THANKFUL ON THE INSIDE

The story goes of a father traveling in the car with his young son who was about 5 years old. They were just going a short distance and so the boy who was in the back seat decided that he wanted to take off his seat belt and stand up. As you might imagine the father then immediately began to correct his son and tried to encourage him to sit down and fasten his seat belt. The conversation went something like this, “Sit down son and put your seat belt on.” “I don’t want to.” “I didn’t ask you, Sit Down, Now.” “But I don’t want to.” “Son, don’t make me count to three!” “But daddy, I don’t want toooo.” “Son! If you don’t sit down right now I’m going to Spank you.” The boy finally sits down and there is a long silence. All of a sudden the boy exclaims from the back seat, “I may be sitting down on the outside, but I’m STANDING UP on the INSIDE!”
We are entering into my most favorite time of the year as the weather takes a turn on the cooler side and the smell of fall is in the air. The autumn beauty is all around us now, as we are blessed to live with these majestic and vibrant mountainous views at every turn. We are also entering into the month and the day that we have set aside for giving thanks. Therein lays a huge problem for some folks, because they have made an altogether different statement with their lives for the other eleven months of the year. You cannot simply come to a day and even attempt to start to tell God thank you for all of His benefits. The reason obviously being that it would take one far longer than a day to just begin because we serve an awesome God whose benefits, that is His grace, mercy and blessings on our lives, is NEW EVERY MORNING!
I want to encourage you today to set aside some time each day in your own individual prayer time to pour out lavishly on God, praise, adoration, honor, and gratitude for all of His Blessings on and in your life. If you are reading this article I want to ask you to do something right now. Very slowly, breathe in and then breathe out, now think about the fact that you are not promised even one more breath. If you have one it is only by the grace of our great God. It’s just that simple, God is great, and things or circumstances in our lives could always be much worse. Would you join the psalmist in affirming, “I will go about Your altar, O Lord, that I may proclaim with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of all Your wondrous works. I will offer to God thanksgiving, and pay my vows to the Most High. I will enter into His gates with thanksgiving, And into His courts with praise, be thankful to Him, and bless His name. For the Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations.” Scripture would also admonish us today that, “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.”
Don’t be caught this Thanksgiving Day thanking God on the outside putting on the façade for friends and family for a day while standing up on the inside. Begin now if you’ve not already by thanking Him everyday on the inside! You might be surprised at the difference it will make in your life!