Give Thanks.

I love hearing people say thanks, I am a massive lover of people saying thank you. We teach our girls manners and love to hear them say thank you when people do or say kind things to them. I was out with my two girls and a man held the door open for my girls and I so as my eldest daughter walked through the door she looked up to the man and said “thank you” that’s all she said but the man looked at her like she was weird. 

Was this not normal?

As I thought over this situation I began to realise that not everyone knows how to say thank you and if you do know how to say thanks do we say it enough? 
As I continued to think over this I began to think about God and how often I say thank you to him for my life?
I was brought up in a household that used thank you a lot, I was taught manners from a young age and was taught if someone gives you something or does something kind to you you must remember your Thank you. So why do we not say it to God?

Reflecting over my journey with God I have been so quick to criticise God over things he hasn’t done but I have been slow at saying thank you for all the things he has done. For instance when me and my husband walked though loosing our house it was a hard time it was emotionally draining and we mourned a loss of something ,worried what people would think of us wondering how our children would cope. But we prayed it though and found the most amazing house to rent in a location we desired and the house had everything on our prayer list but did we say thanks? After living in our house for so long going through different situations I began to moan well obviously God is not listening but did I say thanks? Did I show my appreciation for all he had done for us? 

We all know how it feels to be around people who never say please or thank you. You could go for coffee and buy them one but they never say thanks how would we feel? I know how I would feel.

God asks us clearly to enter his gates with thanksgiving. I do not believe God wants us to sit and thank him every 20 seconds but maybe once a day saying “thank you God for all your doing in my life” why not pray “thank you God for loving me” these are simple things that we sometimes miss because we take it all for granted but I believe if we enter his gates with Thanksgiving (psalms 100v4) something’s will start to change in our lives.

If I can encourage you in one area it’s to be thankful in all areas of life, sometimes we think we have a tough time, I know I did walking through my journey but if I had of choosen a thankful heart I would of looked at things differently. God chose us he loves us unconditionally isn’t that enough to be thankful for?