Reflections of Gratitude

Hello, friends! It has been a while since I last made a post on this page, but with Thanksgiving approaching, I've been meditating and reflecting on the ways that God has been faithful in my life and how grateful I am for His presence in my life, and I thought I would share some of that with you. I firstly want to talk about gratitude as a whole. I will be reflecting on ways that I am grossly grateful for what God has been doing in my life, that is, in the big picture of my life. I also think that gratitude can and should be expressed every day as we realize the ways that God has blessed us each day. I am grateful for God's omniscience and for the season of life He has placed me in.

God's Omniscience

I am grateful that God is all-knowing. One of the classes that I am taking this semester is called "Brain and Behavior," and the premise of the class is to discuss brain mechanisms tied to the behaviors we output. The more detail that we go into, the more grateful I am that God knows. It is amazing how complex some of the pathways are and how psychologists and scientists alike still cannot explain everything about the brain, yet we serve the God who created it and who created us.

I am grateful that I do not have to know, but I can trust in what God is doing. I am grateful that I do not have to know but that I just have to be faithful. I recently finished Daniel, and I was reminded of both of these things in the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in Daniel 3. Their reply to Nebuchadnezzar was this: "if this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up" (vs. 17-18). Their reply made me contemplate two things: would I also respond in this way when faced with adversity, and what would God require of me in this situation? I was honestly not sure that I would respond this way, which led to me reflecting and praying about what was in my heart. And to answer the second question, my faith is all that God would require, just as He did in Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego's case. God knows our story; we just need to have faith to allow Him to write it. I am grateful that God can see the bigger picture and has a purpose for each of the chapters of my life.

My Current Season

Speaking of chapters, I am grateful for the season of life that God has placed me in. Over the past year, it has been difficult for me to stay present in the season of life that God has placed me in without looking ahead to the future. It seems easier to daydream about when I will be able to start the next phase of my life than it is to spend time with God and thank Him for the ways He is preparing me for these future seasons right now. Maybe you are the same way. Maybe you are looking ahead to graduating, to starting a new job, to getting married and starting a family, to when all the kids move out so you can have a new home gym, or to whatever it is that fills in that blank. It is easier to be expectant than to be still.

I would encourage you to find time to spend with God and in His Word within your schedule. I started out the year with the goal of reading the entire Bible and have failed pretty miserably at this. I think I am about two months behind on the reading plan. This has made me even more thankful for God's grace and the gift of His Son, one that we did not deserve. Throughout the year, I have been reminded that I serve a God who is "merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness" (Exodus 34:6 ESV). Even though I fall short, He is still accessible. His Word can still speak, even if I am off the daily reading plan's assignment. But I have to seek. I have to "be still, and know that [He is] God. [He] will be exalted among the nations, [He] will be exalted in the earth" (Psalm 46:10 ESV). The context of the Psalm where this verse is found is that God is a refuge in time of trouble and war. Your life is full of turmoil of its own, and God is "our refuge and strength" (vs. 1). God's Word can strengthen us and encourage us in the midst of our turmoil and our busyness. I found it hard to sacrifice my time to God, as I was worried that giving God time would have negative consequences on my coursework or other tasks I needed to get done. Maybe you are in the same boat as I was. But I realized that this was a trust issue I had with God, in which I felt my tasks would not get done if I spent time with Him. I have been trying my best to fight this, and I can say that spending time in God's word has filled me up and fueled me to get my tasks done, even in the shorter amount of time I have to do them. I was trusting in my own ability more than God's to provide. I am thankful that God has revealed the pride in my heart in this season of life I am in so I can, through prayer and being in His Word, overcome it.

I also want to clarify that I am not saying that it is not worthwhile to be expectant. We as believers need to be expectant for Christ's second coming, as it is promised in God's Word that "just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him" (Hebrews 9:27-28). I am just saying that I am grateful that God has placed me on the earth at this time in this season of my life, even if it does not look how I expected it to. I am trusting that God is at work in me in this season doing things "far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us" (Ephesians 3:20).

I can thank God every day for the blessings He has given me, and I reflect on the sum of these blessings to see how He has been at work in my life. Whether these are also areas of your life that you are grateful to God for, I have a few ways in which all Christians can be thankful: that Christ died for us while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8), that we may now have eternal life through Him (John 3:16), and that "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever" (Hebrews 13:8). I pray that you would spend time meditating on the ways you can thank God for being at work in your life. I pray that if you feel like He is not at work in your life, through prayer and being in His Word, you can see that He has been at your side all along.

Blessings,

Mia