Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks – Thankfulness Part 4

Levels of Thankfulness – Stages of Gratitude

One really important thing as I’ve focused on Gratitude and Thankfulness is that I’ve begun recognizing levels or stages or qualities of Thankfulness in myself. It’s not necessarily a linear progression from one to the other. It can be parts of all or it can be one for one situation and another for another. And it can be most or all of these at the same time for me.

I’m talking about:
• Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
• Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
• Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks
• Whole Life Thankfulness – I’m Thankful for my life!

I’m learning that “Gratitude is an Attitude” (see what I did there?) of the heart, not merely a reaction to favorable circumstances.

No matter what happens, always be thankful, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 NLT)

The transition from Gratitude as a momentary warm, fuzzy feeling prompted by circumstances, to Gratitude as an attitude of your heart, a settled response to God and his goodness, is a process. It’s a process that involves joy and pain, blessing and loss, and it’s worth its weight in gold!

I’m learning that you can be thankful IN everything, without being thankful FOR everything!

In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 KJV)

When I look back over the years the most thankful things I remember have not always been the easiest things! The greatest challenges have resulted in the greatest progress in my maturity, attitude, and character! The greatest challenges have resulted in the greatest Gratitude to God! I love it when things go smoothly, but when I face challenges and God comes through, sometimes the Gratitude is almost overwhelming!

Thankfulness – In Everything Give Thanks

In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 KJV)

It’s not “FOR” everything give thanks. It’s “IN” everything give thanks.

It’s not being false and hyper-spiritual and saying silly stuff. It’s looking for the good in the bad, the beautiful in the ugly. And then intentionally, and sometimes with great effort and determination, focusing on the good and the beautiful. And being thankful for the good in the midst of a situation that includes things that are not good.

In the midst of a situation that includes pain, loss, uncertainty, and confusion we can choose to focus on the good: The kind words of others, the kind and caring actions of others, things that we still have, things that offer a glimpse of hope. We can focus on good readings on the lab work, rather than on the fact we have the disease. We can focus on the energy we have rather than on the energy we’ve lost.

I remember a Holy Moment during our daughter Stephanie’s cancer battle in 2019-2020 when Jean, Stephanie’s mother, used scissors to cut off Stephanie’s remaining hair (which had begun coming out in clumps). Then Philip, Stephanie’s husband, shaved the remaining fuzzy hair from her head. And I stood by and watched love, courage, and faith working together in one of the holiest moments I’ve had the privilege of being part of!

There were many not so holy moments (at least they didn’t seem holy to me at the time) during Stephanie’s battle with the disease, but I’ve chosen to let that Moment stand out in my memory. And now, nearly a year on, the follow-up exams have been clear. I have to admit, it’s easier to give thanks now for the current good news, but let’s set our hearts on the kind of thankfulness that finds something beautiful and thankworthy in the “In Everything” seasons.

It’s not “FOR” everything give thanks. It’s “IN” everything give thanks.

I’m learning. I don’t have all this stuff worked out so that there’s never a moment of angst or fear or loss. I’m learning. And I’m well aware that I haven’t faced all my “In Everythings” yet. There may come an “In Everything” that’s way beyond my pay grade. But I’m learning. I’m getting ready for the “In Everythings” that are still ahead by practicing my “Giving Thanks” in the ones that come along.

Practical stuff:

There is an element of “Well, it could be worse!” and some “Glass half full or glass half empty” thinking in all of this. But one thing I’ve learned about Thankfulness is that it has to be expressed in some way. When we look for the thankful things amongst the “In Everythings” of life, when we search for them, identify them, then we can call them out by saying “Thank you” to God, to other people, to our own anxious souls, something powerful and transformational happens.

This comes more naturally to some of us than to others, but I recommend you make a conscious decision to “In Everything Give Thanks”. Then start to do it…
• Look for the thankful things.
• Identify them when you find them. Name them. Call them out.
• Express your Thankfulness. Say thanks. Thank God. Thank people.

