July 26, 2026
I’m excited about this new sermon series! We all want to be happy and experience joy. To have joy, you don’t need to have great things in your life. God gives joy, no matter what we face. Maybe you’ve met someone who always seems to have a positive outlook, even when they go through very difficult times. When we’re looking for joy, it’s all in your mind. Think about Jesus. He was a joyful person! He didn’t complain! He didn’t say to God, you know, heaven was so much nicer than earth, I’m tired of it down here. Beam me up!
He didn’t complain that his disciples messed up a lot. He didn’t say to God, why do I have to live like a peasant, when there’s an amazing palace in Jerusalem I could stay in? Instead, Jesus was amazed and overjoyed, talking about a poor widow who put her last coin in an offering plate. Jesus was content with a life that was simple and had difficulties. He knew ordinary life is beautiful! If you want joy, you don’t need to win the lottery or swap your family or job for a better one. The joy of the Lord can be yours! It’s all in your mind. It’s not like we’ll never be sad. It’s that God can be a source of joy, and a help, even in times of sorrow.
Next Sunday we’ll talk about strongholds, which are sort of evil fortresses we need to destroy! The third week is about lies we believe about ourselves, about God, and about our purpose. The fourth week we’ll learn how to stop comparing ourselves to others and coveting.
Today we’re talking about our attitude. There’s a scripture, Philippians 2:5 that says, “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God, something to be grasped, but in humility, he made himself nothing, taking on the very nature of humans, and became obedient to death, even death on the cross!” We’re called to have Jesus’ attitude, which is a positive, humble and obedient one.
If you ever noticed yourself experiencing a lot of negative, pessimistic thoughts, there’s a reason for that! Our brains are wired to hang onto the negative. That’s because when we lived out in the wilderness or as cavemen, we wanted to survive! We didn’t want a bear to kill us! So, we were always looking over our shoulders, expecting something bad could happen! That’s why our brains naturally spend more time on negative thoughts, because thinking a lot about what could happen to us was important in order to survive. But today there’s not much chance a bear will kill you or me. We don’t need to spend so much time thinking about mistakes we made, or about people who were rude to us, or about how high the price of gasoline might go. Jesus didn’t live like that. There actually were people who wanted to kill Jesus, but he had a positive attitude, even though he knew he would suffer and die on the cross.
When we get down, worried or anxious, what can we do? In today’s Scripture from 1 Samuel 30:1-6, King David and his army discover that their family members have all been taken captive by the enemy army, the Amalekites. David and his men weep until they have no more strength to cry. Two wives of King David had been captured. The army is so upset; they consider killing David by throwing stones at him! If you were David, how would you feel? Devastated that your family and the families of your soldiers have been kidnapped! You’d feel frightened that your men might take revenge on you and kill you! V. 6 says, “But David found strength in the Lord.” He found strength from God in a horrible situation! And because God strengthened him, he was able to get back his “I can do something about this” positive attitude. David is able to go with his men and rescue everyone who had been taken by the Amalekites! A negative mind will find fault in everything, but a positive mind will find opportunity in everything.
I need to hear this message today as much as anybody else! I want to see the positive in place of the negative. What’s in our minds will come out in our words and deeds. So how do we strengthen ourselves in the Lord, taking on the attitude of Christ?
We start with an attitude check to discover where we have negative thoughts. The first area is personal negativity. This is negativity about yourself. Do you ever have thoughts like “I don’t have what it takes. No matter how hard I try, I can’t get it all done” or “Nobody appreciates me.” Maybe your negative thoughts have to do with your body. You might wish one part of your body was smaller, and another part was bigger. Or maybe the guys say, “If only the hair on my head would grow half as fast as the hair in my ears, that would be great!” I have negative thoughts about myself, do you?
Another kind of negativity is relational negativity, such as, “Every time I trust a person, I get burned!” Or “I wish my spouse could be like other people’s spouses. But he or she will never change!” Or “my boss is a jerk!” Or “My family is messed up!” That’s relational negativity.
Maybe you’re negative about your circumstances. If you’re single, you might say, “If I was married, I’d be happy.” The married folks say, “If I was married to someone else, I’d be happy!” Maybe it’s, “If I had children, I’d be happy.” Or “If we only had different children, I’d be happy!” “If only I had a better job, or more money, or a car that worked, or a bigger house.” That is negativity about your circumstances.
Then there’s spiritual negativity. You might ask, “Why is it that God answers other people’s prayers, but not mine?” Maybe you have a complaint about churches. A guy once told me, “I won’t join a church, because all the churches should join together and become one church. Then I’ll join.” Spiritual negativity can be, “How come I can’t get close to God?”
Do you see yourself in any of those: negative thoughts about yourself, negative thoughts about the people in your life, negative thoughts about your circumstances, or spiritual negativity?
A negative mind will find fault in everything, but a positive mind will find opportunity in everything. Jesus saw the positive, he saw the opportunity around him. He saw the people of faith who believed. He saw when the disciples messed up , that it was a positive: an opportunity to point them in a positive direction. King David saw that when his family was taken and his army was ready to kill him, that wasn’t negative, that was an opportunity! David asks God, “Should I pursue the Amalekites?” God tells him “Yes!” Daivd leads the army. It turns out his army’s anger was really at the enemy, the Amalekites! Together King David and his army free their families.
Now that we’re aware of our negative thoughts, we can replace them with God’s thoughts. Instead of saying, “My boss is a jerk” maybe God’s thought is, “I am in this person’s life to minister to them.” Instead of saying, “I’ll never get out of debt”, say “With God all things are possible.” Instead of saying, “I’m not good enough, I just can’t do this” I can say, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
And another thing you can do to stop negative thoughts is to tell a better story. I talked about this in one of the Wed. Lenten services this year. Ladies, let’s say you ask your husband to pick something up at the grocery store on the way home. He says, “Sure!” Well, he comes home, and he didn’t pick it up, he forgot! You could say to yourself, “He never listens to me. He doesn’t care. He only cares about himself.” In your mind, you get triggered by his behavior. You have all these negative thoughts about him. What if you take a deep breath in and slowly let it out. You calm yourself.
Then when you’re calm you can tell a better story. “He forgot. I forget things too! I know he loves me and I know he’ll remember next time!” That’s a better story! Now it has to be a story you believe! If you don’t think that’s true, maybe your better story is, “He forgot. I forget things too! I know he loves me. I’ll get it delivered from Walmart next time!”
You have a choice. You can tell a negative story. Or you can tell a better story! And you know what? You feel better when you tell yourself that better story! You feel happier and lighter. You’re not holding onto negativity. You’re forgiving as God forgave you. Tell a better story!
So that’s my challenge for you, to take a negative thought you regularly have and tell a better story about that situation.
Jesus had many negative people and fault finders in his life, some of the religious leaders! He told his disciples, “Don’t be like them!” We are called to have the mind of Christ and put on his attitude. Jesus was humble and obedient. He didn’t complain. Because of his life and sacrificial death, we receive salvation and forgiveness of sins! Because of Jesus’ obedience to come and live here on earth, we have his example! In the Scriptures we can see his attitude and how he could see the extraordinary in ordinary people. He teaches us to look at the people and circumstances of our lives with new eyes and find the best in everyone and everything. We’ll be happier for it and we’ll know the joy of the Lord! Amen.
Maureen Duffy-Guy's blog 