But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel. ~Psalm 22:3 (KJV)
Gratitude is our love language to God and the only thing that will make us fluent in that language is practice. In Philippians 4:12 Paul tells the church “I have learned the secret to being content in any and every circumstance, whether full or hungry, whether having plenty or being poor.” (CEB) Notice Paul said “I have learned”, that means he trained himself. All contentment begins with a grateful heart. Paul learned to be thankful in the midst of adversity and we must learn to do the same. Have you learned to be content in plenty and in want? There are many different ways you can look at “in plenty and in want”. For instance, we may have plenty of people in our lives that love us and appreciate us but there is one to whom we want to love and appreciate us. The question is…are we able to have a thankful heart despite the fact we don’t have what we want? Are we able to be content, keep our peace, enjoy our lives and be grateful to God for everything that isn’t going great? That can be a challenging place to get to and it does not come by accident. We must purpose our hearts to trust in God’s sovereignty and timing. We must be ever ready to praise Him just because He is God. When we live life with an eternal perspective we see past the details to the outcome. We trust God to bring about His promises whether we see indicators that He is working on our behalf or not.
The native language of many of our hearts is often self-focused dissatisfaction. This always causes us to distance ourselves from Lord because the bible says God inhabits the praise of His people, not the selfish grumblings of His people. What is the native language of your heart? We have to learn to count our blessings and as the old hymn goes “name them one by one”. Have you taken a tally of your blessings lately or are you looking at everything that seems to be going wrong? If you are looking at the problems in your life instead of the possibilities your thankful heart will slowly transition into a grumbling and complaining heart. There is no way around it! We gain insight into what a group of grumblers looks like in the first chapter of Romans where the Holy Spirit says they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him…and their foolish hearts were darkened. An ungrateful heart is dark and when our hearts become dark, we lose our way. We are told in 1 John 1:5 that “God is light.” (NIV) If you feel far from God, praise will get you back on track. Begin to thank Him regardless of what you think or how you feel, and it will prime the pump of your heart until gratitude begins to flow freely. We should daily practice being thankful to God and for the many blessings and loved ones He has placed in our lives. Go find someone you are thankful for today and tell them how you feel. Experience more of God’s presence and let Him fill your life with light as you practice heartfelt gratitude.
Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever. ~1 Chronicles 16:34 (NIV)
What blessings are you thanking the Lord for today?
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