Gratitude

Something good happened today, and I was filled with gratitude as well as this crazy urge to share my thoughts with everyone! :)  

I have been reminded, a lot, by people I know, of how important it is to praise and be grateful, regardless of the situation. And that in adopting a heart of praise and gratitude, our lives can be changed. 

I’ll be honest. It’s not the mystical enigma I thought it was for a while.

It’s the attitude we adopt, to look upon the life we are given by God’s grace. A while back, there was a talk about what God’s grace was – a gift we did not deserve (funny how things we hear in the talks can fit in place and help us in our lives huh. *hint hint* *nudge nudge* *wink wink* :P ).

Life. By God’s grace, we were given life. A chance to discover, to journey in Christ’s love, to know Him more and more, a chance to rehearse an eternity of heaven with God. We were blessed with the opportunity to know Him, to know one another, to find a community, to learn so much more about our faith and our God. I often wonder about what could have been if I were born elsewhere, if God had placed me in another family and if I may have never known God.

In adopting what some call the cloak of praise and gratitude, we learn to search for the blessings we receive by God’s grace (even something as simple as the fact that we are here, able to see and know of the catholic church) and to practise our faith. In fact, trying my best to praise even when I didn’t feel like I had the heart to praise is what brought me to this day. I didn’t understand how it works, but then someone explained it to me : it is the fact that even as we are troubled and in a state of mind that we can barely praise Him but still do, in trusting that He will make all right.  

I’ve seen how God has worked in my life as I learnt to do that, and the ‘chicken and egg cycle’ it can bring about : being joyful can make you grateful just as how the spirit of gratitude can bring you joy. Recognising the gifts we have is not just about the clichéd way of looking upon a half-full glass and being happy about it, in my opinion, but also about acknowledging that God Gave us this half-full glass and being thankful for it.

And in the joy the Lord has given me, I just wanted to share this quote I found as well as this prayer in my heart with my close friends : my brothers and sisters in Christ! :)) 

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And the Lord God prepared a plant and made it come up over Jonah,

that it might be shade for his head to deliver him from his misery.

So Jonah was very grateful for the plant.

Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing.

In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God.

— Saint Paul of Tarsus (3-67 AD), I. Thessalonians 5.16-18 (54 AD)

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Lord, I thank you for giving me this community of friendship and love, that I could have people by my side for the good and the bad times, as we grow together in love and faith, by Your grace. I thank you that you never abandon us, that you brought us together to help each and every one of us to grow, especially since a great majority of us are alone and away from home and family. 

 

Lord, bless those who have graduated, as they start to enter or have entered the workforce and begin to develop their career… as they leave behind university life as a student and possibly a community of friends and family in beginning this new adventurous chapter in their lives… as they grow a year older and wiser in Your love… Lord, help them never to forget the friends they made who helped them, in one way or another, to grow into the amazing people they are today, as well as to never forget You who sent them friends to journey with in faith – that even if they may not physically spend time with their friends (just as they would not physically spend time with You) they may always keep one another in their hearts.  

 

Also, Lord, bless those returning (or not) to their homelands, those enjoying their holidays and the opportunity you give us to spend more quality time with loved ones that You gave us to remind us of how much You love us. Dear Lord, as we approach the end of another beautiful year of knowing you and learning about ourselves and You, lead us into yet another beautiful one. 

Amen.