Category Archives: Thankfulness

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Make Every Day Thanksgiving Day – You’ll Be Grateful You Did

Practice Gratitude - It Opens the Door To More of God's Goodness

Today is Thanksgiving Day, so offer thanks to God with your whole heart! It will not only make God smile, it will do you some good, too. Bruce Chapman said it well: “Gratitude has been called the gateway to the virtues. As Cicero put it, ‘Gratitude is not only the greatest of the virtues, but the parent of all others,’ opening the heart to deeper appreciation, compassion, repentance, forgiveness, generosity, and wisdom. Giving thanks should be cultivated as a habit. It is a kind of “therapy for the spirit.” Try some “thanks therapy” today – you’ll be grateful you did.

Thanksgiving Therapy //  Luke 17:15-17

One of the lepers, when he saw that he was healed, came back to Jesus, shouting, “Praise God!” He fell to the ground at Jesus’ feet, thanking him for what he had done. This man was a Samaritan. Jesus asked, “Didn’t I heal ten men? Where are the other nine?”

Every generation of parents ask a question of their children. It’s more of a prompting than a question. After receiving a gift or a favor, parents ask, “What do you say?” Of course, the expected response is, “thank you!”

That routine was repeated in my home when I was a child. My mother would ask me, “What do you say to Grammie for her brownies?” Now she didn’t really want my honest opinion—she would have gone postal if I had said, “Grammie, where in the name of heaven did you learn how to bake brownies? Every year they’re as hard as a rock! One of these times someone’s going to break a tooth.” My mom didn’t really care what I thought; she simply wanted a response of gratitude to show my acknowledgment for Grammie’s kindness and effort.

Parents still want their children to show gratitude even if their children don’t feel grateful. They want them to learn to offer thanks simply because it’s the right thing to do. Why? Simply because every human being lives with a debt of gratitude, owing thanks to someone for something. Of course, parents hope their kids won’t just parrot words of gratitude; they hope that the exercise of gratitude now will one day produce authentically grateful people.

And that is exactly what our Heavenly Father hopes for each of us! That is why you can’t go far into the Bible without a reference or an admonition to be thankful, as in this story of the ten lepers.

The ability to express gratitude is one of the fundamental signs of a redeemed life and a growing spirituality. To give thanks is one of the highest callings we have and one of the most self-benefiting things we can do. It keeps us from being self-absorbed. It produces an eternal perspective. It reminds us of how blessed we really are. It creates a perspective that sees that all of life is a gift.

At the end of each day G. K. Chesterton would say, “Here ends another day, during which I have had eyes, ears, hands [to experience this] great world around me. Tomorrow begins another day. Why am I allowed two?” That’s why Ambrose, Bishop of Milan said, “No duty is more urgent than that of returning thanks.” It keeps you focused on God’s goodness and not on yourself. And best of all, gratitude opens the door for more:

To be thankful for what we have received…is the surest way to receive more. (Andrew Murray)

So why not practice a little gratitude today! You’ll be grateful you did!

Practice Gratitude: Write a list of 10 things from this past week for which you are thankful. Then give thanks for them.

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They Were Courageous—We’re Alive To Prove It

Honoring The Brave Who Defended Our Freedom

Synopsis: It is precisely out of the darkest of times when someone steps forward to attempt the heroic that the sacrificial bravery of the one lifts the hearts of the many. Courage! Every age, including this one, needs men and women of courage who will be sold out to certain convictions that drive them to act, not because they believe they will walk away with their lives, but because it is the right thing to do. That is courage, and in itself, it is victory. On this Memorial Day, we honor our brave men and women who paid the ultimate price to secure our freedom. #grateful

Giving Honor // 1 Samuel 11:11-13

But when the people of Jabesh-gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul, all their mighty warriors traveled through the night to Beth-shan and took the bodies of Saul and his sons down from the wall. They brought them to Jabesh, where they burned the bodies. Then they took their bones and buried them beneath the tamarisk tree at Jabesh, and they fasted for seven days.

Courage! Nelson Mandela, a man of remarkable courage himself, wrote, “I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” Perhaps Mandela was describing the brave warriors of Jabesh-gilead.

We don’t know their names. We don’t know anything about them really. But the one thing we do know is what will cause them to admired as men for the ages: they were courageous. Risking all that they possessed —their homes, their families, their very lives—to invade the much larger and more powerful Philistine territory, they put their sacred honor on the line to honor God. They mustered the courage to rescue the abused bodies of King Saul and his sons, marching through the night straight into the enemy-occupied city of Beth-shan and through whatever resistance the Philistine guard may have mounted. Once they had retrieved them, they gave King Saul, Jonathan, and Saul’s other brothers a proper burial. Moreover, they secured a moral victory in an otherwise dark time for the nation of Israel.

There is not much to cheer in 1 Samuel 31, just this courageous act. Israel is at a low ebb, and the prospects for brighter days is exceedingly dim. There has been no coronation of David as Israel’s new king yet—in fact, that is several years off. Furthermore, at this point, as far as anyone might know, David has sided with the Philistines. This is a dark time indeed for God’s people. But that is what makes what the warriors of Jabesh-gilead did so much more spectacular. It is precisely out of the darkest of times when someone steps forward to attempt the heroic that the courage of one lifts the hearts of the many.

