Giving Thanks To God

I love this time of year.  The summers here in the deep south are often hot, long and muggy.  Even though summer is fun and busy, fall is a welcome sight.  Every year, as fall comes around, the mornings greet me with crisp cold air and the smell of wet leaves, I am often overcome with memories of my childhood.  I grew up in Upstate New York, with all the mature, huge, hardwood trees of the north, fall is just stunning. My family would all rake leaves from all of the huge oaks and maple trees and play for hours in them.  I was small but it seemed like mountains of leaves.  The smell of wood burning stoves hung in the air as we played and worked outside, preparing our home and land for winter.  Dad put the heat cables on the roof and we put the storm window on for winter.  We all worked together stacking wood or putting up the last of the harvest from our garden.  The food my parents grew in the garden was canned and frozen to feed us through the rest of the year.  My mom made almost everything from scratch.  We bought our meat from a deli and our milk was delivered to our home and dropped off, twice a week, in a little metal cooler beside the front door.  My parents were happy together and worked hard as a team to do all that needed to be done.  They loved God and taught us about Him in all they did.  They spent a lot of quality time with us, their children.  It was a wonderful life.  Simple and wholesome but so full of rich goodness.  I could never have asked for anything more.  I knew when I grew up I wanted that kind of life for raising my own children someday.

I wish I had continued to fill the days and memories of my life in the same way my parents had started me off.  I went through many hard years living away from the Lord.  I am forever grateful for His patience with me, leading me back to Him.  Grateful for the life I have had since recommitting my life to Him some 20 years ago.  As I look back over my life, as I often do at this time of year, I see a lot of good and bad.  Most of the bad I brought on myself through bad life choices.  But I can always see how God lead me thru those times and used them for good to teach me and help me grow.  Most of the lessons I learned the hard way, were lessons I needed later on in life, in order to make better choices down the road. 

I have been married, painfully divorced and found love in marriage again.  I have birthed and adopted children and lost one.  I have loved with a mothers heart, many children thru foster care and many, God moved on to other places.  I have had material things in abundance and lost them all in one fell swoop.  I have faced serious health issues in not only my own health but in my husbands and children as well.  I have had seasons of joy that could not be measured and times where I cried till I thought I would never feel happiness again. 

In all the days of my life, looking back through it all, there is true Thanksgiving.  From the bottom of my heart....giving all thanks to our Creator...for all things He has done for me.  No matter how we are feeling.  No matter what we are going thru.  Whatever the season we are in...  To know that our joy is in the Lord and He deserves all glory and praise.  To tell Him thank you...for every breath...every moment...every day.  As these are all gifts we do not deserve but are given because of His great love for us.  This is not always easy to do but to truly be content in all things is where we are supposed to strive to be. 

Philippians 4:11-13  Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.  I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.  I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

Thankful in all seasons of our life because we are strong in the Lord.

Even in the hardest times... when the world was being totally destroyed Noah was thankful for the ark.  Abraham thankful for a promised son in his old age.  David thankful for his slingshot and a stone, when up against a giant.  Joseph thankful for being sold into bondage, to later save his family in time of famine.  The list goes on and on.  We are thankful for all things because God is with us and the knowledge we are His, makes life's hard times bearable and good times so very sweet.

Lord God in heaven, I give thanks to you today because of who you are.  You alone deserve all glory honor and praise, in all seasons of our lives.  Thank you God for creating us and providing a way for salvation, thru your Son Jesus Christ.   Please help us to be strong, bold and faithful to share your Word to the lost.  Help us to daily fill needs in lives around us, being your hands and feet here on earth, till you come again.  Thank you for our family and friends.  For the provisions in our lives.  For being faithful to carry us thru the hard times and giving us joyous times of blessings as well.  You are Holy, True, Worthy and more precious than anything this world has to offer.  With all my heart, thank you God.

Psalm 100:1-5 Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands.  Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing.  Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.  Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.  For the Lord is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.