What matters?

“And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” – Philippians‬ ‭4:8‬ ‭NLT‬‬

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This morning I was getting ready for work, feeling a bit annoyed because of several social media posts that reminded me of how it felt to be left out and snubbed, when a small voice inside asked, “Does it really matter what they did to you?”

It stopped me in my tracks—with my comb still stuck in my hair—and I repeated the question to myself: Does it really matter that it happened?

Well, the answer is honestly no.

First of all, it’s in the past and I’ve gotten over it so the annoyance was completely unnecessary and childish.

Two, my life is totally fine without them. I’m living a life I’m grateful for, I’m content even without them. This didn’t (and still doesn’t) affect me or my life at all.

After realizing that in a short couple of seconds, the small voice returned and said, “Then why don’t you show them kindness instead? Isn’t that what matters more instead of feeling butt hurt for something so trivial?”

Ouch.

But it’s true. Being kind towards them matters more than them being kind to me.

With that new revelation in mind, I went to work and as per usual, we had our Monday morning devotion at the office before we started the week.

Our senior pastor shared about Philippians 4:4-9.

Some of his points that hit home are as follows:
1. A lot of people can act kind but don’t have a kind/good heart.
2. Being grateful is the password to the miracle we want.

Here’s the explanation for the second point:

In verse 8 (NLT version), it is said, “And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.”

Every day we are faced with the choice between seeing the bad/negative side of things and the good/positive side. As humans, it is our default tendency to notice the “off” things, the negative/bad things stand out more than the good ones. We notice the one skewed button, the one B in otherwise A-filled report card, the dent in the otherwise smooth surface etc.

It takes practice to consciously seek the good in things, people or situations. But this isn’t just a mere mind game or challenge because it’s attached to our ability to be grateful.

It requires an extraordinary way of thinking to see the good, to not complain to God or be angry.

And the direct consequence of this gratefulness and positive attitude (according to Paul in Philippians 4:9) is the peace of God that’s with us. When we are able to focus on what we have rather than what we lack, we can live in peace and we will be able to meet the miracle that we want.

An example is the story of the boy with 5 loaves of bread and 2 fishes that fed thousands. If they focused on what they lacked (which was A LOT), they would have been busy complaining, being stressed and frustrated with their situation. But once they focused on what they had and brought it to Jesus, they were able to witness a miracle.

Being grateful is the password to the miracle we want.
Gratitude precedes miracle.

Now after hearing all that, you’d think it would be enough confirmation of the reminder I personally got this morning.

But no. There’s another harsher reminder about gratitude, peace and focusing on what matters.

I came home about half an hour ago, checked twitter and to my shock, saw tweets and news about a young lead vocal of a very famous K-pop boy group (which I also happen to like) who took his own life just hours ago.

Heartbroken can’t begin to describe how I felt.

He was so talented, so successful, so young… yet he was hurting so much that he decided to end it all before he even reached 30.

It was a harsh wake up call (the third “HELLO!” of the day! What a record!) to really take a good, hard look at my life.

What matters?
What’s really important in this short life of ours?

Or maybe the question should be: what are the things that feel important to us?

What we let into our hearts and minds can determine the course of our lives—our present and our future. What we direct the spotlight to, what we enhance, can bring us miracles or lead us into more pain and negativity.

Let’s re-examine our lives, our priorities and the things we let dominate our minds and hearts.

Are we focusing on the good things?
Can we be grateful with what we have and not focus on what we lack?
Do we have peace?
Are we doing what we should be doing?

Our lives are short.

What matters?