Being Thankful

I know we hear it every year on Thanksgiving. How we need to be thankful for what we have, and it's true. But sometimes I think we forget how blessed we truly are! If you are on a computer able to read this blog post with your free time, then right there you have something that most children outside of the united states don't have. You have a computer to surf the web with, and you have free time to do with as you please. There are people all around us who have next to nothing, and yet we just choose to pass them by and not offer any help.

You may be wondering how this applies to your life, or where it says in the Bible to be thankful. Well, 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says "Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." In other words, be thankful no matter what is going on around you, even if you have nothing, give God praise and be thankful, it's what God wants of us.

It's not always easy to be thankful for what we have and often times we feel as though we don't have enough and we need more. But if we ask God to help us to be thankful he will begin to open our eyes to all that we have and how blessed we are. Here's 3 things in our lives we can all be thankful.

1. God and his sacrifice for us.

God loves us and cares about us. In fact he loves us so much he gave his only son to a perverse and sinful world to take and bare what should have been each and everyone of our own punishment. He gave up his only son! I don't think we fully understand or grasp that concept. How many of us would be willing and able to give up the thing we love the most, that could never be replaced, for someone who doesn't even know, or respect us? It would be a huge sacrifice! That's exactly what God did! And because of his sacrifice we can one day spend eternity with him! I don't know about you, but I can't wait! We need to remember to be thankful for the sacrifice God made for us. (John 3:16)

2. Our Family

Most of us have some form of family. Weather it be your mom and dad, brother or sister, aunt or uncle, cousins, nephew or niece, grandma or grandpa. There's someone who takes care of you and provides for you. Someone who loves you. To often we take advantage of our family, we think that they will be there forever. When the truth is, they won't. One of my friends just recently told me that she used to feel this way, but then her dad went over seas and almost died and she realised that she wasn't as close to her dad as she would have liked. She said it opened her eyes to the fact that he wouldn't be around forever and after that she realised how blessed she was to have her dad here. We need to thank God daily for the family he has placed around us here on earth.

3. Food to eat

Okay, I know most of us have heard this one before. But there are so many children and adults around the world who have nothing to eat. There are children starving to death with no one to take care of them and feed them. We are so blessed to have food to eat! Even if it's something we don't like, there are so many who would be happy with anything they could get a hold of. Be thankful for the food God gives you, for a meal that he has provided. (Proverbs 22:9)

Three things we can be thankful for, three things to thank God for. God has called us to be thankful and give him praise. The question is, will you be thankful or will you not? What will you do?

Acknowledgement Before God

In the Bible it says that we are to shine our light for Christ. We are to be a witness to those around us who don't know him. We are supposed to be courageous men and women standing up for what we believe in despite worldly persecution! Matthew 5:11 says "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely use you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven!" When we are persecuted for our Lord and Saviour, we are not supposed to shy away from those persecuting us, we are to stand strong and rejoice! For God is with us and will reward us for doing what he has called all of his children to do!

I know it can be hard when everyone around you seems to be claiming Christianity but is living a life style that says otherwise. Or they seem to only want to mock you for what you have claimed. But don't let this discourage you, keep running the race that has been set before you! (Hebrews 12:1) Even if you don't think you are making a difference and you can't see any results, that doesn't mean you haven't impacted someones life. YOU may have planted the seed that will later grow and change that persons life! And without what you had done they never would have been saved later on. So don't give up!

You may be wondering what this has to do with acknowledgement before God. Matthew 10:32-33 says that "Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge before my father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown before my father in heaven."

God wants us to love him like he loves us. And the way we show that love to him is by sharing what he has done in our lives with others. By sharing salvation, by being a good example to your loved ones, by going against the flow! I know all these things are easier said then done, but if you ask God he can help us accomplish anything!

If we can't find the courage to stand up for him here on earth then what's the point of claiming to be a christian? God payed the ultimate sacrifice for us by sending his son to die for our sins so that we can spend eternity with him! We can't just sit around and let our parents, pastors, and friends do what God has called each and everyone of us to do! It's time for us to stand up and show the love of Christ to this dark world, it's time we take on the challenge and show that we are not afraid of what others will think, because we only care what God thinks of us! It's time we become a Future Generation for Christ!

Why is it so hard to forgive those around you? Why is it so difficult to forgive those who have done you wrong? The Bible says that if we do not forgive those around us in our hearts then Christ cannot forgive us. (Matthew 6:14) That's deep! I for one know that forgiving someone after they have hurt me is the last thing that I want to do! But that is exactly what the Bible says to do as difficult as it may be. It says that we are to lay down our flesh daily and fallow him.

If we are to be a Generation for Christ then we need to start laying down our fleshly desires of unforgiveness and selfish pride and stand up for the one who made us! We need to start fully relying on him who is in all things so that he can change our hearts and teach us to love those around us with HIS love and mercy!

Some of you may be asking yourselves, how? How can I do that? I'll tell you how, but first things first. Before you start this challenge you have to purpose in your heart to fallow and stick with it no matter the consequences. This isn't something you just say you're going to do, but then don't have to do any work. You are going to have to work on this and work hard! There are going to be times when you don't think you can stick with it any more, when it's just to hard for you on your own. But here's the good news, we don't have to do it alone! God is always there looking out for us, and if we only ask him, he will help us with whatever it is we are going through. So, if you can commit with me to stick with this challenge of forgiveness and continue to rely on him who made you, then we will soon start to see the power of God's love unfold in our everyday lives.

So how can we start learning to forgive? Well, this isn't something you just do over night, we all know this. If you struggle with unforgiveness in your life, the first step to over coming it is this, to realise it's there! I know, easy right? A lot of us don't realise we are even holding something against another person. We are not completely honest with ourselves. Or we simply choose to ignore it. We ignore the fact that we can never be completely comfortable around that individual because of something they said or did to us in the past. Col. 3:13 says, "Forgive, just as the Lord forgave you." This can be so difficult to comprehend. Think of all the horrible things you have done against God and his kingdom. Now think about this, God has forgiven you of all of those things! We have freedom through him! We are no longer held down by what we have done, he has forgiven us! So if he can forgive us, then why can't we forgive others?

I want you to think of one person you are having trouble forgiving. For the next 2 months I want you to pray for that person every time you think of them, every time you see them, every time someone mentions them. Pray that God will bless them and give you a love for them! Let's see what God can do through our prayers!

"The Prayer of a righteous man is Powerful and Effective!" James 5:16