Being grateful take work. Lots of effort and elbow grease kind of work. Sometimes, you feel like just rolling up your sleeves, tying up your hair, and taking a deep breath. Then maybe, you’d be psyched up enough to just jump right in.
Gratitude is difficult at times. When the bad things happen–and usually that’s like everyday, you’d rather mope and vent. You find some company to add to your misery. Only when you find someone else who’s had it even worse than you (yes, it does happen–I’m only one of six billion plus people on this earth) then we start to pull back a bit.
But good things happen when you make the choice to be grateful. Your mind set changes. Your heart starts to heal up. Your emotions change and you become less tense toward God and more at ease with your life. Grateful doesn’t just happen–it’s something that we have to opt to do. You weren’t born grateful–you had to learn it. Being grateful means looking outside of yourself. Thinking outside of the box, if you will.
Then I was reminded of 1 Thessalonians 5:18, from The Message Bible:
“thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live.”
It doesn’t say to thank God for what happens. Instead, we’re to look for ways to thank God despite the turmoil in our lives. Actually, looking for gratfeul things helps us to defeat the negative. Plus, like the verse says, Jesus wants us to live gratefully, if we belong to Him, that is.
Since God only wants the absolute very best for me, then maybe I should try harder to follow this suggest-ment of being grateful, no matter what happens.
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