Contagiously Good!

Are you contagious? Would people be able to catch what you’ve got? Do you have anything worth catching? Is what you’ve got worth spreading?

Or have the antibodies of sameness, uninteresting, usual, boring, predictable, been working on you so long that they have killed off all your desire to be different? To be different in a good way! To be so radically good that it catches others off guard!

That’s how God wants us to be…going about wherever we go doing good, in whatever way or means the situation calls for. Be it unplanned, unexpected, unusual, or different, God will use you, if you’re open, to do good to somebody in your life each and every day. And it will be one of the most exciting things to happen to you! To be used by Almighty God to make a difference, a lasting difference, for good in the life of someone else.

Your smile at the right time can bring a ray of joy to a person you don’t even know, who is going through a very difficult time. Your ‘Hi, how are you doing today?’ said to a complete stranger can cause them to come out of their shell and begin to experience life in a new way. Your stopping to pick up something that the person in front of you dropped and didn’t see it, restores faith in people and God and His goodness once again.

Like the Starbucks stories we’ve heard about where one person pays it forward and starts a chain reaction to many people in line behind him, that one random act of kindness snowballs into an avalanche that causes good to many, many people.  So your good deeds, your good words, your helpfulness causes a reaction for good even if only in the other person’s heart, who then takes it home and is nice to his family, or the driver ahead of him.

One good deed is very contagious!

Let that good deed be yours:)

Positive People

Most of us like being around positive people; most of us think we are positive people.

Did you know God wants us to be positive people? He created that desire in our lives. He is a positive God and He wants us to be positive people. ‘Yeah but’ and ‘what about’ you start to say. Nope, the choice is ours. God said to choose this day, to choose life, to choose to believe.

Without even realizing it many times we slide over into the negative and let that affect us, our decisions and our families.

People secretly want to be positive since that’s the way we’re designed, but often give in to negative out of fear of bad happening if they get too positive, too happy, too joyful, too expectant of good things in their lives,  so they ‘play it safe’ and stay either neutral or negative. ‘I don’t want to get my hopes up and then they get dashed to the ground.’ And so, all the joy is sucked right out of their lives under the guise of playing it safe. It’s no fun to live like that!

Then to keep ourselves ‘safe’, we try to tone down other’s excitement lest we get excited too and that might cause a ‘scene’. What would people think if I were actually happy every day?  Bah, Humbug isn’t only around at Christmas time. We have to guard against him on a daily basis!

A joyful, happy, merry heart does good like a medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones.

Happiness, joy, positive attitudes and good health go hand in hand.

Don’t miss out on your good life.

Take it.

It’s yours.

Start today…be positive and good towards yourself!

It’s Just Me…

‘I keep having thoughts that I should go talk to so and so, that I should go help so and so, that I should write an article, book, speak to this person, apply for this job, start this business, but that’s just me and I don’t want to be proud and do what I think, after all, it’s not about me.’ ‘My church doesn’t believe God talks to people anymore so I know it’s not Him…so I guess I’ll just ignore all these thoughts and go about my own way.’

‘Is this right?’

Well, God does use all the ‘ME’s’ out there. He has chosen to use people to speak through, work through, pray through, love through, care though. He doesn’t personally come down and wipe away tears, or sit in the living room and visit with us. He uses us…people. I haven’t heard God speak audibly to me, but now that God lives in my heart, I can hear Him through His word. I may be in a situation and need some wisdom or help, and I say a quick prayer to God, “Help, Lord, I need your wisdom.” And sure enough a verse of scripture many times pops into my mind, or I’ll remember something the pastor said in a message that is the answer to my prayer and everything ends up ok. John 14:26 says the Holy Spirit will bring to our remembrance that which He has spoken to us, so that is what is happening in my life here.   Or, I’ll have the thought to stop by and see someone and it turns out they were in need of something that I could provide; sometimes it was just lending an ear, or walking to their mailbox for them, putting away their groceries or taking out the trash.

If we aren’t careful, we can be so concerned that ‘it’s just us’ that we miss many opportunities to do good to others, because we were afraid of stepping out on a ‘hunch’ we had… that could have been a real blessing to another person.

And I have found when the other person is blessed, so am I. The joy and happiness from helping another human being seems to take away my troubles and I feel light and refreshed inside!

Go out and do good to somebody today!