Oops! Forgot about Thankful...

Well, I feel bad and very "task oriented".....

I have noticed on my girls' posts and some other blogs I read -

everyone chose to list things they are thankful for this season.

I just named what we did and all the next things we have to do.

I guess I sometimes see life as a project - I enjoy projects - and I like to do them well - and I like to complete them.

This is what I thank God the most for all the time - when I lie awake at night, sometimes unable to sleep, I think of persecuted believers who are suffering for the sake of Christ and their love for him. I think of how uncomfortable and in pain, often, they are while in prison - having been beaten - or just being in a cell that is cold and hard. And I thank Him for my comfort but know in God's economy they are more privileged than I - having the opportunity and courage to suffer for Him. I'm thankful that God revealed Himself to me and has given me healthy children who have given their hearts to Him. He has chosen them to love Him passionately. I am grateful for that - so grateful. I am grateful for a loving and healthy husband who is still here and with me. We've grown together through thick and thin and as my cousin-in-law, Martha, says, we've learned the dance. She understands that - and her husband, John, is with the Lord in heaven now. They definitely learned the dance.

As I think of those believers who are in prison, I also think of nonbelievers who are in prison for crimes they've committed and I pray for those dark places - and I pray for them and their darkness - I am grateful that God provided me not only with the knowledge of Him and His grace, but an understanding of life and discipline and order and obedience and rules that have to be followed for our sanity - not for our salvation but for a civilized world. He allowed me to be born to parents and into an extended family who taught me sound living. I pray for those who didn't have that and are suffering greatly for their misdeeds. I pray that God's grace and light will be revealed to them.

I have so much to be thankful for, it seems endless.

Mostly I'm thankful for eternity. I really really am. Not just saying that because it's the best thing to say. I want to really look forward to that, the closer I get to heaven. I know that the day I trusted Christ and was brought to life in 1968, that day I did enter the eternal kingdom. But I'm still on earth and I am so thankful for life after this life. And for God who gives me abundant life right now on this day. Always hope. Always light.

Anyway, I could go on and on.

I am thankful for simple pleasures. I love those. Getting up in the morning - going to bed at night - and the daily tasks in between. Nothing too complicated. I am thankful for the moon and the stars in the sky at night that remind me, in a physical way, of the greatness of God - as if the seasons and the birth of a baby don't already do that. Still, every night, in the sky, that vast night and the stars up there and the moon.

I am thankful for little hands that touch me - Ellie's and Luke's and Ada's and Andrew's. So sweet and so cute.

See? There's no stopping me.....

You get the picture.

:-) Thanks everyone for reminding me to name what I'm thankful for.