Courage! Every age, including this one, needs men and women of courage. I want to be one, how about you? But where does it come from? Like the men of Jabesh-Gilead, it arises from three intertwined sources:

Principle: They were sold out to certain convictions that drove them to act. N.D. Wilson wrote, “Sometimes standing against evil is more important than defeating it. The greatest heroes stand because it is right to do so, not because they believe they will walk away with their lives. Such selfless courage is a victory in itself.” It was the right thing to do, so they did it.

Compassion: They cared deeply for what had been done to the people of Israel; they cared out of deep loyalty the royal family, and they cared deeply about the reputation of God. As Lao Tzu said, “From caring comes courage.”

Indignation: They were mad. They were morally offended. They were righteously indignant. Their sense of godly pride had been challenged, and they had to respond. Much of the sacrifice to achieve a worthy cause comes from righteous indignation, and the men of Jabesh-gilead were that, fighting mad. Eric Hoffer rightly observed, “Anger is the prelude to courage.”

Courage! Marcus Tullius Cicero, the second-century Roman orator, said, “A man of courage is also full of faith.” To paraphrase Cicero, people of faith must be people of courage—unassailable principle, deep concern, and righteous indignation. That was true of those who died to preserve our freedom. May that be true of you and me, too!

Remembering: On this Memorial Day, remember the mighty who have fallen, those brave men and women who, in the face of fear, stepped forth to do what was right and paid the ultimate price for it. They were courageous, and we are alive to prove it!

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The Beauty of a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

God Is Never Without A Purpose; God Is Never Without A Plan

If there’s a test in your life that‘s stressing you to the point of cracking, even if you have to “faith it ‘til you make it,” just know this: God is at work! He never allows a test that is not without a purpose and a plan. God’s purpose is to show you that you cannot do life apart from Him—and knowing that is the greatest form of knowledge. God’s plan is to bring you to a place of humble dependence on His immutable goodness and constant provision—and there’s no better place to be. So if you’re having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, stop and thank God for yet another building block to a better testimony!

Moments With God // Deuteronomy 8:2-5

Remember how the Lord your God led you through the wilderness for these forty years, humbling you and testing you to prove your character, and to find out whether or not you would obey his commands. Yes, he humbled you by letting you go hungry and then feeding you with manna, a food previously unknown to you and your ancestors. He did it to teach you that people do not live by bread alone; rather, we live by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. For all these forty years your clothes didn’t wear out, and your feet didn’t blister or swell. Think about it: Just as a parent disciplines a child, the Lord your God disciplines you for your own good.

Like Alexander the Horrible, have you just come through a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day? Maybe it’s not just the day, it’s the season you are in that makes you feel like you are on a losing streak—with no end in sight. Perhaps the weight of an unwanted burden is straining your capacity—and if one more thing is added, you will break. It might be that personal failures and shortcomings are constant reminders of your incompetence—you just don’t measure up. Maybe it’s not just your day that is really bad, horrible, and no good—it’s your life, it’s you!

Or so you think. But there’s some really good, terrific news for you! If there is a test in your life that is stressing you to the point of cracking, even if you have to “faith it ‘til you make it,” just know this: God is at work! Moses reminds you that God never allows a test that is not without a purpose and a plan. The purpose is to show you that you cannot do life apart from Him—and knowing that is the highest knowledge a human being will ever attain. The plan is to bring you to a place of humble dependence on His immutable goodness and constant provision—and there is no better place to be. So thank God for tests!

Slowly read and absorb these verses again from the Message translation:

Remember every road that God led you on for those forty years in the wilderness, pushing you to your limits, testing you so that he would know what you were made of, whether you would keep his commandments or not. He put you through hard times. He made you go hungry. Then he fed you with manna, something neither you nor your parents knew anything about, so you would learn that men and women don’t live by bread only; we live by every word that comes from God’s mouth. Your clothes didn’t wear out and your feet didn’t blister those forty years. You learned deep in your heart that God disciplines you in the same ways a father disciplines his child.

Whatever the test you are enduring, stop what you are doing, set aside your raw emotions, fears, frustrations, disappointment, and anger to reframe your thinking so that you are focusing on God’s purpose and plan for you. Realize how privileged you are that God has allowed, or even caused, and always uses what you are going through for your gain and His glory. Use your test as a building block for our testimony. Think of these wise words from Hebrews 12:7-11,

Endure hardship as discipline. Remember that God is treating you as his own children. Whoever heard of a child who is never disciplined by its father? If God doesn’t discipline you as he does all of his children, it means that you are illegitimate and are not really his children at all. Since we respected our earthly fathers who disciplined us, shouldn’t we submit even more to the discipline of the Father of our spirits, and live forever? For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God’s discipline is always good for us so that we might share in his holiness. No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterward, there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way.

So you see, a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day is really not so terrible, horrible, and very bad after all. Reframe your hardship, or your test, as the discipline of your loving Father, because “God disciplines those he loves, as a father the child he delights in.” (Proverbs 3:12)

Got a test? Congratulations, it means you are incredibly loved.

Take A Moment: What is your current hardship? Embrace it as God’s discipline, which you are to embrace as love. And the best way I know to do that is simply to say “God thanks!”