As I type this update, I’m sitting in Starbucks, milking a homemade green juice which I’ve accidentally camouflaged in a Starbuck’s cup. I’m waiting to meet with one of the high school gals in our youth group. And I’m filled with a deep sense of thankfulness. Now I know it’s November and everyone is writing Facebook posts about what they are thankful for—and I think that’s great! But without trying to sound pious, the gratitude I feel right now is much more grounded than “thankful for caramel lattés."
I’m beginning to see more and more how every single day is a lavish love gift from the Lord. Every moment I enjoy with my husband, my family, my friends, and my church body is simply a testament to God’s grace. Health can decline over night, a healthy church can crumble before your eyes, political turmoil, natural disaster, and persecution could be the mark of days ahead. If and when any of those things happen, I know God will give me the grace to see those trials as a love gift as well. He will help me to worship and praise Him as He deserves and to experience a different type of gratitude that is just as important. But not right now. At this moment, I am comfy, healthy, and by all comparisons care free. I don’t deserve that and I don’t want to scuffle around God’s grace unaware of my flippancy.
For the past several weeks, I’ve been listening to Al Mohler’s, The Briefing, where he gives a daily analysis of headline news and points believers back to the biblical principles we should draw out of them. The world could collapse into chaos in mere months, weeks, or days, but today God’s grace has withheld His wrath for another time. That's something to rejoice about. I’m confident this perspective is part of what has contributed to the great gratitude I’m now experiencing.
Through various sermons and some of my own personal reading, I’ve been struck with our responsibility as the church to pray for the Holy Spirit to work in our midst as we gather together on Sunday mornings, or any time God’s Word is being preached. Without the enlightening work of the Holy Spirit, a sermon, though true, is simply a theological talk. But when the Spirit works, those same words have the power to convert souls and change lives! I need to pray more for my pastor. I need to pray more for my husband. I need to pray.
Will you join me in praying for our nation, our churches, our families, and with thanksgiving present these requests to our great God? And together stand amazed as the peace of God that makes no logical sense protects our hearts and our minds in Him.
"And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." --John 14:16
