Read Psalm 42:5–6

What happens that causes you to be disappointed? Someone or something has failed to fulfil your expectations. You had set up in your mind and then anticipated a certain outcome or response, but it never materialized. Your wish fell flat. Your desire became an empty, unfulfilled dream. Such feelings of disappointment are painfully familiar. As I play the record of my memory, I hear several sad songs from different voices:

“I’m not happy in my work. When I got the job I never realized it would be like this.”

“Marriage has become a drag! And on our wedding day I thought it would be so different. It’s nothing like that."

“She was once a friend of mine. I helped her, loved her, and gave myself to her. I thought she would respond the same way to me.”

“We had them over for dinner more than once, and they never did reciprocate. We didn’t even get a thank-you note. Talk about a disappointment!”

Some examples you could offer would register as even more serious and painful than these.

But we don’t have to wallow in the cave of discouragement. There is a way to rise above such times and experience the goodness of God. Listen to the psalmist work his way out of the pit:

Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! I will praise him again—my Savior and my God! (Psalm 42:5-6)

Notice the psalmist didn’t deny his disappointment. But he had a predetermined strategy for rising above it to find his hope in God. What a terrific help that is, don’t you agree? Let’s determine not to let our disappointments define us. To refuse to allow the inevitability of tough times to pin us down in discouragement. Turn to the God of heaven. Lift your thoughts toward Him. When you are most discouraged, remember Him and all He has done for you this year.

Devotional content taken from Good Morning, Lord...Can We Talk? by Charles R. Swindoll. Copyright © 2018. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, a division of Tyndale House Ministries. All rights reserved.