We all have them: bad days. The pressures. Deadlines. Long lists of “to-dos”. Arguments. The boss is coming down on you. The kids won’t get along. The air conditioning is broken. Again.

Our weeks or months can be full of them.

But take heart. Not in the fact that these situations won”t ever go away. But take heart that you can change your outlook on them.

God, your heavenly Father, the one who created you, has a purpose for you each day. And that purpose is a good one. That bad day is really a good day.

But how? It can be loaded with dark, frustrating moments. It can be summed up as an entire failure of a day.

Let”s look at the life of Jesus Christ. By our (and I stress “our” as in the unbelieving world) viewpoint, the life of Jesus was a failure. He lived a good life, called to himself twelve disciples, and created a mass of followers. But where did he lead them? Most thought he was going to be the new king of Isreal that was prophesied. Instead, the followed him to a lowly cross, where at the young age of 30, he was beaten to a pulp, nailed to a cross, and died. Someone even had the gumption to cry out to him “Hey! If you really are the Son of God like you claim, save yourself!”. But to the eyes of the unbelieving world, it was there that he died, leaving his disciples and thousands of followers to be heartbroken and mourn.

But from the vantage point of God, the creator of the universe, that wasn’t a failure. That whole process had a very specific, and good, purpose. To redeem God’s people. To rebuild the relationship to His creation, one that we had broken due to our rebellious and sinful nature. To give us, who believe in Him, eternal life. Sounds like a good thing to me. The main problem was that the people at the time of His death didn”t see it from God’s viewpoint. They didn’t understand. They couldn’t get past the loss and the heartache of that day.

Even in the worst of our days, God is there. Working out some plan that ultimately is for our good. For our growth. To make us a better person.

Our task each day is to get beyond those downer moments and frustrating details of the day-to-day, and take heart in the fact that God is there, smiling at us, and there is a positive purpose for everything we have encountered that day.