“Oh, no!” a friend cried out as she lost her balance and fell to the floor. Her left wrist caught her fall and yielded to a small bone fracture.
My dear friend ended up in the emergency room, had to have her ring cut off, and her left hand is now out of commission for four weeks, right during the holidays!
In a totally different part of the world my dear daughter in the Lord, Adaleen, also had a challenging Christmas. She went to worship with the church on Christmas Day and then returned to her tiny apartment and enjoyed Christmas all alone.
She writes:
It was so peaceful Gave thanks to the Lord Opened my gifts I ate until I couldn’t move 😄 And then took a little nap🙏🏽
“The hardest time to go through a hard time is in the good times.”
David Brown
Another friend and coworker is missing a recently deceased spouse. The internal conflict of going through that first Christmas without a special someone is legendary.
Suffering a broken wrist when you want to serve others in the kitchen, or being alone at a time when family gathers, or navigating a joyful season when your life partner will no longer share it with you. These things are hard…..
……but even harder at Christmas.
Why Is It So Difficult?
We have an expectation inside of what is right and good, and when Christmas comes, and one or more of those conditions are not there, it exaggerates the pain. Imagine Christmas without any music. Or Christmas without any lights or decorations anywhere. It would just seem so wrong, downright disturbing and dystopian.
But play the music and put up decorations everywhere, and then imagine Christmas where you cannot participate in any meaningful way due to illness, injury, or responsibilities elsewhere, or Christmas without dear ones who have passed away. Again, it just seems wrong. The radiance of the Advent turns up the contrast on the darkness in your heart. I remember when my mom died that I didn’t want Christmas to come. I wanted to avoid it because it hurt so much.
I often think of the advice given to Ciara when she returned home from quadruple amputation last year. Her friend told her to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5).
She wanted to give up. It was too hard, but God gave her grace to pursue gratitude and trust in a sovereign God. She started to think thanks. Her slogan has become Always grateful.
You choose to think the right thoughts. It’s a work in progress. We fall. We get back up. We choose to be strong and let our hearts take courage, we who wait on the LORD (Psalm 31:24).
You download grace from the LORD’s inexhaustible storehouse to think thanks in every circumstance.
This is not easy! This is maturity above immaturity. This is warfare of the mind!
“I WILL offer to you the sacrifice of thanksgiving and call on the name of the LORD.”
Psalm 116:17
It’s a sacrifice of thanksgiving. Sacrifices costs you something!!
Processing the Hard
You don’t ignore the pain. You are allowed to pour out your heart to the Lord. You can do it in anguish even, but run to Him with your pain and not awayfrom Him. He wants to make you better, steadfastly faithful through this, more like His Son, Jesus.
Learning to search for thankful thoughts when you are sad and struggling is a feat indeed.
My friend Debbie, who broke her wrist did that. In fact, she found comfort and inspiration in Ciara’s godly response. How beautiful is that!!
Ciara and Debbie are both worshipping God with their gratitude in the midsts of their pain and frustration. It is like pouring fertilizer on their reward one day in heaven.
We don’t get to choose what kind of tests the Lord will take us through. He chooses our crosses. But we get to choose how we respond.
Having a friend to walk with you during these times is helpful. Just to express to that friend:
“Yes, it is hard, but I am choosing to think on truth.”
The Lord has not left me (Isaiah 43:2, Hebrews 13:5b)
It could have been worse (Revelation 16:17-21)
It will pass; even if it lasts as long as this earthly life, we are headed to a Celestial City where there is no more pain (Hebrews 11:14-16, 12:22-29, Revelation 21:4)
God’s Word is a rock of refuge to us (Psalm 71:3a)
Others may gain inspiration from me thinking thanks which in turn brings more glory to God (2 Corinthians 1:3-4)
Embrace the Hard
I am challenging myself here, as well as seeking to inspire you, to not run away from the “hard,” but instead face it, run toward it, embrace it. You will get through it!!
Step by step, download grace. Cry out to the Lord for help and think thanks!
My two friends who are downloading grace to think thanks in their hard times.
This girl brings me joy. 😃 She is a “fueler” for me, not a “drainer” – spending time with her increases my joy, settles peace in my heart, and expands my imagination. She mentioned that the song by Steph Schlueter entitled, “Counting My Blessings,” is one of her favorites. 🎶
Most of us are very familiar with the fuel gauge in our cars. It reflects what level of fuel is in the tank. But, try to picture an “emotional gauge” inside of you. It reflects how much strength and resilience you have in your “emotional tank” to meet new events and people and struggles each day. People who care a lot and give a lot can empty their emotional tank. If they do it too often without sufficiently refueling, they will struggle with burnout. And your emotional gauge affects your physical and spiritual gauges as well; these three are tied together.
There are several fuels that can slowly refill your emotional tank, like peace and solitude and meditating on God’s truth. But there is nothing like the fuel called “joy.” Joy is the #1 fuel for your emotional tank. When you have no joy, you can barely move forward. But joy acts like a medicine.
