What are You Thinking?

Psalm 73:1 “Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart! But as for me, my feet came close to stumbling”.

Today I am sharing some thoughts and wisdom from an encouraging and timely devotional I read this morning. It was written by Tony Evans. Pieces and parts are my words intermingled among his.

There will be days when you find that you just don’t feel like worshiping God. Perhaps the temptation to compare yourself to someone else has caused you to feel down and even depressed. Driving home from work on Friday, you tell yourself you are glad the week is over because it has been a rough one. As you lament over how tired you feel, satan blindsides you with the thought that your coworkers do not really appreciate you.

By the time you open the front door of your home, your eyes have narrowed and your forehead has tightened. You decide your family doesn’t know or appreciate all you do for them either. You are frustrated and ready to give up. Still, you do not pray and ask God for His perspective. You just keep repeatedly thinking through the day and rehearsing your negative feelings and look for something, anything to numb you to your reality. Saturday morning you get up feeling haunted by the same emotions. You start to resent all the things you need to at home, too. The demands just keep piling up! By Sunday you force yourself to drive to church, but you certainly don’t feel like singing or praising God.

Asaph, the author of Psalm 73, would understand your plight. He allowed discouragement to grow in his life to the point where he was deeply disturbed. The key word in the last sentence is ‘allowed’.

Whenever we take our eyes off of God and His faithfulness, and begin to compare our lives with those around us, we either end up feeling defeated or prideful. God has created each one of us for a unique purpose, which includes worshiping Him.

Psalm 73 is a rambling account of what Asaph was feeling, but by the end, he realizes the truth and puts an end to his negativity. “As for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all (of) Your works” (v. 28).

Sometimes God seems so far away that you can’t talk to anyone else but Him—because nobody else will understand what in the world you are talking about. The closer you are to God, the less likely the enemy will have a shot at your emotions. Stay focused on what God has for you to do. You are His beloved child, and He has an amazing plan for your life. Will you praise Him for this?

Joshua 24:15  But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors (work*) served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods (the flesh*) of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

*Italics - I added

Faithful Friday

I Thessalonians 5:16 Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

If you have read Truth in the Morning for any length of time at all you have heard me talk about my habit on Fridays of looking back at all God has done in my life during the week. It’s a good habit for me because it helps me focus on the good and see how it overshadows the not so good. God is faithful to carry me through even the worse of weeks and situations. If that alone is not worth giving thanks and praise for, what is?

We all have times we focus on the ‘weeds’ in our garden of life. Sometimes we see weeds everywhere we look. Sometimes we only see weeds! But even weeds can have flowers. There is beauty and life and joy out there to see if we take our eyes off the weeds long enough to notice. Most wild flowers are weeds, by the way, yet we wait each spring for them to color our world. God is faithful to provide.

I have decided to now call Fridays – Faithful Friday. I will still make the time to look at all God has done in my week and give thanks for His faithfulness. How can you look at His faithfulness to protect, provide and forgive and not be thankful? I choose to give thanks for the flowers and the weeds. Sometimes it’s hard to tell them apart. Thorns do protect the roses, don’t they?

Attitude of Gratitude

2 Timothy 2:1 Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.

Oh, my goodness, did you see the moon last night or early this morning? What a sight! It was dazzling the night before, as well. I have always been excited by the moon but especially a full moon. I have taken mental trips back in time to a place when people didn’t have electric lights or even oil lamps and imagined how thankful they were for full moons. I enjoy walking around outside in full moons for the sheer magic of it but for those folks it must have been a blessing to have the darkness pushed back those few nights each month.

We take so much for granted, don’t we? People no longer have to make all our clothes by hand or down to a river to wash them as people used to do, yet we begrudgingly resent having to wash the ones we have. Oh, the torment of throwing them in the washer and dryer and having to fold or hang them up! We do not have to go out and shoot something just to have food for dinner but we sure can be put off by having to decide what to fix night after night. All this sounds rather silly but if we are honest with ourselves, we know it’s true. We take much of the blessings in our lives for granted.

