Some days are hard, and having an attitude like Christ is not always easy.
Ants. They were everywhere.
The cat was covered from head to tail in ant spray.
My husband was on the phone with the local pet salon to get a professional bath for the cat.
And me? I was standing the middle of all the chaos wondering where to begin cleaning.
It all started twenty minutes before when my husband and I woke up to find ants marching all over the floor in our living room.
My husband quickly doused the ants with an entire can of ant spray. When he was done, our hardwood floor had turned into a puddle of sticky spray that began to permeate the house.
We were standing side by side staring at the mess when we first heard a noise. By the time we realized what it was, it too late. The cat had run from the back of the house, down the hallway, and into the living room where he slid and tumbled his way across the room.
By the time we got to him he was dripping wet with the toxic spray.
We had just moved into our new home a few months before and were quickly learning the “not so joys” of owning a home. A few weeks after moving in, the hot water tank gave way to water all over the finished basement. Not long after that we had to purchase a new dryer. The list went on and on.
Now I was standing before a messy floor with ants and a cat that needed a bath. How was I going to clean all of this mess up and make it to work on time? How much was the pet spa going to charge for this emergency bath?
We have all had days when things spin out of our control. But we get to choose how we handle days like these.
[biblegateway passage=”Philippians 1:27 ” display=”Philippians 1:27 “](NIV)
Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only heart about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit striving together as one for the faith of the gospel.
Paul wrote this in a letter to the Christian church in Philippi while sitting in a prison cell. If anyone should have had a bad attitude it was Paul. Instead, he chose to continue his mission right there in that cell.
Unexpected things will happen. But we can respond to those events with a Christ-like attitude. Paul was a living example of what he wrote to the Philippians.
