Living With An Excellent Spirit
I saw a study done at Stanford University that found that a positive attitude can be just as important a predictor of your success as your IQ. That means that no matter how high your IQ is, which you can't control, you have the ability to take charge of your thoughts and attitude and lift your life to new levels.
A study of the twelve spies whom Moses sent into the Promised Land as they're described in Numbers 13 would come to the same conclusion about how powerful attitudes can be. All the spies reported that the land was rich in produce and flowing with abundance. But ten spies came back with negative attitudes and declared, "There are giants in the land. We'll never be able to conquer those people. We look like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we are in their sight." However, Joshua and Caleb tried to hush the bad report. They declared, "If the Lord delights in us, He will bring us into the land and give it to us." They had what the Bible refers to as "a different spirit," an excellent spirit.
It's easy to see how a negative attitude can have devastating consequences. In the shadow of the giants, the ten spies did not remember the miracles that God had done and the good things He had promised. Their bad attitude spread to all the people of Israel and kept them out of the Promised Land. But Joshua and Caleb looked beyond the giants and chose to believe and obey according to what God had spoken. They saw an opportunity to trust Him to fight their battles for them. Forty years later, these two men were still strong enough in faith to lead the next generation into the land.
Do you see how important your attitude is? We formulate our attitudes by the way we think, and how we think is directly related to what's going to come out of our mouths. The Bible says that "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks" (Luke 6:45). That's why you can't hide a bad attitude for long. You can try to push it down, you can try to fool people, but eventually it's going to come out in your words or somewhere else in your life, because bad attitudes have legs. They cross over into other areas of our lives.
When you have the right attitude, you can look at your most challenging situation and make it through it by choosing to set your eyes on God's promises. You'll quiet the discouraging voices that come against you by looking through eyes of faith and believing that God will lead you into all He has for you.
A study of the twelve spies whom Moses sent into the Promised Land as they're described in Numbers 13 would come to the same conclusion about how powerful attitudes can be. All the spies reported that the land was rich in produce and flowing with abundance. But ten spies came back with negative attitudes and declared, "There are giants in the land. We'll never be able to conquer those people. We look like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we are in their sight." However, Joshua and Caleb tried to hush the bad report. They declared, "If the Lord delights in us, He will bring us into the land and give it to us." They had what the Bible refers to as "a different spirit," an excellent spirit.
It's easy to see how a negative attitude can have devastating consequences. In the shadow of the giants, the ten spies did not remember the miracles that God had done and the good things He had promised. Their bad attitude spread to all the people of Israel and kept them out of the Promised Land. But Joshua and Caleb looked beyond the giants and chose to believe and obey according to what God had spoken. They saw an opportunity to trust Him to fight their battles for them. Forty years later, these two men were still strong enough in faith to lead the next generation into the land.
Do you see how important your attitude is? We formulate our attitudes by the way we think, and how we think is directly related to what's going to come out of our mouths. The Bible says that "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks" (Luke 6:45). That's why you can't hide a bad attitude for long. You can try to push it down, you can try to fool people, but eventually it's going to come out in your words or somewhere else in your life, because bad attitudes have legs. They cross over into other areas of our lives.
When you have the right attitude, you can look at your most challenging situation and make it through it by choosing to set your eyes on God's promises. You'll quiet the discouraging voices that come against you by looking through eyes of faith and believing that God will lead you into all He has for you.