The Greatest Blessing

THIS WEEK was Thanksgiving, the day we devote to remembering to be thankful for the mounds of blessings heaped up on our lives. I got to spend it with my family, and nobody was missing when we ate together.

I'm glad we have this holiday in America, because gratitude is one of the most important things to maintain and yet one of the easiest to dismiss. When we aren't thankful, our problems seem a lot bigger because we aren't thinking about how good we have it.

Please watch this video I saw on Godvine.com a couple weeks ago. I saved it to show it to you this week, because it made me thankful for everything I have no matter how bad a day I was having.



That sure makes our problems look smaller. What's amazing is that this man was thankful for everything even, and especially, when it looked like he was about to lose it all. That was because he saw that he was about to gain it all when he came to stand before God. He passed away in May of 2010.

What are you thankful for? Nothing is too big or small to be thankful for.

I'm thankful for my family. My talented and wonderfully understanding mom, my dad who is the perfect balance of responsible and fun, my clever and beautiful sister, and my funny and brilliant brother. I am thankful for days when I get to be with them and do anything, or nothing, and see my yellow house with flowers and citrus trees.

I'm thankful for not one Bible, but two, in a world where so many Christians struggle to get their hands on one. In many countries it is dangerous to carry them to give to other people. I'm thankful that I get to go to church in the same place every week, without fear of being punished or pressured because of it.

I'm thankful for my friends at school, for my life group, and for my awesome room mate. I'm thankful for the chance to study what I love in a university, and to go outside every day and see the things God made.

Psalm 100 is my Thanksgiving Psalm that I love to read this time of year.

v.3-4 "[3] Know that the Lord, He is God; It is He who made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture. [4] Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and enter into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name."

This makes me realize that gratitude comes from the recognition of need. We are thankful to God because He provides for our needs. So let's not become ungrateful and think that we can make ourselves, and reach the heights beyond ourdreams without the strength of His wings.

In John 10:11 Jesus tells us how He relates to us: "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep."

We have so much to be thankful for. I hope we can practice gratitude as much during the year as we do in late November.

If we're thankful to God because He provides abundantly for our needs, and if He has provided most abundantly for our greatest need of salvation by giving Himself, then we should be most thankful to Him, for Him. He is our greatest blessing.

More than anything I am thankful to my Savior for saving me, and that He is close enough to hear. I love hearing Him remind me of promises like Jeremiah 29:11, as He did just a couple nights ago: "Fir I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thuoghts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." I'm thankful for His sovereignty in my life, even on days when it all looks like it's falling apart, because it isn't really.

Take a little while to think about what you're most thankful for, and stay thankful. You'll find that when we are thankful for our blessings and bless the Lord because of them, our gratitude blesses us even more.

Dead Hamsters

THIS WEEK I remember something a teacher of mine used to say. He saw too many people walking around "looking like somebody killed their hamster." Too many sad faces. The truth is there's a lot of sad stuff going on under the wide blue sky. What can we do to put a smile on?

I've had a week of ups and downs. I've had a lot of work to do building my last model for my Design One class, and I'm going to me staying up late tonight finishing my project. But I also had the chance to spend time with my cousin who visited me, and we had a great time. I had to miss my cousin's Christening today, but Thanksgiving is in a few days and I will see my whole family then.

There's a lot of good to celebrate, because God loves to bless us. But troublesome things sometimes block out our view of them. What I've learned is that stress and frustration just lets us learn how to depend on God more, and it reminds us that this is not heaven. If every day were good we would start feeling entitled to convenience. We would take everything for granted and forget our essential need for God. So I'm thankful for occasional long nights when nothing is working and I don't get enough sleep, because in the dark we can see the light more clearly.

Two things are most important to have when you feel like somebody killed your hamster: first, God, and second, godly friends.

God's word is full of instances where He saw the need of someone who called out to Him, and he answered him. He will still do that for us.

Psalm 43:5 says, "Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God."

We should remember that praise isn't something we give God to tell Him, "Good job giving me everything I want!" Instead praise says, "You are worthy regardless of what happens, and I know You want and will give me what is good for me!" Nothing in life changes who God is, and discomfort doesn't mean He is far away. It's an opportunity to pray and see Him answer, and to praise Him and see your faith rise. Not problem is too big or too small for Him to care for.

