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Posted on November 28, 2022
Thanksgiving just passed, and I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend! My family and I traveled to my parents house, and it was a wonderful time! It was nowhere near relaxing, but spending the time with my family, busy or not, is always a great time! I hope you all experienced the same joy from the holiday!
Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays! I’ve always loved the whole idea behind Thanksgiving! Being thankful for everything that we have, and for everything that the Lord has done for us, and will continue to do for us! It’s easy to think back to everything that we have, and how the Lord has worked in our lives, one day out of the year. But do you take time, every day, to thank Him for everything He has given you? I know I always seem to forget to do that.
The expression of gratitude, especially to God.
onelook.com
When I looked up the definition, this was the first one I found. The expression of gratitude, especially to God. When I read this, it really shows how important it is that we take the time to say thank you to the Lord. He has done so much for us, most of the time we don’t always see it!
Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;
1 Chronicles 16:34
His love endures forever.
We can even see how it’s important to take the time to thank the Lord for what He has done for us! His love endures forever, and He is good!
I think one of the biggest things that I struggle with is always being thankful, even when I can’t fully see what the Lord has planned for us. Our youngest son, he’s 3 years old, has had constant ear infections since Labor Day. I had felt like we were living at the doctor’s office, because every time I turned around he seemed to get another one! Then there was the constant battle of getting him to take his antibiotics! It was a fight through and through. When this was all going on, it took me quite a bit of time to fully understand what the Lord was doing. I couldn’t bring myself to be thankful, because what was there to be thankful for? Our son was in pain, and there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. One day when we took him to the doctors, because of another ear infection, I had asked his pediatrician if this was normal, or if this was something we should be concerned about. She referred him to an ENT, because of how frequent the ear infections were. There they determined he should get tubes put in, because that will help with the infections.
Now, I know that kids getting tubes put in is very normal. However, I didn’t see the reason to be thankful until they explained how much this is going to help him! They explained that because of all the fluid that he had; he wasn’t really hearing the way he should. They also explained that this could help him with his speech as well! So here we are, having constant ear infections, to finally figuring out that these tubes could be helpful in so many areas, not just draining the fluid! That is when I felt so thankful to the Lord for allowing our son to go through this. Although no parents want to see their child in pain over and over, but I’m thankful for that pain because in the end it’s going to make him so much better!
The Lord has ways of using these normal, painful situations, and turning them into good! It’s a reminder to us that He always has His best interest in mind for us!
I thank and praise You, God of my ancestors:
Daniel 2:23
You have given me wisdom and power,
You have made known to me what we asked of You,
You have made known to us the dream of the king
After going through Thanksgiving, and really having some time to think about what the Lord has done for me and my family, it made it clear that I need to live a life of thanksgiving every day! The Lord has done, and will continue to do, so much for us that I will never be able to thank Him enough.
I will give thanks to You, Lord, with all my heart;
Psalms 9:1
I will tell of all Your wonderful deeds.
My friends, I encourage you to stop and think about all that the Lord has done for you! Consider the situations, in your life currently, that may seem like nothing good will come of them, and then consider how the Lord could be using them for good! Be thankful for those hardships, because we never know what the Lord is doing!
I do understand that sometimes that’s hard. Trust me, I get it! So if you ever feel like you can’t be thankful for something, trying thanking the Lord for things He has done for you, and for things that you know He will continue to do!
Until next time!
Posted on September 15, 2022
I’ve always hated public speaking. I’ve never enjoyed the idea of getting up in front of a group of people and talking about something. Being the “center of attention” terrifies me, and it’s not something that I would immediately volunteer to do. I’m like Mia Thermopolis in The Princess Diaries! Okay, I’ve never gotten so nervous that I run out and throw up, but I have gotten nervous where I feel sick and I get all shaky!
The feeling that I have about public speaking is the same feeling that I get when I know I have to pray out loud. Praying out loud is so difficult for me, as it is for many other people as well. I have such a hard time with praying out loud; I don’t even enjoy praying out loud in front of my husband! Praying should be something that comes natural for all believers, right? Unfortunately, that isn’t the case for many believers.
There are so many reasons people are nervous about praying in front of others. I know for me; I get nervous because my prayers don’t sound elegant enough, and I’m not using the words that I think I should be. Another reason I get nervous is because I’m so afraid that I’m going to mess up a word, phrase, name, or anything, and sound ridiculous! I don’t want to say anything that may come out wrong, and then people laugh or snicker. These are only a few examples. I have more and I’m sure many others have examples of their own!
When I think about these reasons, I can’t help but wonder, do we really need to worry about what others think of our prayers? Does the Lord care how our prayers sound, or how many times we mess up?
I know for a fact that the Lord doesn’t care how many times we mess up, or sound ridiculous, when we pray to Him! He isn’t sitting up in heaven with a clipboard, taking notes, and tallying how many times we say “um” and “okay”, and He definitely isn’t sitting in the back with a timer making sure we don’t go over the time we’re given, and raising His hands if we are going over. (If you have gone through a public speaking classes, then you know what I’m talking about!) In fact, the Lord is sitting there, listening so intently to us that He doesn’t care about the number of times we mess up, or the number of times we say “um”! In fact, He already knows how many times we’ll mess up, how long we’ll end up taking, or how many times we say “um” and “okay”.
For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous
1 Peter 3:12 NIV
and His ears are attentive to their prayer
The Lord listens to our prayers, no matter how silly we think we sound! He doesn’t care how many times we mess up, because He is our Father, and He loves when we talk to Him!
A way that I view this is when I’m talking to my kids. Especially my 5-year-old. She repeats everything more than once, loses her train of thought, says “um” enough times to fail a public speaking class, and sometimes she ends on a different subject than what she started on! I practice a lot of patience when I listen to her tell me a story. However, the Lord isn’t like that. He doesn’t get annoyed at how many times we mess up or lose our train of thought. He loves the idea that we are going to Him and talking to Him, just like I love when my 5-year-old comes home and tells me stories from her day!
Before they call I will answer;
Isaiah 65:24 NIV
while they are still speaking I will hear.
The Lord hears us before we go to Him in prayer! He knows what we are going to say, and He knows how He will answer us. What assurance we have, to know that we aren’t forgotten, to know that we cannot annoy the Lord!
My friends, I want to encourage you to continue to go to the Lord in prayer! Whether or not it’s in front of others. But I want to encourage you to not care so much about what others think of how you pray, because the Lord is the only one that matters! Do I think you should be able to go to your church’s prayer meeting and instantly feel comfortable to pray in front of everyone? Not at all. This is something that I know will take time. I’m still learning! But we need to remember that the Lord doesn’t care how we are praying. He cares that we are praying to Him, and Him alone! He wants us to turn to Him with our praises, needs, and requests!
I’m choosing to work on my fear of praying out loud. Will you?
Until next time, friends!
Faith and Coffee