Thanksgiving

11-30-2009
Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has become a regular time for my family to vacate to the beach each year. We tried the big dinner at my house ONCE, and then offered to take everyone to a wonderful place where Haley (my wife) doesn’t have to prepare or wash anything. We literally landed just a couple of hours ago from the trip, and I couldn’t help but count our blessings. It’s very easy for all of us to find things to complain about, after all, there’s a lot of “bad” in the world. However, there’s a lot more to be thankful for than to complain about.

The most important thanks we should all recognize and do our best to understand is the love, grace, mercy, and forgiveness our Heavenly Father blesses us with. Very few people truly appreciate what Jesus did for us on the cross, and none of us can comprehend the Savior of the world, but we should all live a life of faith.

Haley and I love to reflect while on vacation. We spend an hour every night together talking about how grateful we are and how much we have to look forward to. We KNOW God has plans for us, and we are so excited to live in His will for our lives. We could talk for hours and hours about the will of God, and how His plan could take us in any number of different directions. Our philosophy is to Let God Be God, because we have absolute faith that He will put us where he wants us. Here’s a little story you may be able to relate to with your faith journey.

Three men were sitting around the breakfast table one morning trying to figure out how they were going to survive the severe drought they were experiencing. All three of them lived on a farm, and relied upon the rain to keep their crops healthy. Finally the three men decide to pray to God for rain. “God, we have absolute faith that you are going to bring rain for our crops. We know you will let it pour TODAY. That’s the kind of faith we have in you, God!”As the three men dressed and prepared for Church, they peeked outside and noticed it hadn’t starting raining yet, so they started to pray again. “God we never doubt you, and we trust with all the Faith in the world you will bring rain today. We are putting our Sunday best on and heading to church, and we know you will have it rain before Church is out.” The three men went to church, and as they were walking out of the service, they couldn’t help but notice there wasn’t even a cloud in the sky, so they decided to pray again, but just when they started to pray, the voice of God thundered down from Heaven saying, “If you fellas have so much faith in me, why didn’t any of you carry and umbrella?”

What kind of faith do you have? Do you pray with a thankful heart? Do you pray that you will walk in God’s will, or do you pray selfish prayers and use God like a wish list? When you pray, do you pray expectantly? When we pray, we should pray with all the faith in the world.

Application:
1. Read Matthew 17:1-13
2. Be thankful and have faith!