Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.

Proverbs 4:23 (NLT)

A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength.

Proverbs 17:22 (NLT)

For the despondent, every day brings trouble; for the happy heart, life is a continual feast.

Proverbs 15:15 (NLT)

Keeping your head up and your heart right

1. Remember that God has chosen you

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.

For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.

In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—

to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.

Ephesians 1:3 - 6 (NIV)

And that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve.

After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.

Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect.

I Corinthians 15:5-10 (NIV)

From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.

God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.

Acts 17:26-27(NIV)

2. Remember that God has planned in advance for you

In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the

purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory.

Eph 1:11-12 (ESV)

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Eph 2:10 (ESV)

God has planned in advance for the problems you will encounter

God has planned in advance for the provision you’re going to need

Eph 3:20 (NIV) “God is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us…to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus thoughout all generations, forever and ever! AMEN.

God has planned in advance for the people to help you

The help you need is in the harvest

The help you need doesn’t look like the finished product when you find them

You will never see the help you need if you are always looking in someone else”s field

3. Remember that God has guaranteed a future for you

And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit,

who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.

Ephesians 1:13-14

… “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him”

1 Corinthians 2:9 (NIV)

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Galations 6:9 (NIV)