“A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.” Proverbs 17:22
“The joy of the Lord is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10
So, where can you get this fuel? What is the level of your joy storage to refuel your emotional tank? Is it brimming to the fullest and pouring over?
Joy Is Different
Most of you already know that joy and happiness are not the same. Happiness is a response to positive external happenings; happiness disappears when things go sour. Joy is an internal mindset that sustains you when things are sweet or sour. So, how can you get this “internal frame of mind?”
Meg Bucher gave us the insight that “Happiness is a reaction to something great. Joy is the product of someone great.” True joy is connected to the Creator. In the biblical worldview,
Joy is my calm enthusiastic confidence in the presence of God’s face shining on me, the goodness of God’s character, and the perfection of God’s sovereign plans. In short, God’s delight in me, God’s kindness to me, and God’s control in my life.
We can differentiate joy and happiness in several ways, including:
Source: Joy is a fruit of the internal workings of the Spirit of God (Galatians 5:22), while happiness comes from things outside of me (having a flowing spring within rather than seeking a stream nearby – John 4:14).
Duration: Joy is a long-lasting state of being, while happiness is temporary and fleeting.
Origin: Joy is developed internally, while happiness is achieved externally.
Nature: Joy is a deep enthusiastic peace that comes from within, while happiness is an outward reflection of circumstances. Happiness may be more animated than joy, but joy has more staying power over time and through hardships.
Creating the Fuel of Joy
How do we create the fuel of joy? We extract it from God’s truth and from deposits God has placed within our circumstances. It takes a choice. It takes thought. We must choose to meditate on the good things that God has given us. Being th(i)nkful is what creates the fuel of joy.
Even if our circumstances are not that great, we stop and think for a bit, and find these deposits of joy. In fact, we are to count it all joy when we face trials. Why? God is building long-term virtue in us, and God loves long-term virtue in His children. Our calm enthusiastic confidence in God’s love, goodness and perfect plans for us fuels and sustains our steadfastness when driving down the sometimes long road of sorrow and heartache. Joy heals. Joy gives power.
Gratitude is the first step to building joy into our lives…
Jim Wilder
We are at God’s table every day, and it is free, whatever we have. It is accounted very unmannerly for a man at his friend’s table to find fault with things…Now when we are at the table of God (for all God’s administrations to us are his table)…for us to be finding fault and to be discontented is a great aggravation of our sin.
Jeremiah Burrough, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment
So many of us are trouble-shooters, problem-solvers, which has a nasty side effect – we spend our days focusing on trouble and problems. True, we can’t just live all day in the bliss of thankfulness and militant contentedness where we leave everything a mess and get nothing done. But in our mornings and evenings, and repeatedly oscillating throughout the day, we need to focus on things we are thankful for.
Think the thanks, express the thanks, remember and honor the One to whom the thanks is due. You are creating the fuel of joy for your emotional tank. The ancient word “rejoice” means to intensify joy by repeating it, recalling it, and expanding upon it. It is a sister to being th(i)nkful.
“I do not think the church rejoices enough. We all grumble enough and groan enough: but very few of us rejoice enough.”
Charles Spurgeon
Why Invest in Joy Fuel?
Perhaps the first reason should be because God asked us to rejoice in Him (Philippians 4:4), to give thanks in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:18), and to even rejoice and give thanks when we face persecution (Matthew 5:11-12).
But also, when we purposefully develop a habit of gratitude, and discover the huge deposits of joy in the discipline of thankfulness, we become gospel-contagious. So few people in this world see joy. Their eyes and hearts are heavy with sorrow, regret, and guilt. A joyful person is an anomaly. Many people are skeptical when they see a truly joyful person. “Why are they being that way? That can’t be real.” But a follower of Jesus who knows the gospel well has a treasure trove of things to be thankful for and joyful about.
Most of you know this good news, but some do not, so read this carefully. Jesus of Nazareth was God in human form who came to die in our place and for our sins to save us from God’s judgment. Hundreds saw him after he rose from the dead, and the news of his teachings, death, burial, and resurrection has spread around the world. One day soon, Jesus is returning to planet earth.
A person can only be forgiven of their lifetime of sins when he or she believes in what Jesus did and asks God to save them (Romans 10:9-10). When someone turns from their sin to the Savior, God declares them fully righteous in His court, gives them spiritual rebirth, adopts them as His children, and sends His Spirit to live inside them beginning the lifetime work of transforming them to become more like Jesus. They have peace with God and begin to experience the peace of God.
When Christians sin, we can confess that to Him, be cleansed from that unrighteousness and be restored to the joy of a clean conscience. That joy is catchy! Joy is attractive. Your obedience in cultivating thankfulness and joy could be the catalyst that brings another to Christ!
“You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.”
Do you ever watch or listen to Joni and Friends? Recently, I was struggling with a headache. That is not unusual for me; I have had many headaches over the years. I was intrigued by the way Joni handled her pain. She described inviting the Lord Jesus to her pain. When the talons gripped her body, she would breathe deeply and run to Jesus for His view on things.
“This is my comfort in my affliction, that Your promise gives me life.”