What about grace? Do we as Christians take the redeeming grace of Jesus Christ for granted? Have we gotten so lackadaisical in attitude about grace that we are able to blow off accountability for our actions and choices by standing on a platform of grace? Do we symbolically re-sacrifice Jesus by living like hell when it suits us, dancing to the carnal tune of the flesh, then falling back on His grace and mercy when it’s time to pay the piper? ‘Jesus picked up my tab, I’m outta here. See ya!’ Doesn’t exactly ring with gratitude, does it?

We start taking things for granted when we cease to be consciously grateful for them. Imagine how relationships might change if we made an ongoing point to express an attitude of gratitude!     

Max Lucado said, “Gratitude!  It’s the firstborn child of grace, the appropriate response of the blessed. Immerse yourself in the curriculum of grace!  It’s so easy to be distracted.  So easy to be ungrateful!”

Thanksgiving

1 Corinthians 15:57-58 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Scottish minister Alexander Whyte was known for his uplifting prayers in the pulpit. He always found something for which to be grateful. One Sunday morning the weather was so gloomy that one church member thought to himself, "Certainly the preacher won't think of anything for which to thank the Lord on a wretched day like this." Much to his surprise, however, Whyte began by praying, "We thank Thee, O God, that it is not always like this."

You see, there is always a way to thank God, even in the worst of circumstances. Where there's a will, there's a way. Some days it might seem we have to look harder for the will but there is always a way.

I love our American Thanksgiving holiday. It is a time when even non-believers stop a little while to be thankful and appreciative. Traditions are important to me and this holiday is full of them. This year a lot of what I know as normal Thanksgiving tradition is not happening in my world; this year, however, will still find me grateful and giving thanks. Being thankful isn’t based on the food you eat, the company you keep or the day of the week. Being thankful comes from inside your heart and soul, not what you serve on the side.    

Let's experience a true happy thanks giving — let's will to thank God, and do it happily! As we draw near to Him with our thanks, He will draw near to us and bring victory!

Giving Thanks 365 days a Year

Ephesians 5:20 giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ

Oh, what wishy-washy people we are. Yesterday I wrote about struggling with anger and today I was moved to write on showing thankfulness. Does that mean that my anger is abated and I no longer struggle? No. There will always be issues that irk us and rouse the bear of anger within. All the while, the things I have to be thankful for are still in my life and I can express that as well. For instance, physical pain is a part of my daily life and some days/nights are worse than others. Yesterday was a ‘not so good’ day. Yet, as I lay in bed awaiting sleep and trying to ignore the areas that hurt, I felt my little pup, Nikos snuggle up next to me. The warmth of him was comforting and stroking his silky fur relaxed me. I felt a smile replace the pursed lips of discomfort and I was thanking God for my puppy, the comfort He brought me through that little bundle of fur and for His mercy and forgiveness. I must have fallen into a peaceful sleep quickly for that is the last I remember.

I don’t know about you but I would much rather go to sleep giving thanks than counting my cares or cursing people and/or pain.

Being thankful doesn’t mean you are pretending the unpleasant things in life do not exist, it means you recognize the source of all for which to be thankful is your God of provision and acknowledging Him with praise in spite of circumstantial issues. Yesterday, my granddaughter, Elizabeth, was home and able to go for my morning walk with me. Shortly into our trip around the park, she asked if my knees had stopped hurting. I told her no, they were still painful. She then asked why I was going for a walk when they still hurt. I told her life goes on even in the midst of pain and I would have missed all the beauty of the park, the playful squirrels, the fresh air and quality time walking with her if I let myself focus only on the pain. I have too much to be thankful for to waste time on that.

We have choices, you know. We can choose that on which our thoughts dwell. I tend not to bother with ‘why me?’ or ‘what did I do to deserve this?’ and view them as a waste of time. In the big picture does it really matter anyway? I have a dear friend that shares my need to discover what lesson the Lord may be showing us through almost every situation and circumstance. We put our heads and prayers together to see where He takes it. Sometimes the storms of life last longer than others and it takes a while to get past the dark cloud to look for the silver lining but there is always a promise of God shining through like the rainbow and a positive to take away from every situation. We just have to choose to watch for them rather than pouting through the rain.