Skip to main content

Thankful Thursday



 I just wanted to reflect on all that is good in life. It is so easy to get caught up in what is going wrong, what we don't have, or all the injustice that happens to us.

Why do we find it so easy to dwell on the negative, the hurt, the pain? I ask myself that question more times than I care to admit. When I was getting ready this morning, I kept thinking of "defining moments" in life. I began to wonder why it is that we tend to draw on a bad experience to make a defining moment. Why can't a good experience become a defining moment?



 I realized that it's a lot like looking at film. For those of you that remember photography, when you take a picture the "negative" is what is first developed, but in order to see the beauty that you were trying to capture, you had to fully develop the film until the positive photo appeared on the photo paper.


I honestly believe that it is a choice. So today I am thanking God for the defining moments in my life that I once viewed as a bad memory (the negative), but I now see them as good (the developed picture)...

- I am thankful that I lived in many places growing up and met so many people along the way. (I'm a very social person and fit into most social situations)

-I am thankful for the trip to Walt Disney World with my family when I was a teenager. It was the last time I spent time with my Aunt Cindy. (I miss her, and I realize that time is precious)

-I am thankful for my loving friends that pulled me out of the darkness that surrounded me for so long and never giving up on me. (I could have let the depression swallow me and could have given up, because I felt that life would never get better.)

-I am thankful for having God fearing mother who never gave up on her husband or her children. (I remember when my Mom told me that she prays for me everyday. It meant more to me than she will ever realize)

-I am thankful for a husband who loves me for me. (Our courtship was brief, and I was "In Love", but I didn't think I deserve that kind of love. He truly loves me "warts & all")

-I am thankful for 3 beautiful children that are loving, caring, and giving. (After losing 2 children, I am amazed of God's grace. I could have let the lose overshadow the blessings of who I have in my life now)



So, what are you thankful for today? Can you go back into your memories and pinpoint those "defining moments" and find the good in them? Let go of the pain and Live in the knowledge that what happened to you is not who you are.



~Peace & Blessings~
Jen

Comments

  1. Good stuff, Jen! We can let life's troubles ruin us or refine us. And we shouldn't let all the good moments go by unnoticed or under appreciated either!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

When you ask...

Jesus to use you, be ready! I knew when I completely surrendered my life to Christ that it would be a challenge and not easy. (Romans 7:25) Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature[a] a slave to the law of sin. I honestly thought that I had no comfort zone, but it seems that every time I get "comfortable", God changes the direction in which I am going or He intercedes personally by allowing me to encounter a life that is going through a struggle, and it "interferes" with "my life". So I have come to the understanding I will never be comfortable, and I am becoming OK with that. I have also come to realize that if I am in a state of being comfortable, then I am not growing spiritually. (Psalm 119:2) Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart Last night during Bible study as we were going over the passage in Ephesians 4,...

Discipline In Discipleship

Accepting Jesus Christ as Savior is easy. We learn at a young age that Jesus is knocking at our hearts and is asking to enter in. We sing songs of God's love. We so very quickly accept God's forgiveness when we sin. We can justify our actions through Jesus loving us as we are. Following Jesus as Master and Teacher is hard. Again, we learn at a young age that the world is a cold, cruel place. We view hatred on TV and social media. To forgive when we have been wronged is almost impossible. To put another person's needs before ours is practically unheard of. To understand someone else's actions takes too much effort. Jesus never said being a follower would be easy. As a matter of fact, he said that it would be a narrow road that few would be able to travel. "S o in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you,   for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.  “Enter through the narrow gate.  For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to...

Inside Outside

Why do we view sins as not so bad, bad, and really bad? I have been thinking a lot about this over the past week. Isn't sin, sin? Are we to judge as God judges? God's word says; "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." -Romans 3:23 My sins, and they are many, are not better or worse than yours or your neighbors - or anyone else's for that matter. So who are we to pass judgement on another? Why spew contentment and hate when we know what another person's sin is? Isn't God's forgiveness and love for them just as much as it is for us? There is no "them" and "us" in the eyes of God so we need to stop dividing people up into these two categories. " Dear friends, let us love one another,  for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God  and knows God.   Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.   This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son  into the wor...