Psalm 119:50
Meditating on the promises in God’s Word – that He is there with us, that He knows the details, that He cares about the pain and suffering, that He has sovereign purposes and plans – brings life, an ability to cope, even thrive, and have hope. What a beautiful thought that is! God loves us and meets us in our difficulties as well as our joys, if we invite Him to them.
Thanking God for the Affliction
In Psalm 119, there is another text that deals with affliction.
“If Your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction. I will never forget Your precepts, for by them You have given me life.”
Psalm 119:92-93
The Psalmist expresses gratitude for God’s law and His precepts because without them he would have perished.
Do I know how to be thankful for my affliction?
Seems so wrong to give thanks for things that are so hard. But I remember how James admonishes me to count it joy when I have different trials (James 1:2-4).
“There is a purpose for the suffering.”
Dr. Santie McCracken, Grace-Toti ladies’ Bible study on I Peter
What kind of purpose could God possibly have in my suffering?
Oh, the answers are multiple. We know from His Word that God’s goal in our lives is to conform us to the image of His dear Son Jesus Christ (Romans 8:29). That is the “good” mentioned in Romans 8:28 toward which God is orchestrating everything that happens to us. The heat of the suffering is an excellent tool that can help accomplish that goal. There are more reasons. Here are a few to consider:
God is justly allowing sin’s curse on the earth to take its natural course, the earth is broken and longing for redemption.
God is refining me, freeing me from some vice and building virtue in me (the greater good)
God is jolting me to get me really searching for Him in prayer and in the Bible.
God is equipping me to be a compassionate comfort and strength to others.
God is equipping me for greater service; expanding the scope of my influence.
God is freeing me from trust and dependence of things, teaching me that He is the only thing I should hold on to.
God is opening a door for me to share my faith and show God’s love.
God wants me to long for a better place – this is not our home.
God is privileging us to share in His suffering
God is increasing our rewards – glory in heaven is directly linked to suffering well now.
God is demonstrating that He can sustain and keep His children faithful.
What Promises Do You Cling to?
No doubt you also have some sort of affliction. It is seemingly impossible to go through this life with no kind of affliction. You may have grown accustomed to processing things well with thanksgiving and can’t really think of any affliction at the moment. That is fantastic! But most of us have some type of difficulty that God is using to shape us.
I wonder what promises you cling to in God’s Word as you endure those afflictions? Perhaps it is a hymn or song that brings comfort. I want to encourage you to have your stash of truths ready to go when needed. Hide verses and edifying songs in your heart so that at any time they can be called on to build you up in the Lord.
The biggest promise that never fails is that soon our “Blessed Hope” will come for us.
“waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,”
Titus 2:13
One day all pain will be gone. How can I say that? Because of Revelation 21:4.
“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
Psalm 119:67, 71, 75
Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word.
It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.
I know, O LORD, that your rules are righteous, and that in faithfulness you have afflicted me.
Job 35:16
He delivers the afflicted by their affliction and opens their ear by adversity.
In this excerpt from a recent article dated May 22, 2024, notice what the secular scientific community has observed are the effects of thinking thanks:
Over time, a consistent gratitude practice goes beyond ephemeral emotions — it fosters lasting changes in the brain. By engaging regularly in gratitude practices, like journaling, mindful reflection, and expressing thanks, we modify our neural pathways, transforming a simple act of thankfulness into a sustainable habit. This habit enhances our mental resilience and facilitates a more optimistic outlook with ease, establishing a solid foundation for emotional stability.
Interesting!! This is not from a biblical source. But laboratory science once again testifies that what God has exhorted us to do is really healthy for us to do.
Our “Take” on the Matter
When we take the time to process, and we deliberately choose to discover things for which to give thanks, we are opting to have a certain take. We could select things about which we are especially aggravated in the same situation, and would thereby go for a completely different take on the matter.
You decide what you can “take” from any situation. You may say, “I cannot help myself. I naturally notice all the flaws, shortcomings, and disadvantages.” I would like to suggest that you don’t have to. You can formulate new thinking patters. God will help you as you call out to Him for grace to obey His command in Ephesians 5:20.
“giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,”
What God has called us to do doesn’t feel natural at first, but it is definitely beneficial. The article referenced above reinforces the emerging data that the habit of thinking gratitude is good for you. Your emotional wellbeing is improved, as well as ability to sleep, to name a few benefits. Those are good reasons to pursue being thinkful, but of much more importance is the exhortation from the Creator of the human brain Himself. Even if you did not receive those physical health benefits, it would be very good for you to develop this mental discipline, purely to be obedient to our Creator God.
Do You Have Feet on Your Intentions?
May I encourage you to begin today?
Even if it would just be one item a day for which you give thanks … in a year, that would 365 items.🎉 It doesn’t actually take much energy to choose to be different, to deliberately have a different take on people and situations. However, it does take forethought. You need to actively plan to pursue gratitude, because the natural human disposition is to be negative.