He is the "help of our countenance." What does that mean? It means He upholds us, giving us a reason to turn our frowns upside down. It doesn't mean He will answer all our prayers with a Yes, but it does mean that when we praise Him despite trouble, all our reasons to praise will overwhelm our reasons to whimper and complain.

The other important thing to have is godly friends around us to lift us up. Friends must both encourage each other and give constructive criticism. We must embolden each other toward righteousness and call each other out about sin.

I've seen Proverbs 27:17 around a lot lately, "As iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend." This means that friends help each other succeed, and to see clearly to make good choices. When iron sharpens iron it is an act of love, because if either of those swords tries to go into battle dull, the one using it will probably die.

On Tuesday during one of my late nights in the studio my friend Debbie came while I was away. When I came back I found she had left me an encouraging note and a Mountain Dew that would keep me awake all evening. The note had a reference to 2 Corinthians 12:9, one of my favorites, "[9] And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."

My friend didn't even sign her name on the note. She was acting completely unselfishly. And her gift really helped me to make it through that long Tuesday night. I'm reminded that we serve a God who turns things into the opposite of what they seem. So when we're weak we're really strong by His stength. And maybe when we're troubled we're really the most blessed for having a view of our need for God. Maybe when we're thankful despite frustration we really have the most to be thankful for.

I know I'm not going to get through everything this evening without the help of my God and my friends, and I'm thankful for them. So when my plexiglas isn't sticking together and when I have printer trouble at midnight tonight, I will do my best to smile anyway. To laugh and look forward to Thanksgiving. So grab a Bible and a friend this week and take your day by storm. Show the world that the children of God live victoriously in His name, for the glory of His name. Don't walk around like your hamster is dead. Every now and then, look up from the sidewalk and sing a song of praise instead.

How Big is a Mustard Seed?

THIS WEEK I discovered GodVine.com for the first time. It's a website all about videos meant to inspire, ecourage, and amaze you. It's just my kind of thing, especially categorized as "Miracle."

There's one I really want to share with you, about a man who had a heart attack:



Watch that real quick. It only takes 6 minutes and 15 seconds. I'll wait here.



That was amazing, right? It's so awesome that God still does these things in response to our faith. My favorite part was when the cardiologist confessed that he was having a day of very small faith, but when he took the little bit of faith he did have and obeyed God with it, he saw God's power.

It isn't hard to have faith, and it isn't a weakness to have faith. Faithful people aren't dumb. It takes faith to drive a car, that when you make a turn the light will stay red for everybody else and you won't be hit. It takes faith to eat spagetti, as I did earlier this week, because you must wait patiently for it to cool before you eat it, hoping for the promise that it will be much better after it won't burn your tongue. It even takes faith to pick up a new, unsharpened pencil, faith that when you sharpen it the graphite inside won't be made of chalk and disintegrate, and that it isn't already broken straight from the pencil company.

People need some level of faith just to function in the world. Disappointment comes from putting faith in the wrong things. Pure joy comes from putting our faith where it belongs, in God.

My Life Group talked about faith and faithfulness this week, and my favorite thing we talked about was this: that it isn't how much faith you have that matters, but whether your faith is true. Jesus said that even a faith the size of a mustard seed, which is about the size of the letter O on this page, is enough to see Him move. That is because He respects and appreciates our faith and He is not shy about proving it is not in vain.

I read Psalm 27 this week and it really blew my mind.

v.1 "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?"

It seems so easy to think about, but when trouble comes, aren't I afraid and fearful sometimes? God is completely trustworthy and it isn't hard to trust Him. The hard part about faith is learning to trust Him more than we trust ourselves. Do we try to climb the mountain alone, or do we bring a guide who knows every rock on the mountain? He makes us stroner because He is strong enough for anything.

v. 3 "Though an army may encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war may rise against me, in this I will be confident." Can you imagine having an actual war rise against you? What kind of faith does it take to make impossible odds turn out in our favor? What does that look like?

Joshua 6 tells the story of the Israelites under the leadership of Moses' successor, Joshua. God told them they could have Jericho, an extremely well-forified city with a thick wall all the way around. Okay, what should they do? Should they get out jackhammers and bulldozers and knock the wall down? No. God said just to take a walk around the city once a day for six days, carrying the Ark of the Covenant. On the seventh day they would walk around seven times, and then shout really loud, and the wall would come down. That makes sense.

