CHANGING FOCUS

 One of the things which often inspires my post is God's word.  He never fails to touch my heart and prompt my ponderings when I sit for a while and contemplate what He has written.  Today's post was inspired by Psalm 19 which was the past week's study focus in Bible Study. 

One of the reasons I took such a long hiatus from the WWW was the constant barrage of negativity.  It is no secret that I flee from dissension.  Today's intolerance of any difference of opinion has reached epic proportions.  The WWW has encouraged rude behavior and down right hatred for anyone with a different opinion.  I have grown weary---and sometimes find myself feeling defeated by all the belligerence in today's society.  Gone are the axioms I was raised with---you do not discuss politics or religion in polite society.  The fact of the matter is I at times wonder if polite society is a thing of the past.

While studying this week's Psalm, I came way with this-

WHAT IF WE BEGAN FOCUSING ON WHAT WE HAVE IN COMMON

INSTEAD OF OUR DIFFERENCES?

A novel idea in today's world for sure.  Psalm 19 speaks of the sky-

"The heavens declare the glory of God,

and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.

Psalm 19:1

Thinking this over it occurred to me we all have the sky in common---everyone on this planet.  We may be experiencing different times of the day--but some sky is still over our heads--be it dark or be it light.  Though we are all created gloriously different--we all have the very same sky over our heads.  A constant reminder of God's creation.  What if--instead of thinking on how different the places we might live are--instead we focused on the fact that all of us on this terrestrial ball are looking at the same sky?  What if we could look beyond ourselves and the finite world  within our sight, and remember the very same sky surrounds the entire world?  What an amazing and glorious thought---God's creation covers each and every one of us.  No matter what else might be different--the sky is the same for all of us.

I dare say there are many more similarities we all share.  The desire for love, a need to eat and drink, a joy from laughter, a love of nature, recognition of  common emotions, and on and on.  We humans are amazingly similar (the DNA of all human beings living today is 99.9% alike) to be so diverse.  Would it not be refreshing if we could focus on how alike we are?  What if--instead of arguing over our differences we began recognizing our similarities?  What if------