Sanctification is the process of God molding you to be more and more like Jesus. Following Christ’s example, and choosing to think thanks, is possible as the Spirit works in you. Through prayer, you can ask Christ for his enabling help throughout the day …
to pause your action or talk,
to scan all aspects of your situation,
to select something or someone in it or around it for which you can be thankful,
to express that thankfulness verbally or in written form, and
to thereby develop those neural pathways.
“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”
2 Corinthians 3:18
Let God start formulating in you the habit to think thanks and enjoy the natural consequences!
There have now been 35,705 views in 134 countries!! Praise God! I had no idea that God would be able to use something like this for His glory. Praise Him forever!!
Background
The reason we celebrate anniversaries is usually to help us remember. Take the Passover for example and how God wanted the children of Israel to remember – so He told them to celebrate every year.
In 2016 David and I had a great sorrow.
We had purchased and fixed up a tiny little cottage in the Northwoods of Wisconsin close to a Christian university where we envisioned that we would spend our remaining days serving the Lord by training tomorrow’s Christian leaders. BUT, that was not God’s vision for our future. He closed that school down. We were left with having to sell our little home and discover through the Shepherd’s guidance what next steps He had for us. Now eight years down the road we can see at least part of the reason. He wanted us back in southern Africa. There was more for us to do.
But back then, it was hard and we felt low. I remember distinctly that the Lord impressed upon me that I needed to be thankful even in my pain. It catapulted me into researching what it meant in the Scriptures to obey those commands of giving thanks in everything, in all circumstances. Our emotions were urging us to discouragement and even despair, but meditating on our faithful God and His ways began to upend the heaviness. Our eyes were pulled upward to get a different perspective. This life is not what it is all about. This life is a vapor James tells us in 4:14. We are headed to a Celestial City where all will be set right (Hebrews 13:14).
“Receive every inward and outward trouble, every disappointment, pain, uneasiness, temptation, darkness, and desolation, with both thy hands, as a true opportunity and blessed occasion of dying to self, and entering into a fuller fellowship with thy self-denying, suffering Saviour.”
William Law, 17-Century Puritan
God was teaching me to choose to think thanks for all things that come my way. He was shaping me to be more conformed to the image of His Son, and He may use any means that He sees fit to accomplish that task. It is good.
As I now accumulate more and more days under my belt and get closer to the finishing line, whether by death or the rapture, I am becoming convinced that every minute is a gift and only as we discern the Father’s will and delight in doing it with thankfulness do we truly live without regrets.
One thing I can say from experience is that writing out my thinkful list every evening has become easy and delightful. It’s not hard at all. God is so good to us. His character, promises and sovereignty are trustworthy and dependable.
“God is faithful“
I Corinthians 10:13
Enablers
These are our children. They are all grown now, but such a joy in our lives. Our son Nicolas is the one who encouraged me to start the blog to see if there would be any interest in reading on this topic. Our daughter Stephanie is the one who helped me create the word “th(i)nkful.”
But the one who has tirelessly helped me the most is my beloved husband David. He edits every one of these blog posts and gives input.
Looking Ahead
So, looking forward in time, I want to maybe publish a Th(i)nkful book, if God wills. Maybe it can be a tool God further uses to inspire people to cultivate thinking thanks in whatever situation they find themselves.
God’s Word lays out the exhortation.
“giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,”
Ephesians 5:20
“give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
I Thessalonians 5:18
What About You?
How are your thinkful neural pathways doing? Have you established a pattern that is easy to maintain because you consistently follow God’s command? Are you reflecting to others the Lord Jesus Christ by the way you process things that come your way?
One way to start that process is to get a little journal and every day write a few things down for which you think thanks to God. It doesn’t have to take a lot of time. Maybe a minute or two.
If you like, you could get one of these African thinkful journals, made locally here, but you don’t need a fancy leather one. You could just get a cheap one. You just need space to write a few things down.
Example
Grace is my friend and co-worker in the gospel. She asked me about four years ago if I would hold her accountable every week to think thanks. So every Monday we send each other a text with a list of things that we are thankful for. Most times when I finish reading her list I am so full of praise myself. Her example is contagious and very becoming. I think thanks to God for Grace.
God’s Book of Remembrance
Did you know that God wrote a remembrance journal?
“Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another. The LORD paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and esteemed his name. ‘They shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him.’”
Malachi 3:16-17
How beautiful to think of the Lord listening to us talk to each other of how we are thankful for Him!
Let’s be known for thinking thanks for all God is doing and has done. He is greatly to be praised!!
“Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall commend your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts.”
Have you ever become annoyed or frustrated at something that irritates you or ruins your normal comfort and just won’t go away?
Like if a little stone gets in your shoe while you are walking … and you think, “whoa, what got in there?” But you try to keep going … then reassess, “ugh, it’s not going away; this is irritating.” You try and shake your foot around as you’re walking to get the pebble to a more innocuous spot … only to realize you’re being watched by other curious people. So, you stop and sit down; you’ve got to address the irritation and get it out. With that tiny bit of God’s creation removed, you are just so thankful for the change and the relief.
What if you couldn’t get the irritant out? What if you needed to accept the truth that the irritant would be present longterm? Neither your will nor your arms could remove it?
