From One CPA Parent to You!
Dieudonné Kalangwa
We all have a thousand reasons to thank God for. Thanksgiving means a lot for us, but when doing so, we hide the motive that is behind our act. Mostly, we are grateful because the Almighty answers our prayers, do things the way we were expecting, we don’t care about His sovereignty, we don’t have time to be patient to His will, and want it now according to our desire, not His. That’s why sometimes when the will of God is different from ours, we forget to be thankful to Him.
During several testimonies led by the church members in those last Sunday services of last year, I didn’t hear a single person saying, "I praise the Lord for all that He has done for me, especially for allowing us to understand and deal with loss." (2 Corinthians 5: out of our bodies, in His presence.)
The scriptures say: My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts and my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine.
"We know that all things works together for our good, but still we are impatient with His guidance, we just want things according to our expectations.
Let us read first Romans 1: 21:
“Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship Him as God or even give Him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused.”
While Ephesians 5: 19b – 20 reminds us to sing and make music from our heart to the Lord, always give thanks to God the Father for everything in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Instead, as human, we allow some attitude to dwell alongside us:
*doubt: You are not sure that God can be trusted, as what you are expecting is not what is happening. God doesn’t work your way.
*Selfishness: You don’t want the way it is, the way God is working in your life, you are about to say God get out of your throne and put me there, I want my life this way.
You forget that God is perfect in all His ways, no matter what faces us.
James 1: 17 “Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father who created all the lights in the heaven.”
They are people who attribute the little good that comes to their life to luck, so they think that they don’t have to give thanks to anybody.
They are also those who don’t think that luck is in charge; they think that it is their destiny, so there is no one to thank for anything good or bad.
They are some other people who think that somehow they can control their life, they think that they’ve arranged everything good that happened to them.
They are also some who have no hesitation to be thankful to God, just by good manner or sense of politeness because the way God is doing things is in connection with the way they expected them to be done.
Others say God does what He says He will do. We’d simply say every battle has taught us there’s nothing He won’t help us through, so why should we dwell on the hardships and struggles? We just believe over and over, again and again, that God is faithful; so no matter what situation we may face, we must find reason to praise God with all our heart for the LORD we serve will never let us down.
He is a dependable God. He is still an intentional God. No matter what comes our way, He’s still God and will still be so good to us in all circumstances.
One question comes in our mind:
Am I the kind of Christian who only thanks God when He’s serving me?
I just rejoice in thanking Him for provision,
We need to graduate from just an attitude of gratitude to a way of life that is grateful.
Moses was teaching the people to relate to God on the provision level, and people had only to thank God for what He’s given them. That‘s just good manners, that‘s just politeness, but David was a little bit different because of his experience. He was raised up as a shepherd in Jesse’s house to be king and anointed by Samuel. He had a remarkable ability to remember where he came from and it always made him grateful like He speaks in Psalms 23:4: “Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evils for you are with me.”
David’s life was very dysfunctional. He was driven by a sense of returning to God who had given all the blessings to him.
Moses teaches us how to thank God for what He has done that is visible, but David comes along and teaches us how to thank God even though things were difficult.
Don’t expect God to move to your time, your schedule, don’t be impatient but rejoice for His presence in your life.
Romans 8: 28
“And we know that God causes everything to work together for good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them.”
Let me tell you that our life must be for Christ.
We need to be going back to Christ in everything, even when we are trying to understand some loss and then find ways to be thankful to God, a better life is still yet to come.
Let us be grateful for one of us who has fought the good fight and has finished the race.
Let us not be anxious about anything but by the way, present our request to God with our hearts full of joy, prayer and thanksgiving.
There are times when trouble troubles us, and we think life’s not fair, we feel alone, but remember our Faithful friend is closer to us, He is present, He is the indescribable Gift of God.
We must be thankful to God in connection with everything in our life, no matter what it might be, no matter what is happening in our life, be thankful, no matter what situation we must find reason to praise God.
We should reminder ourselves that thanksgiving is the essence of Christian’s attitude as 1Thessalonians 5: 18 says,
“Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to CHRIST JESUS.”
Amen."
~ Dieudonné Kalangwa