Let your giving of thanks in your present situation prepare you for the giving of thanks “In Everything”. You and the people you love and influence will not regret it!

So far we’ve been thinking about:
• Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
• Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
• Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks!

It’s not as if any of these are the ultimate goal of Gratitude. They’re more like stages in a process. They’re more like places we visit and revisit on the journey of our life. And I’m still convinced that these are not something we move through in linear progression or that there are better and worse kinds of Gratitude. In my experience, I find myself moving through the spectrum of Thankfulness pretty frequently. But I do want to grow in Gratitude so I spend more and more time simply being Thankful for my Life!

Next week we’ll wrap up the Thankfulness series with Whole Life Thankfulness – Thank You For My Life! Don’t miss it!

As always, I’d love to hear from you and I welcome your comments and questions. If you’re reading on the blog, leave a comment below. If you’re reading from the email, click “Reply” and tell me what you’re thinking.

 

Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I Guess It Could Be Worse! Thankfulness Part 3

When I started the Thankful Series two weeks ago, I wrote about our human need for someone to be thankful to! We all realize that there are times when things go well, when we’re blessed so much more than we deserve, that we simply need someone to thank. It’s a glad thing for people of faith, for believers, that we can be thankful to God!

As I’ve continued to focus on Gratitude and Thankfulness, I find stages or qualities of Thankfulness in myself. I’m talking about:
• Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
• Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
• Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks
• Whole Life Thankfulness – I’m Thankful for my life!

It’s not necessarily a linear progression from one kind of Thankfulness to the other. It can be parts of all of them, or it can be one kind for one situation and another kind for another. And it can be most or all of these at the same time for me.

In Fact, as I’ve been writing this post, I’ve been processing through so many different levels of Thankfulness!

Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!

You’re right! Comparative Thankfulness is when I see my blessings in comparison to the presently observable blessings that someone else is or isn’t experiencing. Comparative Thankfulness has its potential pitfalls, but let’s look at some ways in which it can help us more greatly appreciate what we have and also develop compassion for others who are less fortunate.

I remember a sort of proverb I heard several times back in a previous century. Do you remember this one? “I complained because I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet.” I know, right? Or the classic, “There but for the Grace of God go I!” Those sayings can be trite and shallow, but there is a truth there.

Each week when I go to the Infusion Room at St Charles Cancer Center, I’m reminded that compared to other people who are doing Chemo, I have it pretty easy. I haven’t even lost my hair. Actually I should say, “I haven’t lost what’s left of my hair after 78 years on the planet!”

When I go in for my treatment, I see all the people who are receiving regular Chemo sitting in the chairs with their books and tablets and wires and tubes. Then I go to the “Velcade” chairs in the back and the nurse comes to do all my vitals and the interview questions. Then I wait while they mix my infusion that will be injected by needle under my skin and be absorbed by my body over the next week while I take my other two Chemo meds in pill form each day.

And I do the Comparative Thankfulness mental dance. “Oh, I’m thankful that I don’t have to do that!” and on the other side of the equation, “Oh, but I’m going to be doing this for the rest of my life if it works, and something else if it doesn’t.” Because my cancer doesn’t get cured, it gets treated and managed. I do this comparison stuff a lot. Actually a bit more than I like to admit!

There are some possible good “side effects” to Comparative Thankfulness (we learn a lot about side effects in cancer treatment): It can help to develop awareness that we aren’t the only people dealing with hard stuff. And many of them don’t have the faith resources we have to deal with the hard stuff.

Comparative Thankfulness can help us develop compassion, understanding, and empathy. It can help us learn to cut people some slack when they don’t handle terrible things terribly well.

Comparative Thankfulness can help us realize that we actually have a lot to be thankful for. In our gratitude for our blessings, compassion grows and we begin to find ways to graciously share our blessings with others who have less, even if our own blessings don’t seem to be totally overflowing at the time. If it goes the good way – I develop empathy and want to help others.

