Cure for grumbling!
Verse for Today: Saturday, June 16, 2012
Ephesians 5:20 – … always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Gratefulness is an attitude and a culture that we develop in our lives. There are different expressions and words in different languages and cultures to convey gratitude. In some cultures, there is an expression of gratitude for every small thing that people do to each other. But compared to all favors human beings do to each other, what God does for man is far greater. God creates, protects, provides, forgives and loves man. As creator, He provides the basics of life like water, air and food. When God gives so much for our finite earthly life, He gives far more to our eternal life through the death of Jesus Christ, His Son for which we are to be eternally grateful to Him. As we live for Him here on earth, we are in His hands and whatever that happens to us is either His perfect will or His permissive will. His perfect will is what He wants in our lives and He is the source of it all. His permissive will is what He permits in our lives as we make choices which are not necessarily for our good. But in His infinite mercy, He forgives us of the wrong choices that we make in our lives and keeps the negative impact of it all to minimum. When we confess our wrong choices to Him, He forgives us and refurbishes our spiritual lives with His Spirit and Word. For all such care, provisions, protection and guidance that He grants in our lives, our hearts ought to be filled with gratitude to Him. We ought to thank Him for all that He gives and grants in our lives and also thank Him for not giving us what we ask amiss.
Dear reader, are you a grateful person, always giving thanks to God for all that He sends your way? Do you thank the Lord for every answered prayer, whether the answer is ‘yes’, ‘no’, or ‘later’? Are you able to thank the Lord for not answering some of your prayers? Perhaps you are disappointed that He has not answered you with ‘yes’, but later you will have seen that it was better that the Lord didn’t grant that prayer. We ought to give thanks for all the favorable circumstances that He has granted us. We also ought to thank the Lord for giving us His strength as we pass through unfavorable circumstances. For our very life, which is only but a vapor, we need to give thanks to the Lord because we are alive and are breathing only because of His mercy and grace. We are commanded to give thanks without grumbling for the small or big thing that we experience in life and all the realities of life that we pass through like heartache, poverty, ill-health, financial problems, business failure and friendlessness. We ought to thank the Lord for all His provisions, care and protection for us as we live in this evil world. We need to be thankful for physical strength, emotional health, spiritual growth, Christian friends, opportunity for sharing gospel, church, the Bible, spiritual leaders and teachers, family, children, houses, transportation and everything else that we enjoy in this life because all of these come form the Lord to us. So if we look around, we would have reason to praise God all the time. When His Spirit fills us with His power, we will be able to see positives even in negative situations. Let us make sure to know that all that we have are from the Lord and as per His perfect will as seen in His Word. When the Spirit fills us, He convicts us of the things in our lives that are not given to us by the Lord and will challenge us to get rid of it and to confess it to the Lord. Thus the Spirit will enable us to praise the Lord for all that we have received in life. Let us today thank the Lord for what He has done for us and all that He will do in the future as we live for His glory.
Psalms 34:1 – I will extol the Lord at all times; His praise will always be on my lips.
Thought for Today
The habit of thankfulness is the best medicine to cure grumbling.
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