Choosing Gratitude

I am currently working on the devotionals from the book Choosing Gratitude: Your Journey to Joy by Nancy Leigh DeMoss.

Each day of the 30 day devotional we are to keep a gratitude journal. Today we were to make a top ten list of the things we are most thankful for. Here is an excerpt from today's journal:

Scripture Reading: Romans 11:33-36 “Oh the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments and his paths beyond tracing out! 34- Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor’ 35’Who has ever given to God that God should repay him?’ 36For from him and through him and to him are all things, To him be the glory forever! Amen.

Key thought or insight gained by Scripture reading in relation to thankfulness.
All things come from God, through him and to him. He does not owe us a thing! We have nothing to give Him that He has not first given us. And yet He gives to us. We should be thankful!

Responses to questions in devotional. What is my top ten from my lists so far of things I am grateful for:
1. Jesus Christ! Salvation and looking forward to a better place to live than this fallen world.
2. Husband that loves, cares for, provides for and protects our family. Grounded in the word and spiritually growing.
3. Health and ability to take care of my family, and health of my family
4. Scripture to guide us and point us in the right direction. That is the living, breathing, word of God that is truthful and relevant today as well as yesterday and tomorrow.
5. Friends and Family of Believers
6. Being able to stay at home and also homeschool my kids. Time and resources to invest godly values in my kids.
7. Being able to serve God in ministry and supporters that God used to provide a way to make that happen.
8. Electricity, Safe drinking water, safe place to live, vaccinations for kids, warm, dry house.
9. Freedom to worship and a local fellowship that is Biblically based as well as resources such as Wretched and WOTM!
10. That I am a work in progress, that God does not leave me alone or stagnant. That He is completing a work in me and through me that He set in plan before the world even came to be.

Write out prayers in response to study and meditation. Thank you so much for the refocus on the fact that all we have is from you and to you and through you. That there is nothing we have that is not from you, and that you do not give to us because we owe you something but because you freely give to us and love us, even beyond salvation. I thank you that I can rest in you that I am not left to myself to grow and live on this earth but you are the one, true God that is alive and active. That you are loving and trustworthy. That I can rest in You while I work to grown and learn. That you are working in me and through me, even through my mess ups and wrong choices and distractions.

What the Lord shows me about gratitude as I make this a focus of my thinking. Gives me a completely different perspective and outlook on life, but more importantly a proper perspective on God.

What heart issues need to be addressed, “triggers” to ingratitude that I need to watch out for: Judgementalism and my tongue.

What are some helps in becoming more grateful: Daily reading of the word and doing daily devotions

What are consequences of ingratitude and blessings of gratitude? The effect it has on me, and on how I treat others as well as how I effect others.

So there you go. Nothing that is earth shattering but what the Lord is working on in me through my devotions. And I am so thankful that He is working on me. I'd rather grow than be stagnant, and grow in gratitude.