But there is this one negative side effect of Comparative Thankfulness that might show up. Let’s hope not, but it might! It’s when we see others whose Comparative Blessing Level is way below ours and we think, “I wonder what they did wrong that things are that bad for them!” and the accompanying thought, “I must be a really good person to since that didn’t happen to me!” We can begin to feel prideful or superior to the other less-fortunate person.

It’s like when Jesus disciples encountered a blind man and the disciples asked Jesus, “Who sinned, this man or his parents for him to suffer this blindness?”

1 As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been blind from birth. 2 “Rabbi,” his disciples asked him, “why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?” 3 “It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him. (John 9:1-3 NLT)

During the years my family and I lived in Jamaica, two years in the rural market town of Linstead and five years in Kingston, the capital city, we lived without many of the comforts and conveniences we would have taken for granted if we’d been living a “normal life” back in the US. Sometimes we’d focus on the frustrations of sacrifice and inconvenience. But it only required going outside our gate onto the street to put things in perspective. The physical, practical needs of others were obvious and ever-present. Women came to our gate begging for food or for money to feed their children. Ragged children came to the car window at every downtown intersection. Beggars, often crippled or blind, sat by the door of the bank, the post office, and the supermarket.

We were always quickly reminded that if instead of comparing our minor sacrifices and inconveniences to the comfort and ease we’d be experiencing in the far-off mythical land of “back home in the USA”, we’d simply look around at the needs of others in the community around us, our gratitude attitude quickly changed! We were thankful for the blessings we had instead of focusing on the things we lacked. And we realized that even in our comparative lack (if we looked north), we had an abundance that we could share with those around us.

The needs around us were obvious and overwhelming. We soon learned, and were often reminded, that we couldn’t do it all, but we could do something.

So while comparing ourselves with others has a few pitfalls to watch out for, it can help us appreciate more the things we do have, develop empathy and compassion for others who are less fortunate, and realize that even our comparative lack can also be comparative abundance that we can graciously share.

So here’s my point with these thoughts on Comparative Thankfulness: It’s not the ultimate goal of Gratitude. And we’re going to look at two more kinds (Levels, Qualities) of Thankfulness in this series: Thankfulness in all things, and Thankfulness for my Life. And I’m still convinced that these are not something we move through in linear progression and that there are better and worse kinds of Gratitude. In my experience, I find myself moving through the spectrum of Thankfulness pretty frequently. But I do want to grow in Gratitude so I spend more and more time simply being Thankful for my Life! I’m really looking forward to sharing the next two blog posts with you. I think you’ll find some joy in “Thankfulness in all things” and “Whole life thankfulness.”

As always, I’d love to hear from you and I welcome your comments and questions. If you’re reading on the blog, leave a comment below. If you’re reading from the email, click “Reply” and tell me what you’re thinking.

Thankful Part 2 – Circumstantial Thankfulness

Thanks for the Blessings

As I started the Thankful Series last week, I wrote about our human need for someone to be thankful to! Some people thank their lucky stars, some thank the Universe, some thank “the breaks”, but we all realize that there are times when things go well, when it all seems to break our way, when we’re blessed so much more than we deserve, that we simply need someone to thank. It’s a glad thing for people of faith, for believers, that we can be thankful to God!

I’ve begun recognizing as I’ve focused on Gratitude and Thankfulness that I find stages or qualities of Thankfulness in myself. I’m talking about:

    • Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
    • Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
    • Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks
    • Whole Life Thankfulness – I’m Thankful for my life!

I’m becoming convinced it’s not necessarily a linear progression from one kind of Thankfulness to the other. It can be parts of all of them, or it can be one kind for one situation and another kind for another. And it can be most or all of these at the same time for me.

In Fact, as I’ve been writing this post, I’ve been processing through so many different levels of Thankfulness!

