Have you ever felt like God seems to be answering everyone else’s prayers but yours? Your family and friends are moving on with their wonderful lives, but you’re stuck in place?

The psalmist had similar feelings. In Psalm 73, he was angry and bitter that the wicked around him were thriving and didn’t have the difficulties he had. He envied their prosperity and let self-pity overtake him.

But then he entered God’s presence and his perspective changed. He realized that his circumstances shouldn’t dictate his passion for life or his understanding of the character of God. “God’s presence is my good,” he said (v. 28). “God is the strength of my heart, my portion forever” (v. 26).

When you compare yourself to others, you’re taking your eyes off God and putting them on yourself. Doing so will cause you to become angry, because you’re not getting what you think you deserve like everyone else seems to be. So you sink into bitterness and self-pity and let the temporary things of this life overshadow the eternal.

Today, if you find yourself feeling this way, enter into God’s holy presence and allow Him to change your perspective, to shift your focus from the temporary to the eternal. May you say with the psalmist, “I didn’t understand … Who do I have in heaven but You? And I desire nothing on earth but You” (73:21, 25).