The Making of Pearls
An oyster is part of the mollusk family. When they sense an irritant, like a parasite or piece of grit, that has lodged in their shell, they have no arms to remove the irritant. But God has exquisitely designed them to slowly secrete layers of aragonite and conchiolin (the rainbow-like iridescent coating often called nacre) to coat the invader. In time, those secretions day after day turn an irritant into a pearl.
The oyster or mussel slowly secretes layers of aragonite and conchiolin, materials that also make up its shell, to form nacre, also known as mother-of-pearl, which encases the irritant and protects the mollusk from it.
How incredible is that?? Something that irritates and causes frustration is dealt with using a process that in time creates a pearl, a gemstone of great value. Only God!!
Irritating People
I have been musing on this concept. Could I respond like an oyster to irritating things in my life? Weather conditions, financial conditions, or health conditions that are outside my control? That’s hard!!
People can also be an enormous source of irritation or frustration in life. Perhaps you are thinking of someone right now? They may be within your immediate family, extended family, in your church, or a colleague at work. Perhaps you avoid the irritation by simply avoiding contact.
We live in South Africa, a nation with a history of apartheid (1948-1988), which could be simplistically described as state-enforced separation of people who were irritating to each other. There are eleven official languages and even more cultures here. There are many people-groups supposedly trying to live together in harmony, but the irritation breaks through far too often.
As humanity, we are very much in the same boat: God created us all in His image and likeness, and we are all fallen, sinful, and broken. Similarly, the Bible is for all people groups. It transcends eras, cultures, and individual preferences. And the two-fold Great Commandment, woven throughout its pages, is to love God supremely and your neighbor (created in His image) as yourself.
Nacre of the Spirit
Could we respond like the oyster when irritations occur? What if we did our own “nacre” around irritating challenges? If we have idols in our heart where we love control, love comfort, and love people-pleasing, then we will not respond well to irritants or irritating people. Idols create a “no-nacre zone.”
Loving someone means either overlooking their faults, praying and searching for subtle ways to help them work on their faults, or committing to help make up the difference where their faults may cause a problem. Loving someone is using my own Spirit-enabled internal resources (nacre) to absorb their oddities, prickles, and dysfunctions, and not let them irritate me. I stay when I could walk away. Love is accommodating someone’s weakness while you are thankful for, and celebrate, what is good. This applies to relatives. This applies to orphans. This applies to witchdoctors. This applies to people in other political parties.
Here is a for instance. In your office you need to closely monitor a coworker from a very different culture … different morals, a different work ethic, and different views of authority. They look different and they value things that are totally out of your orbit. Irritants abound!
BUT….. there are some very beautiful things about them as well. What if you choose to search for ways to think thanks to God even for them? You might express one thing that you are thankful for in them each day.
You could express your thankfulness for them in prayer to God (as you also ask God to fix them … and fix your heart so that you can show selfless love to them)
You could write your thankfulness in your th(i)nkful journal, or even better …
You could express your thankfulness to the coworker for something you have noticed in them!
When we choose to meditate and express our thanks for those beautiful things, it is like applying nacre in the making of the pearl. Perhaps I need to get into the pearl-making business! May I learn to put th(i)nkful nacre around my irritants, especially humans that God has put in my life for a purpose. I could become very rich with all my pearls!
Dick Hester was not that person. He expressed his encouragement and gratitude frequently and beautifully. He was a Barnabas … a son of encouragement.
I remember multiple times, while he would be encouraging David or myself, if he heard of a difficulty we were encountering, he would ask, “Can we just stop and pray about that right now?” Precious memories!
In the last few days we received word of his graduation to heaven. He will be sorely missed.
Chris Anderson reminded us of one of the quotes that Pastor Hester is known for: “Unexpressed gratitude is ingratitude.”
How often we are guilty of that! We may actually feel gratitude and even meditate on our thankfulness, but the sentiment does not leave our mouths or pens or keyboards. We do not express our thankfulness orally or write it down. Hence it looses its potential to encourage another person. I am not sure why we hesitate to express our gratitude. Perhaps we are introverted or private people, or we don’t want to give the impression that we are trying to impress someone. But often, it’s simply because we don’t think of expressing our thanks.
The expression of our gratitude, whether small or great, brings a reaction. It is received by others and stimulates them to similar conduct. We have released the gratitude to go and do its job. It is good to be thankful for something, but it is best if we can connect the blessing with its source and be thankful to someone for something.
Look around you. Is someone planning, teaching, or serving in some way? Are you thankful for it? Have you said anything to them? This is what Dick Hester specialized in. He would come up to you, take your arm, and say that he had been watching you and was just so thankful for what you did or said. No one else said a thing, like ever. But Dick would encourage you by expressing his thankfulness for you … and you would float away with this private joy. Why is it that people so often say at a man’s funeral the things they should have said to him in life?
Unexpressed Faith
“So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
James 2:17
Thankfulness is like two other virtues … faith and love. Private, personal faith is dead, lifeless, worthless. Living faith creates energy. True faith works. It has symptoms that people can see, and if they get near you, that faith can be infectious.