Health Update:

1) Last Thursday I had my “one-month of treatment” cancer check-up. My oncologist told me that the numbers that should go down are beginning to go down and a couple of the numbers we want to go up are climbing. He said, “What we wanted to happen is happening. This helps us toward a good prognosis!”

2) Jean had a successful surgery to repair her broken leg/ankle on Monday, May 18. She’s recovering well at home with minimal pain so far. She has more mobility than any time in the two weeks since the break occurred. It’s looking good! Our daughter Melissa and her husband Colin have been looking after us. They’ve been coming over to help get Jean out of the house and into the car when we need to go for medical stuff. Our daughter Stephanie is with us this week to help out and give me a break. Son-in-law Philip set up our Alexa so Jean can reach me in any room in the house from her headquarters in the living room. Life is good!

So many of you have written, texted, phoned, and emailed words of hope and encouragement! Many have given financially to help with the unexpected expenses of my illness and Jean’s injury! A Meal Train team from our church has been providing evening meals most days. Please be patient with us if we’re slow to acknowledge and respond. Your responses have been overwhelming in a very good way! We love and appreciate you all very much!

This week’s blog post is going to focus on Circumstantial Thankfulness – “Thanks for the Blessings”. It’s a good starting place, because blessings are usually easy to identify and they’re really nice to receive! They make us glad. They make us blessed. They make  us, well, Thankful!

Here are some verses from Psalm 30, written by Shepherd/King David to praise and thank God for his blessings. Let’s see what David has to say….

1 I will exalt you, LORD, for you rescued me. You refused to let my enemies triumph over me. 2 O LORD my God, I cried to you for help, and you restored my health. 3 You brought me up from the grave, O LORD. You kept me from falling into the pit of death. 4 Sing to the LORD, all you godly ones! Praise his holy name. 5 For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor lasts a lifetime! Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning. (Psalm 30:1–5 NLT)

How’s it going, David? OK so far! I had some challenges, in fact some really scary stuff happened and I prayed and asked God for help and he fixed everything! Should be alright from here forward. Some bad guys (my enemies) were out to get me, but God could tell that I’m a good guy and they were bad to the bone, so he rescued me!

This is genuine thankfulness! David faced some big challenges and God helped him. Everything was going great! The one possible problem I see here is that when we stay too long in Circumstantial Thankfulness, we can begin to get the idea, and even project that idea to others, that we got the good stuff because we deserve the good stuff. It’s too easy to start thinking, “Look at me! No wonder I’m blessed! I am, in fact, the most blessable person I know!”

Our attitude can take on overtones of: “Be good like me and trouble, if it comes, won’t last long!  Here’s how you do this stuff.  Glad I figured this out.  Now we’ve got it pretty much under control!”

It’s really good to be thankful for God’s blessings! I remember a line from an old hymn we sang at church years ago: “Count your many blessings, Name them one by one, Count your many blessings, See what God has done!” Counting our blessings, being specific about the ways God has blessed us, and acknowledging that our lives are made rich by the goodness of God helps us in so many ways. It moves us from scarcity thinking to abundance thinking. It moves us from focus on what we don’t have to what do we have. It makes us thankful for blessing and it increases our faith for God’s provision. It leads from thankfulness for what God has done to praise for who God is to us. It’s good!

But the caution I see here is two-fold: If we are only thankful when the blessings overflow, 1) We can get stuck in Circumstantial Thankfulness where we are only thankful when everything is great, and 2) We can develop an Entitlement Attitude.

When we develop an Entitlement Attitude, we can start thinking: I’m one of the good guys! I’m obviously pleasing God. Look how he’s blessing me. If I just keep doing these things I’m doing, if I push all the right buttons and check all the right boxes, nothing bad can happen.  God is obligated to keep me from harm or loss. Entitlement is about what I feel I deserve. Gratitude is about God’s goodness, mercy, and grace!

Father, it’s about you and your unfailing love, not about me and my entitlement! I’m grateful for what your love and grace has provided, not what I thought you owed me! And I’ll praise you now simply because you’re good and you’re worthy!

