Be Glad

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son. John 3:16

2020 is probably not a year that anyone will remember with complete joy. I awake each morning with the question, will I be sad or mad today? Jigsaw puzzles have lost their luster, crosswords are sometimes too easy and jumble requires too much brainpower. I can't even clean house because it will use my shoulder too much.  Raking leaves would require bending over. Another no-no. So I turn to reading and even that does not bring happiness to my day. Then I remembered a poem that my mother used to recite to me when I was in a complete funk. This poem was written by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, an American poet in the 1800s. It was published in the form of Poems of Passion and Solitude.

This is the way I remember it from my mother.

Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry alone for the sad old earth has to borrow its mirth but has trouble enough of its own. There is probably more to the poem but that was the part I often heard. We need to laugh these days. We need to feel joy. We need to be glad about something. Oh how wonderful. Instead of mad or sad, I can add glad. After all, it is a rhyming word!

Can we all add glad to at least one day a week? Can we laugh and see who laughs with us? Can we remember that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son?  There must be something to be pleased with if He even loved our world.

Prayer: Let us be grateful Lord, for what we have, not wanting more or needing a lot more. In your son's name, we pray. Amen

Carolyn Olsen