Thursday, January 22, 2009

Choose Your Own Way

by Donna L. Watkins

Your ability to succeed in this life often comes down to one single thing: your attitude.

© 2008 Donna L. Watkins - Monarch at Montpelier Gardens

How you react to what life has thrown at you in the past, or what's going on right now, will make or break you. It's not the circumstances in life that get us, it's how we perceive and react to them. Do we consider God has a plan and purpose in it all far beyond anything our minds can comprehend ... and in that knowledge, do we trust in Him to deliver us, while in faith we look for the lessons to be learned?

Something as awful as the Holocaust produced a variety of outcomes for people who experienced the same situation. Did God do this awful thing against the Jews? Of course not. There are heavenly powers that create the evil in this world, and the only way we can survive it is through faith that God will use it for good in our lives. But! the choice is ours on whether or not it is used for good in our own life.

Romans 8:28 promises us it will be, but there is an "if clause" that involves our choice: "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God." We have to make the choice to love God in good and bad circumstances.

One of my devotions told this story of a survivor of the Holocaust:

Dr. Viktor Frankl endured the Holocaust by this principle. The Nazis killed his family, placed him in a concentration camp, starved and beat him. When the war ended Frankl was neither broken, bowed nor bitter. When asked how he endured such treatment with a positive outlook he said, "Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms, to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way"

Often, we expect God to turn the world around on our own whims. On whose whim does He do this? We all have our own design of what life should be. Life on earth is a drop in the bucket compared to eternity which never and never and never ends. We are here for reasons we know not of ... and our choices most often create the pathway that we will walk on while we're here.

David had a good attitude that I myself have adopted to begin my day: "This is the day the Lord has made; I will rejoice and be glad in it" (Psalm 118:24). It's a choice! There's only two attitudes: good or bad. I choose to be naming my blessings rather than recounting my woes. Make that your choice also! It places a realm of protection around you and troubles don't look as we thought them to be. It's quite incredible! A change of attitude gives you the ability to choose your own way.

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© 2008 Donna L. Watkins - This article was reprinted with permission from TheNatureInUs.com.
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