Be thankful

How many times have you prayed and thanked God for the air you breathe?  Or thanked Him for life?  What about daylight, friends, animals (if you like them lol), sight, a house, sleep, or other things like that?  So often we take those things for granted!

Imagine this scenario:  You're driving to school or work and a reckless* driver pulls out right in front of you.  Although it looks like you don't have time to stop or go around the car, miraculously you make it unscathed.  I'll bet the first thing you would do (definitely after calming down--that would be scary!) would be to pray and thank God that He kept you safe.

Now, imagine this scenario:  You're driving to school or work . . . and you get there perfectly safe.  Now, I'm guessing that most of you would just walk inside and grumble about the amount of paperwork you have to do or that there's a test today in the class you just really hate.

Although both scenarios end the same way, you make it safe to your destination, you only thanked God in the first scenario.  Why?  God kept you safe both times.  The difference is that in the first situation the traumatic event reminded you to thank God, while in the second situation the fact that God kept you safe was taken for granted.

I'm not saying that you all do this--I hope that you all give thanks and glory to God.  I just realized that I have a tendency to take things like this for granted.  Today I was reminded of this because I was complaining** about the awful rain (my horse's stall floods if it rains hard) and a bunch of other things :)  But then I thought "Wow, this rain is actually kind of pretty--God is so creative.  And, although there's a leak in my boot, I'm thankful I have boots.  And, although I'm not really happy that I have to be out here in the pouring rain taking care of this nasty flooding problem, I'm soooo thankful that I have a horse!"  Even though I could have kept complaining (I was still a little irritated) God showed me that I should be thankful for what I have instead of complaining about it--it's all a matter of how you look at things.

So, be extra thankful for what God has blessed you with.  Especially if it's something you normally take for granted.  And, if you're tempted to complain, find the positive side and see how God has blessed you instead of focusing on the negative.  Remember to thank God for everything!

If you want to read the whole story about what happened with the flooding and the rain, check out this post on my other blog.  Never surrender!

*Why do we call an irresponsible driver "reckless."  You'd think that those drivers would have lots of wrecks.  We should call the responsible drivers "wreckless" because they're probably the ones who really are wreck-less. hehe :)

**Actually I was complaining to myself.  There was no one else outside, so I sounded like a total idiot. lol