Thankful Thursday

When I first discovered Thankful Thursdays, and then decided to try to remember to participate each week -- I had no idea it would be hard. Yeh, hard. Who knew? Of all the weekly prompts and challenges I've decided to try to keep up with, I figured this one would be the easiest thing around.

My life is blessed. Truly blessed.

So, what's the problem?

Me, I guess. **sigh**

I have this problem, built into my psyche -- and I don't know the best way to thwart it working so well in my life.

I tend to see the obstacles and not the open paths. I see the list of things that can go wrong and not the possible positive outcomes. It's as if every blessing has a hidden dark side just waiting to bite me. Or go sour. Or just turn-tail and run away. That's it. If I get too happy to have it in my life, it's going to go away. Better to ignore it and pretend it isn't there than to get too comfortable with it.

That just isn't the right way to see things, is it?

It is way too much like the response of the Israelites when the spies came back with the news of "giants in the land" -- and Jacob and Caleb said, "God can handle it." The Israelites seem to have forgotten about the crossing the sea on DRY land. They seem to forget His protection and love so quickly, so easily. They were easily overwhelmed by the enormity of the obstacles, or imagined obstacles, in the road ahead.

God calls us all, especially me, to trust Him. Trust that the road ahead is known to Him and He IS in control.

So, that's a long way to go to get to what I am thankful for.

And, funny, while I was typing this post, the phone rang and I almost ignored it. (Having said to "Zorba the Swede," [what my DH prefers I call him in my writing] that we should get rid of Caller ID since it works only about once in every hundred calls or so -- it actually worked this time and said it was my friend that I meet with weekly for chitchat and creative play.) I did answer the phone, and now 58 minutes later, we're off the phone.

And she brought up some of the things I was just writing about; you know, seeing obstacles instead of opportunities. Strange, huh? :-)

And, about trusting God when things get to be overwhelming. Hmm ...

See, I gave her a few books, on Creativity from the Christian perspective, for her birthday last week and she's been reading them. She had to read some good quotes out of them to me. (Maybe she'd trying to tell me I should be reading my copies of the same books?)

So, while I was thankful for friends in my last Thankful Thursday post, I am thankful again for friends. Friends who care and who are a gift to me from God.

We both know that God brought our lives together for a reason. We don't know the exact reason. But we know, "It's a God thing!"

I was a new student at the University of Minnesota. She was in the same art history class and sat right behind me. We got talking somehow and ... well, that was more than ten years ago. We didn't see each other for a few years after I left the U and moved from MN to WI. Then I got involved with The Angel Company(tm) and our Team met at a location only 15 minutes from my friend's house.

I'd been afraid to call her house because - well, I thought I had seen her about a year before that. We, Zorba and I, were buying plants at the nursery and there was this other couple buying plants. It was not her husband, but sure looked like her. Must have been her double -- she's never even heard of that nursery center. LOL. But, I didn't know it and was afraid to call her house and get her husband; didn't want to hear anything had happened between them.

So, I sent a note, Figured, if they had split, he would just send it back or burn it and that would be that. Got a call back, "SUE!!!! We have to get together!!! How soon can you get here?!?"

We got together.

My life is light on close friends. And almost as lightly touched by acquaintance-friends. So, a friend for me is a true gift and blessing.

The couple true-blue friends I do have are very special to me. I am thankful for them. THANKS, Sherry and Carol! And Annette is very special too. :-)

What else am I thankful for?

Well, did ya notice that I said Sherry called with quotes that went along with what I was thinking at the time?

Again, that's a "God thing!"

His timing. His presence in my life. How He hears me and "talks" to me to show me things I need to know about myself, others, the world around me, and mostly about Him. Things that help me learn to trust Him more and more all the time.

His patience with me. His love for me.

His faithfulness to me. How He has held me close through all these years, even when my faith was based on a wrong foundation, He held me fast, not willing to let me crumble as the foundation crumbled. He is holding me up while the foundation is being rebuilt that I might stand fast in Him.

It was a great book, and I identify with the title so well: Soul Survivor by Phillip Yancey. When there are so many things that could shake our faith in God and destroy our connection to Him, He holds us and shows us the errors and the truth -- if we are willing to look for the truth.

I am thankful for God's hands in my life, the gifts He gives, the blessings, the talents, the dreams, the calling and mission, the friends He sets beside me on the road of life; His willingness to be patient and kind to a stupid, dolt like me. (Stupid because maybe if I looked more at Him and less at the road ahead, I would see the Opportunities instead of the Obstacles ...)