Gratitude

Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song. For the Lord is the great God, the great King above all gods.
~ Psalm 95:2-3

Here's something that I've been thinking on recently and it's changing the way that I view circumstances in my life. I've been pondering on how I am truly undeserving of the blessings that God has given to me. I think that the tendency is to think that somehow we are owed something because of what we've done or where we've been or how we've attained some spiritual maturity level (as if). This may not be something that we verbalize or are even honest with ourselves about but I think sometimes it is there in the back of our minds. It's that voice that cries out that things just aren't fair when we face a rough spot or feel a desire is unmet.

I can be so selfish at times and I know that I've been known to cry out about the unfairness of things before (and knowing me, probably will again). However, the more and more I've thought on this lately the more I realize how completely undeserving I am of any of the things that have blessed my life. I'm not deserving of a house, a family, wonderful friends, relationships, a job, a car, or the myriad of other things that can fill my days. God has been overly gracious and provided above and beyond in so many ways but at the root of it, none of the things that I have are given because I deserve them. So when I cry out about unfairness, I think that maybe what I'm really doing is telling God that somehow I deserved something different than what He has allotted to me for these moments. That somehow He "owes" me something different than what He has given. Now there's a scary thought to ponder.

So how does this tie in with gratitude? Well, what I'm thinking is that since I never deserved anything in the first place and I am certainly not owed something by God, the only thing to do is to praise Him and give Him thanks for the fact that I ever had the blessing at all. It's gratitude to the God who showed me mercy and grace in so generously giving me so many things that I have no right to, the greatest of which is found in the sacrifice of His Son! It's not about unfairness in the current moments - it's about recognizing that it's never fair that we had what we had to start with - it was just God being who God is and loving us with blessings that are abundant and beautiful and excellent. For that, we should give thanks and stop crying out unfair.

Of course, as with most things, this is much easier to think about than to actually apply. The hard part is that gratitude doesn't change the situation or answer the questions or eliminate the pain. What it does do though is open up our hearts to reflect on the real goodness of God and our place in His world - in my case it helps me take the focus off my own heart and emotions and directs it towards the One who can heal and bring peace.