I'm reminded of the Kiwi and the Dragonfruit again, how God chooses the foolish things to put to shame the wise. They Israelites knew what God was telling them to do, and He hadn't failed them before. So they walked, and they shouted, and they ran for the city, and the wall fell. All it took was faith that God is wise and has good intentions for our benefit.

That's the kind of faith we are supposed to have. Faith that whether the sun is shining or there is a hurricane outside your window, whether the answer is to walk back into a room and pray for a dead man, or to just walk around a wall a few times, God will keep the promises He has made. One way or another.

Faith in God gives us access to the power of God. It doesn't take much.

We are called the descendents of Abraham because his faith in God was enough for him to me called righteous. His faith was imputed as righteousness.

Romans 4:23-25, "[23] Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, [24] but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, [25] who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification."

If an ounce of faith is enough for us to be saved and reconciled with God because of His sacrifice, then faith must be very strong indeed. Imagine what else can happen. Go ahead and ask.

Kiwis and Dragonfruit

THIS WEEK I ate a kiwi. Have you ever eaten a kiwi? If you haven't it's probably because you were afraid to. It's not a good-looking fruit. It's a fuzzy, soft brown oval the about the size of an egg.

If you haven't eaten a kiwi, you should get one. They cost about 33 cents each at Walmart. You should eat a kiwi because, despite its weird appearance, it has a treasure inside.

If you cut a kiwi in half you see a lovely pattern of black seeds and bright green fruit. You can eat it right out of the skin with a spoon. It's tangy and sweet and wonderful.

The kiwi takes faith. You have to believe that when you cut it open it won't be as boring as it looks, because it isn't. That's what I thought of when I read 1 Corinthians 1 this week. Check it out:

v.27 "But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty."

God invented the kiwi in a way that it doesn't look like much, but within it shows His goodness and His ability to provide wonderful things for us.

When I thought about that, I remembered the one time I tried somethign called a dragonfruit. When I heard there was a fruit called dragonfruit, I decided I wanted it to be my favorite fruit. I couldn't wait to try it. Its skin is bright pinkish purple with frills, and inside it is pure white with thousands of little black seeds. It's pretty enough to decorate your house with.

If you haven't eaten a dragonfruit, don't bother. They don't taste good or bad. They literally taste like nothing at all. They should be called "Disappointmentfruit."

Despite the wonderful appearance of the dragonfruit, the kiwi outdoes it. God has chosen the kiwi to put to shame the dragonfruit, in a way. Of course, He made both. But I can't help but think this is something like the world. God loves to use all kinds of people to show His power and faithfulness. But His word is especially full of fishermen, shepherds, carpenters, poor people, and children. Whether He turns them into kings or reveals to them His mysteries, He honors the humble because they don't exalt themselves. Their low position is perfect for showing how He cares for those we tend to forget, and how He can provide in any situation. When He came in the flesh He even chose the humble position of a carpenter born in tiny Bethlehem and raised in backwoods Galilee, and He saved the world.

1 Corinthians 1:18-19 "[18] For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. [19] For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.'"

His ways are different from our ways. He loves to do things in ways nobody expects, ways that nobody really understands right away.

He told us in Matthew 23:11-12, "[11] But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. [12] And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

I'm inclined to think that what God thinks is great is better than what the whole world thinks is great. 1 Corinthians 1:25 "Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men."

There is a lot of good stuff in this world. People and money and theme parks and lemonade and glitter all seem pretty wonderful, and they are blessings. But next to God, everything else is dragonfruit. God puts the kiwi on the table and says that the weaker things can be greatest. He says that a mighty nation can come from a single child of old parents. He says the whole world can be saved through the sacrifice of one Man, if that Man is His Son. He says twelve guys from no special background can become fierce witnesses of a life-changing faith that sweeps over the entire world.

Then, in Matthew 16:24-25, Jesus says this "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it."

How do we respond when He says this? Remembering that He has always been right and always does what He says, and knowing that He honors our faith and humility, there's only one thing to do. We take up the cross and follow Him daily. We choose the funny-looking kiwi for the brilliant promise that waits inside it. Because life in Christ, no matter the cost, will always be more wonderful than all the beautiful and bland dragonfruit the world could hold.