Thankfulness

I have often thought of myself as a very thankful person, but recent retrospection has led me to believe the opposite. My thankfulness nowadays seems to stop where my purse strings close. That isn’t real thankfulness. Increasingly, financial worry, coupled with being in a new place, with no family at hand has made me less and less thankful and more and more worried. And so I decided that to be really thankful, I would have to start making a conscious effort to remember all the good things that God has graciously offered me. Instead of complaining about the smallness of my storage space, I choose to be thankful for a house, and a place where I can keep the stuff I really need, while I learn to throw out all the unnecessary junk I invariably collect. By giving me less room for storage than I had before, the Lord is teaching me to be less of a hoarder, and anyone who knows me well enough knows what sort of a hoarder I am. Instead of complaining about the trouble my daughter causes me while eating, I choose to be thankful first of all that I have a daughter to look after, without whom life in this country would have been almost a total misery, while so many many people in this world long for a child to call their own. Secondly, I thank the Lord that He has provided me with enough to make her another glass of milk if she spills the first one, while millions of people struggle to feed their children one square meal a day. Instead of complaining that I am bored sitting at home doing nothing, I choose to be thankful that God has given me so much time for leisure for me to pursue anything I want, while in many families, women are struggling everyday, juggling family and work, not as a choice but as a compulsion – to make ends meet, to fulfill commitments, and to give their children the best of everything, trading wonderful family time in the bargain. Instead of complaining about not having medical insurance yet, I choose to thank God for having provided my family and myself with wonderful health and the assurance of His protection from all sickness and disease. There are millions of things, some small, some big, to be thankful to God about, and I have realized, that when you truly spend time thanking God for His provision, you have very little time left for complaining. Try it. Thank Him for the air we breath, our ability to walk, our family, our friends, our capacities, our limitations, our ideas, our insights, our ignorance, our possessions, our weaknesses…the list is always endless. Thank Him more, and see the difference. Sometimes, like for me, thankfulness can be a real effort, but I tell you, it’s worth every cent…