It is an understatement to say life has its highs and lows. The highs are easy to live with. It is living through the lows that is the challenge. In fact, it can be downright hard. Emotions are affected. That affects the way we think and feel. That affects the way we feel about God. God seems far away. He doesn’t seem to hear. So why try? Why continue to try? The lows now become even lower. So, what can we do? How can we survive?

The response might be, “You just need to pray more.” But that is part of the problem. We are prayed out. We prayed and prayed and there was no answer. So, telling us to pray is not going to help.

The problem is one of perspective. We must change the way we think, then the way we see will be improved. We control the way we think. No one can make us think what we don’t want to think. If we choose to stay in the valley of lows and keep the same kind of thinking that put us there, there will be little prospect of getting better. So, we need to think about what we think about. “As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” Find something lovely to think about, something honorable, something just, something beautiful. If we change the way we think, we will change the way we see.

Also, find something worth admiring. Find something or someone that captures your attention. It is not only the way we think that needs to be changed, we need to change our imagination. We lose the ability to dream. We lose the ability to see beauty in all God has created. We lose the ability imagine what we can be. If our imagination is dark, then everything we imagine will be dark. If we imagine people are hurting us, when they aren’t even thinking about us, then we will see them as adversaries. In the Revelation, John asks us to imagine the throne of God. Imagine that scene and imagine being moved to praise God. It will brighten what we dream about. 

Further, do something for somebody. Buy a gift to give to someone who has been a help to you. Write a letter or send a card, not an email or text, and tell that person who has helped you how much you appreciate who they are and what they have meant to you. Reach out to someone you can help. Remember, someone once helped you, now find someone to help. Find someone who you can walk that extra mile with. Do that little thing above and beyond the need to encourage.

Maybe those little things can help change the perspective we have of life and ourselves. Now we can increase our faith. Now we can pray. Now we can feel the relief of the heavy burden that pressed us down. Our world seems brighter. How we see people has changed. Yes, life under the sun has ups and downs. But when we are down, we don’t have to stay down. We can rise. If we walk with God, He will lift us up.