“For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.”
Romans 10:10
Paul emphasizes the connection between the heart and the mouth – believing and speaking. If we refuse to express our faith in the Lord Jesus, it communicates that we are not truly saved. Living faith creates energy and needs to speak.
The same is true of love. Living love creates energy that oozes out somewhere, someway. What kind of foolish nonsense is a love that is unexpressed, that does not affect your actions or words or even your pulse rate? Faith, love, and thankfulness all express themselves. Unexpressed faith, love, and thankfulness are bizarre, stunted, undeveloped, and useless distortions of the real virtues.
Take Courage, My Friend
In light of our dear Dick Hester’s home-going, can I encourage you to take courage? Ask God to help you express your gratitude to another person today. Make it a daily goal to express some kind of gratitude every single day. You may not have many of those days left.
“Gratitude is a quality similar to electricity: it must be produced and discharged and used up in order to exist at all.”
William Faulkner
We may disagree with Faulkner to some degree. You can stop and think and direct your thanks to God as obedient worship and it would qualify as gratitude, but Faulkner does have a point. The essence of being th(i)nkful is expressing your gratitude orally or in a written form.
“What if you woke up this morning and had only the things you thanked God for yesterday?”
How would you describe a man whose mother was the ninth wife of a polygamist, and due to persecution by the other wives, chose to flee from the home forever leaving her toddler baby boy to grow up as the abandoned one among all the “other children?” He would never see her again.
When he reached his primary school years, there was so much strife in the home that he left as well, becoming a street-kid sleeping outside under bridges or wherever. Amazingly, he cheerfully and dutifully did odd jobs for people in town to buy food and pay his own way through primary school. In his early teens, he returned home only to find that his father and family were involved in intense witchcraft, so he fled home again.
As he worked his way through high school, there was a German-language teacher who had the boys come to his home for a meal, and he shared the gospel with them. God spoke to this young man’s heart, and he received Christ. He received forgiveness for his sins and a new purpose for living.
A few years later, as he grew in his faith, he worked his way through engineering school, but while working as an engineer, God called him into ministry. Now a pastor for more than a decade, he is finishing his Masters in Theology with NTCGS (National Theological College and Graduate School). David had him in his latest class.
How would you describe such a person given his horrific childhood? Would you have described him as “Blessed?” His name is Paddy Blessed Musoke.
David and Paddy (Paddy gave me permission to tell his story)
Choosing God’s Perspective
As we discussed God’s purposes in suffering during our class time, David mentioned the seven initial responses Christians should have when facing suffering:
God is God and I am not (Ps. 115:3, Is. 40:13-14).
God’s ideas and plans are far beyond my human understanding (Is. 55:8-9).
God is the sovereign over all calamities in and around my life (Job 36:32, 1 Sam. 2:6-7, Is. 45:7, Lam. 3:38, Amos 3:6, Nahum 1:3). Nothing/no one touches me without His love, permission, and design (Rom. 8:28).
God knows exactly what I can handle with His grace, though it seems more than I can handle; He is holding back a crushing amount of suffering that might destroy my faith (1 Cor. 10:13, Dan. 3:17, 2 Pet. 2:9).
God loves me with an everlasting love; He is always good; He is faithful and will never leave me (Psalm 119:67-68, 71, Is. 43:2, Jer. 31:3).
God calls me to be resolutely thankful for so much during my suffering (Phil. 4:6, 1 Thess. 5:18).
I am the servant of the Lord, immortal, invincible, and indestructible until the Lord is finished with me, and then eager to go Home when He calls me (2 Cor. 5:1-9).
Paddy came up after class and after sharing his story, related that during his devotion time in November 2023, he sensed the Lord asking him to thank Him for his hard past, for his painful childhood and difficult memories. “Thank me, Paddy.” It seemed so odd and horrible that the Spirit would ask this … and yet he knew that God had already used his past pain and street smarts in ministry. With tears, he agreed and thanked the Lord … and felt a huge burden lift from his soul knowing that the Lord had built sovereign foundations into his life, making him the man and minister that he is. He thoughtfully nodded and told us, “It is important to be thankful in all things.”
Setting Up God For A Fall
Your view of God is the most important thing about you. To the extent your view is flawed, it will distort, disturb, and disrupt your perceptions of yourself and your circumstances. Your real theology comes out in a crisis, like the squeezing of a sponge reveals whatever is inside. To use another analogy, trials are the tornado that tears off the “street view” your formal beliefs leaving exposed the basement of your functional beliefs.
There are several common ways that Christians think about God that “set Him up for failure” when they begin to suffer. In other words, popular teaching as well as the hymns and choruses we sing require more of God than the Scriptures do, so that when we suffer, we feel He has failed us, wasn’t there for us, did not hear us, or refused to respond to our deepest needs. Let’s look at some of these flawed views:
GOD IS MY GENIE – “When I call on Him, He has magical power to grant my wishes and fix my problems.”
GOD IS CHIEFLY MY FRIEND – “My friends don’t hurt me or let me down but run to help me in hard times however they are able … and God has infinite ability.”
