It's very easy to be thankful when everything is going great. When life isn't turned upside down and inside out. When family is acting like...well, family. When finances are good, and your kids halo's aren't being held up by their horns. (These are just some examples) So this year I was finding it especially hard to be "thankful". Until the other night. It was a bad day, anxiety and depression is bad on it's best day, but on a day like that one you just try to make it from one hour to the next. So when I finally went to bed that night I found myself trying to think of what in the world I would be thankful for the next day. A while back I decided to do the "month of thanks" on Facebook. Everyday listing something we are thankful for, and that night, for the life of me, I had nothing. I couldn't think of anything! As I was laying there I kept thinking of all the reasons I wasn't or couldn't be thankful.. So of course I did what all rational people do, I started complaining to GOD. It was in the mist of telling GOD all the reasons I couldn't be thankful that I found my reason.
I started by listing off every reason I had to not be thankful and every time I did a very still, small voice answered me with such assurance and love. It was breathtaking!
1. My family is falling apart. (I am your family)
2. I miss my relationship with my father. (I am your father)
3. I had to walk away from my church. (I am the church)
4. I am drowning in myself. (I walked on water)
5. I don't belong anywhere. (You belong to me.)
6. My son is leaving. (I have AMAZING plans for him)
7. I will never be good enough. (You were worth dying for)
8. I have lost myself. (I found you)
Every time I had a reason, GOD had an answer. As I looked back over the last year of my life I could see GOD's hand in almost every aspect of it. When someone whom I love dearly and was very close to decided they no longer wanted to be part of my life or the life of my kids, GOD intervened. Just when I know satan was laughing and saying "I will hurt you", GOD was saying "I will bless you". And He did, by opening the heart of a niece who I had never known and allowing me the honor and privilege to know and love her. She is a GODly young woman who is not only is a friend, but a wonderful cousin and role model for my children. He (GOD) is continuing to work, to do exceeding and abundantly good things. And I sit in awe of a Savior who has never forgotten me.
So, this is what I am thankful for. I am thankful for that still, small voice. I am thankful that in the midst of all the chaos around me, the fog that seems to infiltrate my mind, that there is this quiet, calm, reassuring voice that always comforts me and speaks directly to me. I am thankful for those moments that to others may seem so small or insignificant but, to my GOD are worth addressing me and calling me by name! I am thankful that I am hidden in Christ!
1 Kings 19:11-12
Then He said, “Go out, and stand on the mountain before the LORD.” And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. (New King James Version)
