How is your day going? Are you having a good day or a bad day?

Melissa and I were reading a book on the drive from Tennessee the other day. In it, the main character was a 14-year-old boy. He got beaten up one day after school. There was a girl that he liked who saw what happened and tried to stop the bullies, but wasn’t able to.

The next day, he went to school with a black eye. He was scared he would run into the bully again. He had a biology test he wasn’t prepared for and knew he was going to fail. Then he had to go to detention because the principal punished him for being bullied.

However, the girl he liked asked to talk with him after school. When he said he couldn’t because of detention, she volunteered to sit through detention with him. Then, then hung out after detention. At the end of the day he thought to himself, “This has been a great day!”

What was he thinking?

Why would a day with a black eye, the risk of being bullied again, failing a test, and having to go to detention for being a victim being a great day?

You know the answer.

He got to hang out with the girl he’d had a crush on. She even sat through detention with him. The rest just didn’t compare.

We all have bad days. Sometimes even bad weeks or months. Sometimes we have to live through 2020! Yet, regardless of what is happening, we know that Jesus loves us and has saved us. We get to hang out with God anytime we want. He even joins us in our suffering. Even in our darkest moments, we have something to be thankful for.

Not Faking It
I’m not saying that we ignore the difficult times. I’m not saying that we put on a fake smile or force out an unfelt prayer of thanks.

I am saying that we take time to remember the great things God has done for us both Jesus work on the cross and things God has specifically done in our lives in the past. We remember them and declare them. We put our suffering in perspective by looking to Christ so that, like the character in the book, the rest just doesn’t compare.

It’s like what Jesus did.