Dr. Barbara Lee Fredrickson is a psychology professor and head of the Positive Emotions and Psychophysiology Lab at the University of North Carolina. She and her team surveyed six hundred Americans to ask about their daily activities and correlate them with the degree to which they experienced negative or positive emotions. Dr. Fredrickson’s research found that we are happier and more resilient when we face the pandemic and other challenges with others in community.
This was a Fourth of July unlike any in living memory. But even with the pandemic and recession, I am grateful to be an American. Every time I travel overseas, when I return, I’m glad to be home. I pray for my country to be a nation God can bless.
When you and I seek to become godly and spend time in God’s word and worship, he will make us what we strive to be. Our desire to be obedient positions us to be empowered to be obedient. As we work, he works. And he redeems the challenges of our fallen world by using them to draw us to himself in dependent faith.
let’s choose to make praying for holiness a regular, consistent commitment and discipline. God can give only what we will receive and lead only where we will go. If we do not ask him to make us holy, he cannot make us holy.
In a week focused on the consequences of character, it is therefore vital that Christians do what is needed to become the change we wish to see. We cannot control what others do, but we can control our words and actions and the values they reflect. We can use our influence for biblical morality, but only if we are people others are willing to follow.
Data is showing that coronavirus cases are rising in many states, as such, we must be responsible and do our part to continue to protect the most vulnerable in our communities.
We have been focusing on the theme of encouragement in discouraging times. As we face an escalating pandemic, ongoing recession, and divisive debates about policing, statues, and autonomous zones, Christians can find ways to “rejoice in hope” (Romans 12:12) and then share their hope with a hopeless world.
The world is more interconnected than ever, but it feels more divided than ever. We are conflicted on whether to wear masks and practice social distancing to stop the spread of coronavirus. We are conflicted on partisan politics as the election season escalates. We are conflicted about racial justice, removing statues, and occupied zones.
We often think that Jesus died to save us because we were worth saving. The fact is, he died to save us because he loves us. In fact, he loves us enough to die for us again, right now. And he loves us because he is love. Not because we were or are lovable. Not because there is anything in us that merits his love.
It is sadly understandable that secular people would despair of hope in times that seem hopeless. Our responsibility as followers of Jesus is to help them follow Jesus as well, sharing God’s word and grace with all those we influence.
