Thanking God When We Don't Feel Like It

“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” - 1 Thessalonians 5:18

What happens when we don’t feel like giving thanks, especially during times of rising fuel prices, increasing mortgage rates, food shortages, job losses, and more? Amid unstable times, God asks us to focus on Him and His faithfulness, instead of our circumstances. He draws us to dwell on His promise to never leave or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5), and to trust Him to help us in every situation we face in life.

Some say if they aren’t really feeling thanks, then it’s fake and insincere to practice thankfulness. But thankfulness is not a feeling or based on what’s going on in our lives but rather it’s an offering to God.

God Calls Us to Be Thankful

God understands it can be difficult for us to give thanks during trying times but He wants us to be willing to be thankful even when we don’t feel like it.

Psalm 100:4, expresses God’s call to us to be thankful. “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name.”

His will is for us to approach Him with thankfulness. Yet many of us misunderstand God’s directive to give thanks in all circumstances, believing we’re supposed be thankful “for” everything when the truth is, God is asking us to be thankful “in” everything. Still some of us struggle with this concept, resisting thankfulness, thinking God is telling us to be thankful “for” the challenges. But we’re missing what He is really leading us to do, which is to be thankful despite the difficulties, to not let lack, losses, disappointments, and hurts keep us from expressing our gratefulness to Him.

Sacrificial Thankfulness

Throughout Scripture God emphasizes the importance of thankfulness, understanding that even if it’s sacrificial on our part, He is honored and glorified through it. Psalm 50:23, describes its benefits. “Those who sacrifice thank offerings honor Me, and to the blameless I will show My salvation.”

As well, Psalm 116:17, encourages sacrificial thankfulness. “I will sacrifice a thank offering to You and call on the name of the Lord.”

Still with our human weaknesses and frailties, it may feel like God is asking too much of us, especially during times of huge disappointments, unbearable heartaches, and tremendous losses. It can seem beyond our capabilities to offer Him thanks amidst such deep devastations.

Practicing Sacrificial Thankfulness

If it’s God’s will for us to give thanks “in” everything, how do we begin? Prayer is the place to start. Colossians 4:2 urges us to keep alert in our prayers with an attitude of thankfulness, which involves recognizing where ungratefulness can creep into our thoughts, words, and even our prayers.

At times when we think there is absolutely nothing, we can find to be grateful for in our lives, we can be thankful for Jesus Christ and the Salvation we receive through Him. Even when life seems empty, we can give thanks to God for His peace, presence, faithfulness, and comfort. As Colossians 3:17 urges, “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”

In experiencing everyday disappointments, job losses, natural disasters, financial stresses, and more, thankfulness helps us to cultivate a trust in God. Like Isaiah 12:2 assures, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The Lord, the Lord Himself, is my strength and my defense. He has become my salvation.” Even in situations that seem hopeless, like there couldn’t possibly be any good ever come from them, God promises to work them together for our good. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).

Intersecting Faith and Life:

If you’re finding thankfulness difficult to express, try beginning each day by finding one reason to be thankful to God, then throughout the day, take time to offer thanks to Him.

By: Lynette Kittle

Source: Crosswalk Devotionals

Lies with Truth

I set my Bible on the podium and stared at the eager faces waiting for me to begin the message. I’d prayed and prepared. Why couldn’t I speak?

You’re worthless. No one will ever listen to you, especially if they know your past. And God would never use you. Seared into my heart and mind, these words spoken in various ways over my life ignited a decade-long war against the lies I so easily believed. Though I knew the words weren’t true, I couldn’t seem to escape my insecurities and fears. So I opened my Bible.

Turning to Proverbs 30:5, I inhaled and exhaled slowly before reading out loud. “Every word of God is flawless,” I read, “he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.” I closed my eyes as peace overwhelmed me, and I began to share my testimony with the crowd.

Many of us have experienced the paralyzing power of negative words or opinions others have of us. However, God’s words are “flawless,” perfect and absolutely sound. When we’re tempted to believe spirit-crushing ideas about our value or our purpose as God’s children, God’s enduring and infallible truth protects our minds and our hearts. We can echo the psalmist who wrote: “I remember, Lord, your ancient laws, and I find comfort in them” (Psalm 119:52).

Let’s combat lies we’ve accepted about God, ourselves, and others by replacing negative speak with Scripture.

By:  Xochitl Dixon

A Life of Integrity

Abel Mutai, a Kenyan runner competing in a grueling international cross-country race, was mere yards from victory—his lead secure. Confused by the course’s signage and thinking he’d already crossed the finish line, however, Mutai stopped short. The Spanish runner in second place, Ivan Fernandez Anaya, saw Mutai’s mistake. Rather than take advantage and bolt past for the win, however, he caught up to Mutai, put out his arm and guided Mutai forward to a gold-medal win. When reporters asked Anaya why he purposefully lost the race, he insisted that Mutai deserved the win, not him. “What would be the merit of my victory? What would be the honor of that medal? What would my mom think of that?” As one report put it: “Anaya chose honesty over victory.”

