Heart Condition

Accepting the Challenge

It’s November and appropriately we’ve been talking about giving thanks.  But we can all agree, it’s been a weird year.  A year of uncertainty, a year of change.  A year of political tensions, racial tensions, and religious tensions.  A year of illness and fear.  A year of scrambling to adjust our businesses, our social engagements, our worship to fit the new guidelines and mandates.  It would be really easy to get lost in the struggles of loneliness, uncertainty, and fear and move quickly past this season of Thanksgiving in the hopes of quickly ushering in a new year.  A new year with new hopes, new plans, new joys.  But God calls us to a life of peace in the now, an attitude of thanksgiving every day, to find joy in the moment, to be fully present, fully engaged.  Looking only to the future, seeking the change or the fix, will rob us of all our joy in the now.

Last week, we asked you to join us in giving thanks every day.  We challenged you and ourselves to open our hearts to let God work in us, heal us, and grow us, through learning to be just as grateful in the little things as the big things.  I committed to joining this challenge, and so with the help of a dear friend, we’ve been posting our daily thanks in a shared message.  We’re only 10 days in (truthfully only 7 because I started right after last week’s blog post), but I wanted to share a little of what’s happening to me…

I have some amazing big things to be thankful for.  If you read our blog regularly you know some of the big stories, but this month, I’ve really been focused on the everyday.

Making the List

1. Election Day/The country I get to live in
2. My family, kids who more often than not, bring me great joy
3. The previous 17 years at a ministry that I love.  Even in the hard times, they were the most amazing years of ministry & growth, more than I ever thought I would have.
4. That my future & hope belongs to God and not this election.
5. Evenings with no kids at home
6. Nights I don’t have to cook.
7. Water – in all it’s forms but today it’s an outdoor hot tub at the gym
8. Amazing women friends
9. Excitement and vision new FZ plans
10.  Afternoon naps
11.  Game nights with friends
12.  New Blinds and a hubby who hangs them
13.  Football games in the sunshine in November
14.  Chinese Food
15.  Dad’s negative Covid Test
16.  Family Game Nights
17.  German Food
18.  Getting to visit really big cuddly horses –  made me feel like a kid again
19.  An unexpected phone call with a friend
20.  Change of plans that allowed me to go to my son’s football game.
21.  An impromptu dinner out with the whole family.

Inviting Change

That’s it.  It’s not super spiritual or deep.  It’s not an attempt to explain why I’m grateful for each thing.  There are no rules about what qualifies of being worthy of this list.  It’s just simply a recap of the day and the things that I appreciated.  Sometimes I flesh those our further in prayer and talk to God about why something brought me such joy, but sometimes it just is what it is.  And can I tell you something?  It’s changing me.  I’ve only been doing this a week, but I see it in the little things.  I’m less grumpy, less pessimistic, less easily frustrated.  Acknowledging a great interaction or experience with someone, smooths over the bumpy moments in another interaction (especially with family).  Focusing on the positive of a change in plans leaves me less cranky than simply having to accept a change of plans. 

All the daily frustrations still exist, but its an extra moment of joy, a grateful heart instead of a resentful one, a wave of peace over anxiety.  Somehow this list of things to be grateful for, taking the time to write it down, reflecting on it, and talking to God about it, is creating space for more love, peace, joy, patience, kindness, and gentleness.  Won’t you join us?  Really, what do you have to lose?  If a moment of thanksgiving creates more space for these gifts, isn’t it worth it?  Don’t the people in your life deserve that version of you, doesn’t the world, don’t you?