GOD HAS MY IDEA OF LOVE – “God’s love is like my love for my children, wanting only happy and positive things so that I can thrive, and His power guarantees me a smooth ride in life.”
I HAVE FAITH IN FAITH – “If I believe, pray, and give enough, it will go well for me. If God doesn’t answer, there is some unknown sin or problem with me that is stopping Him.”
PSALMS AND PROVERBS ARE PROMISES – “If I do what is right, God will make things good. As my shield and defender and Shepherd and Rock, He won’t allow bad things to happen to me.”
ALL THE PROMISES OF SCRIPTURE APPLY TO ME – “As a Christian in the modern Church Age, I can claim as my own the promises God gave to ancient Israel at any time, even those given during unique circumstances.”
“None of these diseases shall come near me” – Exodus 15
“No weapon formed against me shall prosper” – Isaiah 54
“He only has thoughts of good and not evil” – Jeremiah 29
God has some great relational titles: Creator, Father, Redeemer, Sanctifier, Crafter, Comforter, and Guide. I love all of those. But genie and friend are not on the list. There are no such verses that explicitly say so, and those who say God is in those roles often turn their backs on Christ, the Church, and the faith when hard trials come. “How could God … ?!” And they turn away from a God who is silent or busy or not there or not very loving. Their wrong view of God set Him up for a fall.
The role of the Holy Spirit as our Comforter is perhaps closest to the role of a friend, but God is not committed to making it easy and nice for His children as friends typically are. Ask the Old Testament prophets. Ditto John the Baptist. Ditto Jesus. Ditto all of the Apostles. Ditto the faithful martyrs through the centuries. We are caught up in the workings of a much greater plan than we can imagine, and often we need more personal shaping than we can imagine, so God’s work involves our suffering.
So when God’s Word says to give thanks in all circumstances, He knows that this will be grueling for some of us. And yet, it is curative. It embraces with tears the background sovereign purpose and design behind all our pain and loneliness so that, as Rutherford wrote, I can “praise God for the hammer, the file (rasp), and the furnace.”
“It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply.”
A few weeks ago David and I visited a new gathering of God’s people, Redeemer Community Church. We knew of people that had joined this new work, and wanted to visit one day; then the opportunity arose. It was so good. Refreshing and edifying. Pastor Erik shared from Philippians 4:4-9. He emphasized how we are to rejoice in the Lord ALL the time (verse 4).
But, how is this done, practically speaking? How do I rejoice when I see the earth or my country destabilizing? How do I rejoice with my recent medical diagnosis? How do I rejoice when my loved ones are making the decisions they are? How could Paul write this while sitting in prison?
The key is simply this: Rejoicing, or having joy, is a calm enthusiastic confidence in 1) the goodness of God’s character, 2) the reliability of God’s promises to His children, and 3) the absolute perfection of His sovereign plans. So many of us begin with the unspoken presumption that God’s job is to protect my world, keep me comfortable, free from sudden downturns in health, finances, and relationships, and to slowly carry me to a peaceful death at some ancient age. But God is not “about us” and has made no such promises.
We can rejoice when we choose not to be anxious (let go of our expectation of our world going as planned), but instead, through prayer and supplication with THANKSGIVING (affirming His choices in our circumstances), we take our requests to God (verse 6). Only then can we experience God’s overwhelming peace, described in verse 7.
God’s Peace Follows Prayer with Thanksgiving
“And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 4:7
Have you ever meditated on what that verse is really saying? It’s pretty amazing to experience peace … like when you find one of God’s lovely places far away from tech and humanity. But what about a peace that surpasses all our understanding?? A peace that causes others to scratch their head, or accuse me of being in denial of my circumstances?
I really WANT that peace. I want my heart and mind to be “kept” or guarded. I want God to carry through on His perfect plans, even if it means hardship for me. I am determined to keep my eye on Him because I know His eye is on me, as Peter when he walked on the stormy waters.
Perhaps I should ponder how to discipline myself to pray with thanksgiving?
12 Monthly Verses
I am choosing the theme of “Peace” this year and am memorizing a verse on peace each month. I want to know these verses so well that I can pull them up in my mind and meditate on them at any time I want. OK, I cheated and started in December.
John 14:27 is urging us to receive His peace, not worldly peace, but God’s peace.
So you may say, “that sounds wonderful, but you don’t know what is happening in my life. There’s everything but peace. I have sorrow, worries, fears, and pain … physical pain, emotional pain, spiritual pain. The road to experiencing peace is too gnarled. Not sure I could ever get to peace, much less peace that passes my understanding.”
Well, I am here to say that you can! It is not dependent on your circumstances. It doesn’t have to do with that. It is dependent on something else!!
Because of what Christ did on the cross when He paid for our sin, and when He defeated death, sin, and oppression by rising again, we too can “defeat our circumstances” by trusting in the character of God to work things together somehow for our good, our becoming like Jesus. Romans 8:28-29 states that is what God desires in our lives. Like a great sculptor with a rough rock, He is chiseling away in my soul anything that doesn’t look like Jesus. He has to use different “tools” such as pain and sorrow to make that happen. And it takes time.
