My birthday is today.  I am now 27…the age my husband was when he died.  I always really liked that he was two years older than me so that even when I felt old there was this strange comfort in knowing that at least he was older.  I’m weird, I know.  But knowing that in just a few months, I will be older than he ever got to be on this earth is really hard to swallow.  Just another hurt to add to the pile…

So in my wrestling and crying out to God about this, He brought to mind something that He’s been working on me for months but I had put on the back burner.  In a word…Thankfulness.

Here it goes:

Is my first response to hurt, annoyance, loneliness, burdens, pain, to say thank You Jesus?  Not usually.  Why?  That requires a multi-faceted answer I’m sure, but I’m just going to stick to one.  It’s because even at the ripe old age of 26 27, thankfulness is not a natural response…it never has been.  I mean, to those of you who have had children, after giving birth to them and finally getting a glimpse of their sweet, wrinkly, cheese covered face, did they look up at you and thank you for the hours of agonizing pain you just went through to give them life?  Or when you waken to their soft little wimpers piercing cries to feed and change them, do they look up at you adoringly and thank you for all that you sacrifice for them?  Well, if your kids are anything like mine than quite the opposite happens…more screams, more demands, more selfishness ensues.  And it doesn’t end in babyhood.  They learn to talk and they just have a more direct way to show their ingratitude.  Then they grow into adulthood and now they think they really actually have a reason to complain because life is harder than they anticipated.  And mama was right when she told us life wasn’t fair.

But why does that surprise us?  Maybe because we all think bad things couldn’t possibly happen to us.  We’re just normal.  Nothing special.  Well, at least that’s what I thought.  And then my child was born with an incurable disease and I watched the love of my life die in pain.  The temptation is to complain, why me?  Why them?  Why us?  But I forget that God is not a respecter of people.  The hierarchy that we have established is simply from man’s perspective and not how God sees us at all.  He sees no difference between the highest political figure or the wealthiest tycoon, from the simple housewife or the starving orphan.  So if the poor and “forgotten” are expected to suffer than why not everyone else?  And doesn’t God give each of us the same exact thing…salvation, forgiveness, grace?  If I only saw that as the gift that it is and that everything else is but a bonus, wouldn’t that make me more grateful for the everyday blessings and even the irritants?  Knowing that I live in a world deeply affected by sin and death and the fact that there is still beauty and blessings is simply the miracle of God’s grace?  A changed perspective is what I need, so when I wake up in my empty bed and the loneliness threatens to settle in cold and weary, instead of allowing it to take hold, choose to be thankful.  Thankful that He blessed me with a glimpse of unconditional and sacrificial love (both giving and receiving) even for a short time, on this earth…just a tiny peek of Jesus’ love!  And instead of complaining about the mundane, realize that there is no such thing in this life with Christ…ALL things are for my good.  All things are gifts from Him.  And instead of focusing on grieving that Josiah is forever 27 on this earth, to be thankful that God chooses to show me SO powerfully that every day is indeed a gift.  And seeing every day past the number Josiah was given as a bonus…isn’t a bad thing.  While it was not God’s plan for Josiah to know his children or to have his children know him on this earth, every single day is a gift because I do get to know them and to be their Mom.  I do get to pour into their lives.  I do get to continue on in the extraordinary plan God has for me for however long He chooses.

God has a lot to work in me so that I actually live this way…but He’s starting to open my eyes.  And I don’t think it’s coincidence that I happen to be reading this book.  And I don’t think it’s coincidence that this happened to be the point of my pastor’s message on Sunday (or that I happen to be reading through that same portion of Scripture in my devotions).  And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I have been so broken these past couple weeks so that I am in need of His healing.  Nope.  No coincidences.  Gifts!  And I’m oh so painfully learning to see them that way…and be thankful.