All My Gratitude

If I make sure I mean "thanks" when I say it, life will be more joyful. Life will be fuller. The smile will be "realer". Heart to heart will be positive and honest. Hellos and goodbyes will be sweeter. Fellowship will be ecstatic. My life will be more serving and less selfish. There will be more to laugh about. I can't imagine laughing more than I do now. Or smiling more. But, again, each smile will be realer, each laugh really happy. Pain will be less grudging and more loving, until "grudge" no longer has a place in my vocabulary!

Thanks to the Lord!

Thanks for every little child whose little cheeks press against mine; whose face rears back with mega laughing joy; whose little feet run to me as I purposely smile at them... kids sure won't rob you of a blessing.

Thanks for the friend who listens quietly and doesn't try to force a solution down my ear; for the friend who teaches me patiently and motivates me to be the one God created me to be; for the friend who watches over me invisibly and prays to the Father of lights for me as I walk through this dark world.

Thanks for the ones who stab me in the back and give me a reason to believe in the justice of God; for the ones who seem impossible to tame, challenging me to reach out even farther and go the extra mile to love unconditionally like Jesus does; for the ones who plot and scheme in the dark, compelling me to find more and more strength in the Lord as the days grow evil.

Thanks for the Bible - the very mind and heart of God!

Thanks for every ounce of truth that I've received and learned; of which I'm so viciously protective of, fighting to keep it untainted, undefiled, hidden in my heart.

Thanks for the grace I am so freely supplied when I'm deceived by the devil; the grace that leads me back to the straight and narrow, bandaged and broken; for valuing me when I was of so little worth and hopeless.

Thanks for humbling me every time I think I've finally got something figured out.

Thanks for holding me back from messing up Your plans when I try to get what I want; for helping me to let go and let God; for answering my every prayer, even when I don't truly know the depth of what I ask for!

Thanks for testing my character and refining me like gold in a furnace... I have a long way to go.

Thanks for letting me be a girl - we have so much more fun!

Thanks for listening to me talk and talk and talk about things that absolutely do not matter to anyone else but You.

Thanks for making me someone's shadow, someone's sunshine, for making me the death of someone, and the joy in someone's life; I have had so much experience!

Thanks for showing me every single day that You love me - it never fails! I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I'm Your girl, and You're gonna take care of me; You have a special place in Your heart for me.

Thanks for saving me. You saved me from hell, dear Jesus, and You continue to save me from myself as I live under grace.

I am now under that beautiful wonder of grace

That erased all my past

And I feel the heartbeat of mercy inside me

And now I have found joy at last

I live in freedom where chains cannot bind

And I won't look back

On what I've left behind...