“When you look for the bad in mankind expecting to find it, you surely will.”
This is my favourite line from one of my favourite childhood movies, Pollyanna (1960). The film is based on a book written in 1913 by Eleanor Hodgman and features a little girl named Pollyanna who chooses to look for the good in all people and all circumstances despite being orphaned, crippled, and criticised.
When she comes to live with her rigid aunt in a small town in America, she explains this “Glad Game” to others: Her parents had been impoverished missionaries in the West Indies. Pollyanna had wanted a doll so badly that her parents wrote requesting a doll for a little girl. When the missionary barrels came, there had been a mistake and instead of a doll, there was a pair of crutches. Pollyanna was deeply disappointed. Her father then made up the “Glad Game,” where whenever she was upset, they would think of something to be glad about. What was there to be glad about crutches? Well, they could be glad that they didn’t need to use them.
Pollyanna’s “Glad Game” catches on and the town that had been fractured and full of cranky people eventually becomes a caring community who find the good in each other.
The Glad Game. At first, it’s a very difficult game to play if you’re used to playing the Self-Pity Game or even the Blame Game. Many of us are champions of the Whinge Game.
What if we started to play the Glad Game? What if we looked for the good not only in difficult circumstances but also in challenging people? What differences would we see and experience?
The wise king said, “Whoever seeks good finds favour, but evil comes to one who searches for it.” Proverbs 11:27. Or, as one translator paraphrased, “Anyone can find the dirt in someone. Be the one that finds the gold.”
After all, God chooses to see the good in us and believes we are worthy dying for. Glad tidings, indeed.
by: Jinha Kim
"But those who drink the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life." John 4:14