Almost Everything is Very Good

An emergency began to unfold for Dr. Claire Simeone, director of the Kei Kai Ola hospital for Hawaiian monk seals. Dr. Simeone began to receive a flurry of phone calls during her lunch break. Yet every time she answered there was nothing but silence at the other end. And all the calls were originating from the same location – her hospital. At first she thought it was a wrong number, then a prank, and finally from a person too disabled or sick to speak. Perhaps someone was suffering a stroke.

Dr. Simeone began to panic. She rushed back to her office. There she learned that the hospital had been receiving hundreds of inquiries from angry people. They were all demanding to know why the hospital was incessantly calling them. And all these calls were coming from the same telephone number.

What mysterious person was making all these calls? They were tracked down to a touch-screen phone in the hospital lab. There, perched on the screen of the phone, was a gold-dusted day gecko. With his little “suction cup” toes on the touch-screen he was unwittingly making phone calls. But these were not merely individual phone calls. The little lizard had somehow managed to send calls to everyone on the hospital’s phone list. The gecko was ringing the phones of “a bazillion” people – leaving only an eerie silence on the other end. 

This harmless little gecko’s ability to create such havoc in the minds of so many people is a telltale sign of our times. It’s not only indicative of how easily our technology can be manipulated, but also our minds. Our mentality seems to simmer just below the paranoia point. We are deeply entrenched in our “what’s wrong now” pattern of thought. Our minds are preoccupied with “what’s broke” and “what’s not working” that if any two or three problems arise, we lose all hope.  

Take, for instance, any healthy individual, fully functioning car, or fully developed nation. Is the individual’s mind cognizant of the fact that his heart keeps beating, his lungs keep breathing, and his kidneys keep filtering his blood? Does he appreciate the fact that his stomach and intestines keep breaking down and drawing nutrients from the food he ate? Is he even aware that his blood stream carries these nutrients to the door step of the 37.5 trillion cells of his body and then proceeds to remove their waste? Probably not. But if he has a sore throat or a tummy ache, those symptoms totally occupy his mind. 

Back in 1999 I purchased a new car. The day I brought the car home I saw a small dimple on one of the front fenders which I hadn’t noticed at the dealer. The following morning as I came to my new car, what was the first thing I noticed? Was it the new car with all its brand-new and fully functioning parts? No. All I could see was that tiny dimple on the fender. And I couldn’t rest until the dealer fixed that one blemish. 

If you only get information from the news, then you’re probably convinced that our nation is crumbling, about to totter and fall. That’s because our media only focuses on “what’s wrong” and on “what’s not working.” Consequently, we’re only aware of the problems.  

Unnoticed are the 200 million or so wage-earners who faithfully go to their jobs, pay taxes, love their spouses, and care for their children. Ignored is the fact that we have a functional government, operating under the same U.S. Constitution for over 230 years. We lose sight of the fact that God is continually raising up people to develop new technologies to build and upgrade our nation’s infrastructure. He raises up people to build utilities, roads, dams, electrical grids, banking systems, and hospitals. And God is forever calling and equipping people to be medical doctors, scientists, emergency workers, and political leaders. 

You see, despite our tendency to hunt for the bad in life, almost everything in life is working. Almost everything in our world is functional. Nowhere is this more demonstrated than in creation. God has thoroughly interwoven into the earth’s biosphere millions of symbiotic relationships in which plants and animals help each other, feed each other, and keep each other in check. Ocean and wind currents distribute life-giving nutrients and warmth to trillions of living organisms. Beyond our planet we find a universe whose governing laws are so finely tuned, that if any of them were slightly altered life would not be possible anywhere. 

Yes, almost everything in life is O.K. It’s more than O.K. It’s very good. Sure there are those times when geckos make phone calls or squirrels cause power outages. But it’s our predisposition for paranoia that takes the scare and runs off a cliff with it. Instead, let’s do these:

• Focus on the things that are working. 
• Count God’s blessings and hunt for the good in life. 
• Challenge that bad news we hear – or at least balance it with the good. 
• Ask God to open our eyes to the plethora of divine activity all around us, at every moment. 

It will tune us into a wonderful reality. It will be medicine to our minds and healing to our hearts. “Bless the LORD, O my soul and forget none of His benefits” (Psalm 103:2).  

PRAYER: 

Dear Father in heaven, please open my eyes to the wonders of Your creation and to Your continual activity all around me to bless, to help, and to heal. Open my eyes to Your love for me that I might run into Your healing embrace. Amen.