us. So our focus determines who we are. It is very important to keep our eyes on what He is doing. His love will just flow into us and through us if we do that. I can’t live any other way, and you shouldn’t either.