In real life, we do get good stuff. We receive blessings. We’re thankful for those blessings. But in real life we also lose things, have unfulfilled expectations, and experience hurts and disappointments (remember the “Not Disappointed” series?). We experience difficulties in relationships, finances get tight, sickness comes calling.

Entitled people are neither truly happy nor fully content! Why? Because entitlement says, “I don’t deserve the bad things – I do deserve the good things – and if I don’t get what I do deserve or I get what I don’t deserve I’m unhappy!” Entitled people seem to forget that God gave us the message(s) of the Psalms partly to remind us that “God is Good, but Life is Hard, but God is Good!”

Friends, I’m not saying it’s easy, I’m just realizing I can’t live a healthy and vibrant life if I feel slighted or let down when I don’t get what I think I deserve…

And remember, I’m not ranking these kinds of Thankfulness in terms of better and worse! And I’m not treating them as a linear progression from Circumstantial to Whole Life Thankfulness. I believe they’re all legitimate ways to be Thankful and Gratitude-full.

    • Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
    • Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
    • Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks
    • Whole Life Thankfulness – I’m Thankful for my life!

The truth is:  God loves us not because we are good, but because God is good!

And here’s the corollary to that: God loves us just as we are, not just as we ought to be, because we’ll never be just as we ought to be!

In my next post we’ll look at Comparative Thankfulness. Like Circumstantial Thankfulness, it has some strong points and some weaker points, and we’ll explore that together. Stay tuned!

As always, I’d love to hear from you and I welcome your comments and questions. If you’re reading on the blog, leave a comment below. If you’re reading from the email, click “Reply” and tell me what you’re thinking.

 

Thankful Part 1

Jim’s Health Update – May 11, 2021

Hi friends, We’ve got some news to share with you about my health. I was recently diagnosed with a cancer called Multiple Myeloma. MM is a cancer of the plasma cells in the bone marrow. We’ve chosen a targeted chemotherapy treatment. If I respond well to the treatment, remission is possible. This week I finish the first four-week treatment cycle. So far, side effects are minimal and manageable. I’m in good health otherwise, so that’s in our favor.

Jean and I are doing well. This caught us by surprise, but after a month and a half of blood tests, MRI scans, bone marrow biopsies, and treatment, we’ve accepted that we’re moving into a new season of life that simply isn’t going to be like it was before the diagnosis.

We would appreciate your prayers for healing and for wisdom and for God’s continued provision. Daily “GraceNotes Devotionals” will continue as will my Weekly blog post “Notes from My Journey”.

We’ll put a Health Updates tab on my blog site https://jimastephens.com.

Thanks for your love, prayers, and support. Love from Jim and Jean Stephens

Thankful – Part 1

We humans need someone to be thankful to! Some people thank their lucky stars, some thank the Universe, some thank “the breaks”, but we all realize that there are times when things go well, when it all seems to break our way, when we’re blessed so much more than we deserve, that we simply need someone to thank. I’ve heard that the saddest thing about being an atheist is that there’s no one to thank. It’s a glad thing for people of faith, for believers, that we can be thankful to God!

That coin has two sides, friends! There are also those times and seasons when things aren’t going our way and we are desperately looking for someone to blame! But that’s another story and we’ll deal with that later. For the next few blog posts, I’m going to address thankfulness and gratitude and it’s something we all need to think about.

As I’ve been thinking about Thankfulness and Gratitude (I think about those two things a lot!) there are a few things that have stood out to me very clearly and distinctly, and I’m going to focus the next few blog posts on what I’m learning (again, for the 1000th time) about the peace and power of learning to Simply Be Thankful.

Levels of Thankfulness – Stages of Gratitude

One really important thing as I’ve focused on Gratitude and Thankfulness is that I’ve begun recognizing levels or stages or qualities of Thankfulness in myself. It’s not necessarily a linear progression from one to the other. It can be parts of all or it can be one for one situation and another for another. And it can be most or all of these at the same time for me.

