[Steve Myers] We've probably all heard of the word placebo. We oftentimes will think of it as maybe a sugar pill that someone gives us that is supposed to maybe help us to feel better even though in reality it doesn't do anything. Well, that's supposed to have a positive effect. In Latin placebo means "I will please."

Now there's another word that maybe we're not quite as familiar with, but it's very similar to this word and it's nocebo. Nocebo, and you guessed it, it's the opposite of placebo. And it means "I will harm." A nocebo is something that's really a harmless substance, doesn't do anything, and yet people expect the worst from it.

Here's an example: a while back there was a high school in Tennessee. One of the teachers smelled some type of fumes or something, and they alerted the classrooms. All of a sudden everybody it seemed started getting sick. A hundred people were taken to the hospital, something like almost 40 people were kept overnight because of these terrible symptoms they were all feeling. But guess what? It was nothing. It was a nocebo. There was not really any scents at all. There was no smell, but someone just had that feeling that something bad was happening, and it affected so many people. And I think it teaches us something that's very important.

Oftentimes in life we get a feeling that something bad is going to happen. We have a tendency to think that something harmful - or we have a negative expectation. We're not even sure what a situation will bring, and yet we look at it very negatively or we think, "Oh, something awful is going to happen," and we get a terrible feeling.

Well, that's this nocebo effect. Yet, that is not the way that God wants us to view life. He doesn't want us to look at life as though something harmful is absolutely going to happen, that we should have some type of dark expectations of terrible realities that could or might come about. Instead God says we need to strive to look at the positive side of life, and the good expectations that we should have especially when God's on our side.

This concept reminded me of a passage in Romans 15:13. And here's what it says, you talk about a positive impact that God wants us to have and that good, positive perspective. Here's what it says, "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing." Boy, you talk about a positive impact.

First of all it frames God as a loving, hopeful God. God looks at life in a hopeful way because in the end He's going to make sure everything turns out right. And that's the kind of feeling He wants us to have. He wants us to have joy and peace. And in fact that verse goes on to say, "That you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."

So through God's Holy Spirit we not only can have a positive perspective, but the Apostle Paul says we can abound in it. Or in other words we can overflow in a positive perspective on life especially when we take into account God's impact and His plan for all of us.

So let's strive to do that. Let's make sure that we wipe out the concept of nocebos in our thinking, and let's take on that positive perspective that God has for us.

Don't swallow that nocebo pill, and let's make sure we always count on God and His will because that's the best medicine.

That's BT Daily. We'll see you next time.