Thinking Thanks is Part of the Journey to Peace
To envelope our burdens and challenges by choosing to think thanks about them, and in the midst of them, is a path of hope that leads to peace, God’s peace.
To identify gifts from the Lord right in the hardships is vital. Thanking God for His presence, His wisdom, His sovereignty is a good place to begin if you feel at loss to know on what to think thanks.
May God fill you with His surprising PEACE this year as you set your mind on Him.
You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is set on You.”
I told David I was recording things in my th(i)nkful journal. Every evening before bed, I seek to count and express things for which I thank God. I find that it is not difficult at all. I usually don’t have enough room in my journal. Over time, the discipline becomes a delight as God gives you a heart to look around and recount His good gifts.
When I first started this habit in July of 2017, it took some conscious thought to discover items to write down, but now…. super easy. As I am going through my days now, my th(i)nkful search engine stays busy in the back of my mind. Is this something that I will record tonight in my th(i)nkful journal?
In giving counseling homework, I am adamant about including thinking thanks. I want my counselees to write down things daily, or to verbally express things, that they are thankful for. I want to inspire them to begin to count.
Take Into Account
The definition of count is take into account. I think of a bookkeeper who carefully logs the correct numbers to keep accurate records.
I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD, the praises of the LORD, according to all that the LORD has granted us,
Isaiah 63:7
… that I may recount all your praises,
Psalm 9:14
We give thanks to You, O God; we give thanks, for Your name is near. We recount your wondrous deeds.
Psalm 75:1
But we your people, the sheep of Your pasture, will give thanks to you forever; from generation to generation we will recount Your praise.
Psalm 79:13
I shall not die, but I shall live, and recount the deeds of the LORD.
Psalm 118:17
The Lord seems to want us to recount His blessings. To recount is to count again, which means stopping, backing up in time, and counting again. It’s like the word “recollect” – which means to collect again because, like doves when their cage is opened, things we can be thankful for fly away.
Do you recount? Do you recollect?
Count It All Joy
There is another place in the Word where we are exhorted to count. In James 1:2 it states that we are to “count it all joy” when we meet various trials because they have a purpose to produce steadfastness in us. This is a different kind of count. It means to consider, deem. We are to regard the trials in our life as joy.
That’s a little harder. We like counting good things, but counting hardships as joy?? They don’t seem to belong in the joy column! There’s a dark, dismal, disaster, discouragement column for those! We have to look carefully at the verses.
“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”
James 1:2-4
There’s a purpose to the trial, a greater good God is accomplishing. The testing of our faith produces steadfastness – “sticktuitiveness” – the ability to stay steady and not freak out under pressure. One way to look at it is that we are like functioning, active products that the Lord is manufacturing. You wouldn’t want to use an appliance or drive a car that had never been tested. That testing-refining-testing-improving process is what matures us, helping us to become “just perfect” for the job God has for us to accomplish.
So, we have to value, and even celebrate, our trials because God is using them to make us different from our original selves, to reconfigure our thoughts, desires, behaviors, and responses to be like His Son. As we increasingly understand the character of God, we can try to figure out and appreciate what He wants to do in us through the trials. This is not so easy and sometimes takes years.
Count Your Many Blessings
Johnson Oatman, Jr. was born in Medford, NJ. He lived from 1856-1922. Count Your Blessings, written in 1897, was Oatman’s masterpiece and E. O. Excell wrote the music for it.
Johnson is known for writing many hymns, but this one is his most popular one. It seemed to find favor with God’s people right from the beginning. While in London, revivalist Rodney “Gipsy” Smith announced the hymn to his audience by saying, “Down in South London the men sing it, the boys whistle it, and the women rock their babies to sleep to the tune.”
When upon life's billows you are tempest tossed,
When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,
Count your many blessings, name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done.
REFRAIN: Count your blessings, name them one by one;
Count your blessings, see what God hath done;
Count your blessings, name them one by one;
Count your many blessings, see what God hath done.
Are you ever burdened with a load of care?
Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear?
Count your many blessings, ev'ry doubt will fly,
And you will be singing as the days go by. [Refrain]
When you look at others with their lands and gold,
Think that Christ has promised you His wealth untold;
Count your many blessings, money cannot buy
Your reward in heaven, nor your home on high. [Refrain]
So, amid the conflict, whether great or small,
Do not be discouraged, God is over all;
Count your many blessings, angels will attend,
Help and comfort give you to your journey's end. [Refrain]
Maybe you need to do some counting, even as a family around the Thanksgiving dinner table. We discover that when we begin to number the many blessings, our perspective changes. We are so incredibly blessed. God has been so good to us. We have been redeemed and given an overwhelmingly different future if we have placed our faith in the work of Christ on the cross. If we face trials, we know that we have a Divine designer and developer managing every detail for our long-term good and His long-term purposes. Even if we face leaving this world, we can be at peace because our mind is stayed on the Lord and we trust in Him (Isaiah 26:3).
I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.
th(i)nkful 