I’m talking about:

    • Circumstantial Thankfulness – Thanks for the blessings!
    • Comparative Thankfulness – Well, I guess it could be worse!
    • Thankfulness In All Things – In Everything Give Thanks
    • Whole Life Thankfulness – I’m Thankful for my life!

I’m learning that “Gratitude is an Attitude” (see what I did there?) of the heart, not a reaction to circumstances.

Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 NLT)

The transition from Gratitude as a momentary warm, fuzzy feeling prompted by circumstances, to Gratitude as an attitude of your heart, a settled response to God and his goodness, is a process. It’s a process that involves joy and pain, blessing and loss, and it’s worth its weight in gold!

I’m learning that you can be thankful IN everything, without being thankful FOR everything!

No matter what happens, always be thankful, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 NLT)

In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. (1 Thessalonians 5:18 KJV)

I’m learning that Gratitude doesn’t come through having what you want, it comes through wanting what you have.

Be consciously and intentionally grateful for what you have and don’t waste the moments of your life whining and complaining over what you don’t have!! Express gratitude and thanksgiving continually!

When I look back over the years the most thankful things I remember have not always been the easiest things! The greatest challenges have resulted in the greatest progress in my maturity, attitude, and character! The greatest challenges have resulted in the greatest Gratitude to God! I love it when things go smoothly, but when I face challenges and God comes through, sometimes the Gratitude is almost overwhelming!

So, here’s my plan: For the next few (three or four?) posts I’m going to dig into some of these things I’ve been learning about Thankfulness and Gratitude. I hope you’ll stay with me as we explore Thankfulness and Gratitude and I’m very, very confident it won’t be a waste of your time or mine! (And I’m torn between using the word Thankfulness and using the word Gratitude.) I like both words a lot, so I think I’ll use them both in these posts!

It’s not happy people who are Grateful, it’s Grateful people who are happy!

As always, I’d love to hear from you and I welcome your comments and questions. If you’re reading on the blog, leave a comment below. If you’re reading from the email, click “Reply” and tell me what you’re thinking.

 

 

 

Not Disappointed Part 4 – Not Disappointed in the Life God has Given Me

May 4, 2021

I’m not disappointed in the life my Good Father has given me, and my Good Father is not disappointed in me!

I’m going to briefly review the three previous posts on disappointment before wrapping this up. I’ve included links to each of the other three and if this series has been relevant to your location on your journey of faith, I encourage you to read through them again.

Part 1 Personal Identity Statement: I am God’s beloved child and God is not disappointed in me!

The story of how God gave me my Personal Identity Statement: “I am God’s beloved child and he is not disappointed in me!”

Part 2 Very Disappointed: We get disappointed in each other and even in ourselves sometimes.

Disappointment is based in expectations. If we get our expectations right, we can avoid a lot of disappointment. Also we need to clarify in our own minds whether we’re disappointed in the person or in a specific action or attitude. In many cases our disappointments in ourselves and others means we’ve been judging! Not recommended by Jesus.

We can learn too much from a life lesson or an experience. I had an experience when I was 17 in which I learned that my dad and my mom were very disappointed in me. I thought the lesson was that they were ALWAYS DISAPPOINTED in me and actually they were TEMOPORARILY DISAPPOINTED in my immature behavior.

Was my dad disappointed in me that night? Of course he was! Or maybe actually he was more frustrated by my behavior. I had, in a variety of ways, failed to fulfill his expectations of me, of my attitude, of my behavior. But my dad loved me and even though he said he was disappointed in me, it was actually my behavior that disappointed him. I don’t think he was wishing he could trade me in for a different son. At least I hope not!

That experience so impacted me that I apparently stuffed it away and didn’t remember it until God helped me know fifty years later that God is not disappointed in me.

Part 3 Not Disappointed: Why God is Not Disappointed in You! (LINK)

Is God disappointed in me? No!

