14. Thankful and Blessed

One of the things that happened to me during my years of being shut down from disappointment was that I lost perspective. All I could see were the issues I was facing and my need to just keep going. It’s like holding a large coin in front of your eyes. If you hold it an arm’s length away from your eyes, you can see it clearly, but you’re also aware of everything else in your peripheral vision. However, the closer you bring it to your face, the more it blocks out everything else and you lose all sense of perspective, because that coin is all you can see.

That’s what happened to me.

I was holding my issues so close that they blocked out everything else from my view.

One day, Holy Spirit told me that giving thanks would help to break the disappointment. I must be honest; I wasn’t too impressed when He told me that – it sounded too simple. But He was right … of course!

Thanksgiving is powerful.

It breaks negative thought patterns and mindsets, and brings fresh perspective. Thankfulness trumps negativity every time! I’ve heard it said that thankfulness is the key to good mental health, and I agree with that statement, because I have personally experienced how thankfulness brings perspective and breaks negativity in our lives. You cannot speak out your thankfulness to God and be negative at the same time – the two simply cannot co-exist. You are either thankful, or you are discouraged. You get to choose.

You have to make a decision.

That is the bottom line. I had to choose. Every morning when I woke up, I had to choose to ‘go again’. I had to choose not to sink under the weight of disappointment or the paralysing fear that nothing would change. I had to set my gaze on Him and choose to be thankful for what I did have, and to intentionally watch what came out of my mouth.

I decided to try and think of as many things as I could to be thankful for, and then to speak these out loud to Father. I started with the obvious ones, like I’m thankful for my family, thank you that I have friends who love me and thank you that Jesus died on the cross for me …but after a while I ran out of things to thank Him for. There were times when I was so ‘out of focus’ because of something that had happened that I lost all perspective, and couldn’t think of a single thing to be thankful for.

That’s when I developed a strategy of looking around the room or place I was in and thanking Him for things in that room or place, just to get me going. Thank you Father for this bed that I sleep in. Thank you for this soft pillow. Thank you that I have books to read. Thank you for my chest of drawers. Thank you for the clothes that are in it. Thank you that the floor is carpeted … I know, really basic. But, at times, that was necessary just to kick start my thankfulness process.

It felt pretty banal to start off with and quite mechanical. I would usually run out of things to be thankful for after a couple of minutes. But I persevered and, over a period of weeks and then months I developed my ‘thankfulness tool’ until I could go for well over half an hour without a pause, just thanking Him for everything in my life, even the bad things, and my perspective shifted much more quickly than it did in the beginning. I noticed that it wasn’t always the big things that made a difference. The little things became really important and I became much more aware of the little blessings that I had so often taken for granted: the unexpected smile from a passing stranger, a beautiful flower, a cute little bumble bee with a fluffy stripey bottom, even the clutch pencil that I used to write in my Bible, or the fragrance of washing up liquid.

The Bible tells us in Psalm 100 that we are to “Enter His gates with thanksgiving, and His courts with praise”, and I can see now more than ever why that is. When you’ve spent time thanking Him for everything you can think of, your awareness of how good and kind He is increases exponentially, and you can’t help but explode with praise and give Him glory for the wonderful Father that He is!

So my challenge to you, especially if you’re struggling with disappointment or you’re finding this phase of your life journey really tough, is to start a Thankful List. Write it in your journal or keep it on your phone, and start to note everything that you can think of to be thankful for, no matter how simple it seems. You will be amazed what comes to mind!

If it’s hard to begin with, just keep going, ask Holy Spirit to help you and He will open your eyes to see things in a way you never have before. Aim for 100 things on your list and, when you get to 100, change the goal posts to 500 things that you are thankful for, and then 1000. Whenever you have a ‘lack of perspective’ moment, all you have to do is read through your Thankfulness List to remind you of how blessed you are and how good He is.

What the locusts have eaten

One of the most wonderful attributes about the character of God is His redemptive nature. He is a God of restoration, a God who redeems that which was lost. His greatest act of redemption was when Jesus paid with his life to win us back to the Father, and we can see His kindness day by day in the way He restores to us that which has been stolen or destroyed by the enemy.

The prophet Joel spoke about this concept of restoration and, in chapter 2 of the book of Joel, we see him calling the people to repentance. Verse 13 says, “So rend your heart, and not your garments; return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness.”

The result of this was a promise from the Lord, in verse 25: “So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust and the chewing locust…you shall eat in plenty and be satisfied …then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel; I am the Lord your God and there is no other. My people shall never be put to shame.”

How beautiful is this promise?!

A plague of locusts is such a graphic picture of how we can feel when we’ve encountered disappointment after disappointment. It captures the sense of desolation that can engulf you. But when we turn to God with all our heart, He will restore to us the years that the enemy has stolen. He is a restorative God, kind and merciful.

Psalm 30:5 says, “His favour is for life; weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.”

The night can seem to last forever and disappointments will sometimes rob you of joy for a season. But the truth is that the dawn ALWAYS comes. Night cannot last forever, that is an impossibility - the dawn will break and joy will come.

If life has thrown you some harsh curve balls, if you’ve been through lots of disappointment or are  going through really tough times even now, I want to tell you that there is hope.

You WILL dream again!

Don’t lose heart!

Wait on Father God, partner with Him, and you WILL see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, here, on earth. 

“I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness

 of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord, be of good courage,

and He shall strengthen your heart; wait, I say, on the Lord!”

                    `                                                                     Psalm 27:13-14

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Until next time ….

Start a Thankfulness List and add at least one new thing to it every day.

Meditate on the following scriptures. Type them on your phone or write them in your journal and read them regularly, thanking God for giving you courage and strengthening you. Declare over yourself, “I will doubtless come again with rejoicing!”

“Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy. He who continually goes forth weeping, bearing seed for sowing, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.”

Psalm 126:5-6

“I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart; wait, I say, on the Lord!”

Psalm 27:13-14

Nicky Heymans is an author of historical fiction who is known for drawing fresh life and inspiration out of familiar Bible stories. She would love to hear from you! Please feel free to share your thoughts or ask questions by scrolling down to the bottom of this page and clicking on the 'contact' link, and she will get back to you.