Thanksgiving in the Lord!

“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.” (Psalm 100:1-5)

Don’t we thank God when it is only necessary? We thank Him so much when we sense that miracles of God are happening or has happened in our or somebody else’s lives. In other times, we often don’t, especially when we are bored. It is difficult to thank Him all the time. How can we enjoy and get pumped for everyday tasks? As I’m writing this devotional, I am actually bored. This sometimes happens to me. I could find something else to do, to enjoy myself, but I also believe that doing something else other than the will of God is worthless. Since I believe Christian-writing is the will of God for me as the Spirit of God has been prompting me to write, I think it is sometimes necessary to ignore our feelings. For example, you do same thing in work, but you find it bored, would you change your job and your workplace because of your feeling?

How then we could thank God all the time? We should think what is the reason why we are doing what we are doing. I always thank Him for giving me a writing gift as I have a disability in talking. I think my natural gift is giving encouragement as one of my passions is that I want others to live their lives to the fullest. Yesterday, we have looked at God being the Creator of everything, including us (Genesis 1-2). According to James Waltner, one of the things we should be thanking God for is that He is the source of giving us abundant life. Jesus Christ has declared, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:7-10) Jesus being the shepherd and we are the sheep is just a figure of speech. As a shepherd leads His sheep, Jesus wants to lead us through the Spirit of God (John 14:15-27). God has been willing and ready to pour His Spirit into us, but the only question is that are we willing enough, to follow Him? (Luke 11:11-13)