The Italian Memorandum

“A glad heart makes a cheerful face”

(Proverbs 15:13)

“When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all up hill,
When the friends are low, and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh…

Success is failure turned inside out,
The silver tint of the cloud of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far…”

–Author unknown

The story is told of a man visiting the Louvre in Paris. He went through the entire museum and commented sarcastically to the doorman upon his leave, “I didn’t see a thing in there!” The doorman smiled and gently replied, “Don’t you wish you could have?” (Arlie J. Hoover, Fallacies of Unbelief, p. 64). We cannot always be of a chipper disposition (John 11:35; Philippians 4:11; Proverbs 15:13). But, what determines whether we spend our days in a chipper mood or a dismal flurry of bitterness? It is written, “good news refreshes the bones” (Proverbs 15:30). The gospel is a message that must be internalized and verbalized (Romans 10:8-11). If we wait for chipper days, we miss the point. We must activate what we know by the gospel. There are no chipper days, only chipper people (see James 5:13). May it be so with you.

-Robert M. Housby