Echoes From the Campfire

[Don Adkisson]

       “He realized how easy it is to become so obsessed with the less important things and forget about eternal matters.”
                    --B.N. Rundell  (Bear Gulch)

       "Since then we have been given a kingdom that is 'unshakeable', let us serve God with thankfulness in the ways which please him, but always with reverence and holy fear."

                    --Hebrews 12:28 (Phillips)
---------------------------
Something we all need to ponder, especially on this day in which we live, is the question that I'm going to bring to you.  It is so easy to "get" things today, many of them we do not need so from time to time we should take inventory.

               Question:  What if you woke up tomorrow with only the things you thanked God for today?

     Hmmm, what would you have?  Your clothes, your shoes?  Your car, your pets, or your phone?  Most of us thank the Lord for our food at meal time, but what about the plates, the utensils, the table where we sat?  Do you thank Him for a full pantry and refrigerator?  
     Going too far?  Maybe, then again, maybe not.  We take so much for granted in our life.  Now, I understand that and often the quietness of gratitude can at times be assumed.  For example, we don't continually thank God for our salvation.  We just sort of take it for granted after we thanked Him once.  We have a grateful heart, and we don't have to be constantly saying "thank you, Lord for saving me."  Trust is part of that, I understand it.  Having a thankful attitude is a big part.  But stop, look, at the blessings of God, and be thankful, truly thankful.
     Look around you and what do you see?  Trouble and trials; the world coming apart; stupidity at its highest; hatred and bitterness.  Chad Bird brings the totality of life back to us "We see our struggles with clarity while being nearly blind to the blessings in which we swim every single day."  Take time to thank God for the small things.  In recent days, with the cold and having to turn off the water, I am thanking the Lord for running water, for hot water, for the availability of it.  No, we don't have to be blabbing, "thank you, thank you," all the time, but it should become a heart attitude.
     There is the argument about the glass being half-full or half-empty instead of being thankful for the glass and whatever amount that is in it.  I try every morning to thank the Lord for keeping us through the night and for a new day.  Perhaps we should be more thankful, I recall the words of Billy Bray, “As I go along the street I lift up one foot, and it seems to say, 'Glory!' and I lift up the other, and it seems to say 'Amen;' and so they keep on like that all the time I am walking.”  In other words, be thankful for life.  Joseph Alleine would say that we should be thankful for the week before us, the day in which we find ourselves, the hour in which we are working and breathing.  Another old preacher, Pappy Flynn wrote this about being thankful, "It begins the moment we realize that every breath is borrowed, every sunrise is a gift, and every blessing carries the fingerprint of a Father who never lets go."
     Perhaps it is age that helps us realize that we do need to be thankful people.  We begin to have an understanding of what Paul says, "In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." (1 Thessalonians 5:18)  Maybe thankfulness is not something we feel, but as someone said, "it's something God grows inside us."

D.C. Adkisson