Here’s a legitimate question: How can you say God is not disappointed in me? I’ve done a lot of things I’m disappointed in! I’ve failed to do a lot of things I should have done! Here’s how, friends! God knew exactly what to expect of us, in advance, even before we were born! So if God knows what to expect of us, and if disappointment is based in unfulfilled expectations, how could God be disappointed in you and me?

    • God’s expectations of you are that you will do exactly what he knows you will do, and he loves and accepts you anyhow! Remember disappointment is all about unfulfilled expectations. God has realistic expectations of you and me.
    • God knows where you will stumble, where you will fall, where you will disappoint yourself and others.
    • God sees you on the other side of your disappointment and God works with you from that perspective.

Don’t miss this, friends! If God is omniscient (meaning God knows everything, past, present, and future), then God won’t be disappointed when the thing he already knows is inevitable happens. God has a plan that sees us on the other side of the failure, repented, converted, and moving forward in his purpose for us.

Part 4 Not Disappointed in the Life God has Given me.

    • We get disappointed in others.
    • We get disappointed in ourselves.
    • We get disappointed in God.
    • We get disappointed in the Life God has given us.

Disappointment is sourced in unfulfilled expectations. In order to avoid disappointment, we must develop realistic expectations. Short form: Get the expectations right, eliminate the disappointment. This is simple, but it’s certainly not easy! I’m working on it…

Friends, I’m not pushing you to reach the same conclusions I have about disappointment. I’ve been working through my relationship with disappointment for most of my 78 years of life, at least for the part of those 78 years I knew what disappointment felt like. From the early part when I learned from my mom that in a world of lack, if you don’t get your hopes up, you won’t be disappointed. From the part where I learned that my behavior had made my parents “very disappointed” and I thought that they were disappointed in me rather than in my behavior. From the part where my brand of the Christian faith taught me that God was pretty much always disappointed in me because God is perfect and holy and God can’t look on “sin” and I was pretty sinful. Following that line of thinking, it seems as if God must have been really inconvenienced by the conflict between his love for me and the reality that much of the time he couldn’t really stand the sight of me. (I’m smiling here! I know better now!)

Then, in my 60’s, my journey of faith took me into regions I hadn’t traveled before, and I discovered that God was, first and foremost, my loving Father. God is my Good, Good Father. I realized that in our attempt to eliminate the mystery of faith and to encapsulate a limitless God in a completely knowable and understandable box for safekeeping, we’ve been missing a lot! At least I was missing a lot! I’m finding more and more of what I’ve been missing. And my new reality is that when I find something more, in order to embrace it fully, I often have to let go of something. You know what I mean?

What has God promised you? Find God’s Spirit-inspired, Spirit-quickened promises that are relevant to the place in your journey you find yourself and wrestle with the application of those promises to your life. This is what must form our expectations.

Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him. (Psalm 62:5 NLT)

My soul, wait thou only upon God; For my expectation is from him. (Psalm 62:5 KJV)

My identity (a gift from God, by the way) is “I’m God’s beloved child and he’s not disappointed in me!” I’m learning to live into that day by day. I rejoice in knowing that my identity is secure when I do well and when I don’t do well, when I succeed and when I fail. I see it more clearly, more often. I get there and connect with the reality that God is not disappointed in me more often these days and I stay there longer. Someday I’ll fully live in the light of the truth that “I’m God’s beloved child and he’s not disappointed in me!”

In the meantime, I journey through the valleys and along the ridges. Sometimes I rest in green pastures and sometimes I walk through the dark valley. But it’s still me, beloved of God, accepted and approved, doing the walking and the resting.

This “Not Disappointed” series of blog posts represents processes at work for more than half a century of my life and it’s still not finished! Enjoy the trip. Safe travels!

As always, I’d love to hear from you and I welcome your comments and questions. If you’re reading on the blog, leave a comment below. If you’re reading from the email, click “Reply” and tell me what you’re thinking.