Gratefulness
While reading through an article at (in)courage recently, the words of Lara, The Farmer's Wife, seemed to leap off of the page at me. With one sentence my attention was arrested. The line "I cannot thank my Savior that I have enough and in the next breath mutter that I fear for what is to come." seemed to pop off the screen.
Oh me, somedays the gift does begin to feel like a burden, and I am like a child with too many gifts on Christmas day. If you too find your gratitude being choked, join with me in beginning anew counting the gifts God has given, especially those that are small, insignificant, and hard. Together we can uproot ungratefulness and deprive it of it's destructive power.
Each of us is so blessed. It's never fails to stir up thankful amazement watching God orchestrate my life so perfectly. The timing of the article is perfect. It comes right on the heels of a week spent thinking about the goodness of God. "God is good, all the time." is a popular saying from the 1990s and early 2000s that could be heard in countless churches across America, maybe the world. However, as is the case with most popular phrases, it died out and was replaced with the latest and greatest new thing. However, for whatever reason, I have found myself seriously contemplating God's goodness. I have been examining my opinions and comparing them to the Word of God. I've been feeling a need to make sure that what I believe and teach my children lines up with the Word. It must be solid, Biblical truth, not just man's philosophy with a few scripture verses thrown in for good measure. What did I find? Questions. Questions, questions, and still more questions. These aren't tormenting questions based in fear and doubt. The questions coming to mind are thoughtful and sincere. Their desire is for clarity, understanding and truth.
Jeremiah 29:11 returns over and over and over again "For I know the thoughts and plans that I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts and plans for welfare and peace and not for evil, to give you hope in your final outcome." Verses such as Isaiah 48: 16,17 are never far behind "Come near to me and listen to this: I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it happened, I was there. And now the Lord God has sent His Spirit in and with me. Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am the Lord your God, Who teaches you to profit, Who leads you in the way that you should go." or how about Is. 49:15,16 [And the Lord answered] Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yes, they may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have indelibly imprinted (tatooed a picture of) you on the palm of each of my hands; [O Zion] your walls are continually before Me." "The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and abounding in mercy and loving-kindness. The Lord is good to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works [the entirety of things created]." Psalm 145:8,9. The more I read, the more I find. It is literally impossible to escape God's goodness. The only way to miss it is to deliberately choose not to see it, to focus elsewhere.
Gratefulness. Choosing gratitude, choosing to be thankful in all things, at all times is a life-changing habit. The chokehold of ingratitude is broken and the chains of despair fall powerless at our feet when we choose to be grateful, for it all. That being said, here are #79-109 (I think, I lost count once or twice) of the thousand gifts I'm counting.
- teenage boys having fun
- a little man (3 yrs. old) thinking he's as big as they are
- inner growth in an 11 yr. old girl
- truth from the lips of a 4 yr. old - plain spoken though it may be :)
- pizza, pop, and brownies
- lunch already waiting to be cooked
- the aroma of coffee freshly ground
- the popping sound of guns shooting trap
- being changed by the Word
- slippery ice and fluffy snow
- the loving concern of a dog for his people
- Christian cartoons that teach God's truth
- the enveloping love of family
- My Beloved's smile
- unexpected company divinely sent
- enough food to feed extra mouths
- little ones growing big
- clear skies full of stars
- clean, cold air awakening the senses
- boxes of books in the mailbox
- the mailbox just down the road
- neighbors with the same last name - family every one
- scraps of satin that together make a whole
- aprons waiting to be sewn
- paper clean and crisp and white
- the smell of ink coming from a new book
- the sound of little feet coming down the stairs
- stories old pictures tell
- fighting that reveals the needs of young hearts
- memories being made