Proverbs says that those who desire to live honestly, who want their lives to display faithfulness and authenticity, make choices based on what’s true rather than what’s expedient. “The integrity of the upright guides them” (11:3). This commitment to integrity isn’t only the right way to live, but it also offers a better life. The proverb continues: “But the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity” (v. 3). In the long run, dishonesty never pays.

If we abandon our integrity, short term “wins” actually yield defeat. But when fidelity and truthfulness shape us in God’s power, we slowly become people of deep character who lead genuinely good lives.

By:  Winn Collier

4 Practical Ways to Discern the Voice of God

1. Discern God's Voice Through Bible Study

“You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” (Jeremiah 29:13)

Prayer

We can wrestle with what we are struggling to understand, asking God to answer and reveal things in prayer. Our connection with Him deepens as we dive into His Word. His voice will often pop right off the page with a direct answer to the stirring of our hearts.

Nothing is coincidental with our God. When we are intent on seeking Him, He is faithful to be found. Use the powerful tool of prayer, conversation with the one true God, to ask for wisdom in discerning His voice through Scripture.

Discipline

Jesus awoke early in the morning to be with and talk to God. If He needed quiet time with His Father, we should be wary to walk out into the world unarmed.

There is no way around the discipline of studying God’s Word. In order to hear His voice, we have to know what it sounds like. And to hear it, we have to quiet all other noise.

“For God’s voice to sink into our minds and hearts, His words have to be there frequently, and they have to stay a while,” writes Liz Ditty, highlighting the importance of meditating on God’s Word. “Eastern meditation is characterized by clearing your mind,” she explains, “but Christian meditation is about filling our mind with the words, thoughts and images of Scripture.”

Repetition

“Hearing the voice of God is about so much more than knowing what to do,” Cara Joyner writes. “It’s about relationship.”

Studying God’s Word isn’t just a task we can check off each day; it’s involving Him in our daily lives. When we repeatedly let Him into the cracks of our hearts, He starts to sweep them out and make them new.

Similar truths will start to wave flags of victory in conquered parts of our hearts. We will begin to remember and recall His faithfulness as He answers prayers and speaks to us through different seasons of our lives.

2. Discern God's Voice Through Others

“As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.” (James 2:26)

Service

Created in the image of the one true God, we are meant to honor Him in everything we do. A huge part of our faith is reflected in the way we treat and serve others.

Jesus said, next to the most important commandment to love God with all of our hearts, that we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. We are placed in each other’s lives to teach, encourage, help, and hold each other accountable. When we are actively living a life of faith, He will connect a passage we read in the morning to a conversation with a friend.

Seeking God isn’t just absorbing scriptural truths; it’s allowing Him to extract what He has put in us and use it in the community He’s placed us in. The Bible tells us not to sit idle for good reason. When we move, our great God grows our faith and His voice becomes more recognizable.

Wise Counsel

Mentors in the faith are important. They can be found formally or organically, and as we seek more of God, we will find those people.

Prayerfully ask God to send spiritual mentors who can help you recognize God's voice and even speak His words into your life. We don’t need to seek out 'Pinterest-worthy' people; their lives will speak for themselves, and their knowledge of the word of God is vital. Their advice will come, not from their own prideful opinions, but from the truth of God’s Word coupled with real life experience.

3. Discern By Looking for the Good

“But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.” (Hebrews 5:14)

When we diligently study the Word of God, praying for Him to reveal hidden things and involving Him in our daily lives, we stack bricks on a solid foundation of truth. As we diligently aim to know and live the truth, we are increasingly able to hear His voice.

“As we seek truthful things, we’re forced to confront our own falsehood,” writes Hannah Anderson. “As we pursue justice, we must grapple with our own injustice. And as we search for whatever is lovely, we learn to reject the tawdry and pragmatic for things of eternal worth and beauty.” The more we know God, the more we know how far we all fall short. Remembering who He is reminds us we are all forgiven and never loved less.

4. Discernment Rejects Perfectionism

“Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly.” (John 7:24)

Perfection is impossible this side of heaven. One man, Jesus, lived a perfect life without sin. The more we learn to own and learn from our mistakes the wiser we will be.

Discerning, hearing God and understanding what He’s trying to say to us, requires our attention. Nothing gets our attention like pain. Painful circumstances cause us to focus intensely on Him for help. When we run from our mistakes, we are cheating ourselves of hearing Him.

“Discernment requires time and effort,” says Dr. Charles Stanley “You can’t simply move through life, thoughtlessly reacting to situations yet never learning from them. Take time to reflect on your responses and observe the consequences of your actions and choices. If you feel convicted by what you notice, let that motivate you to begin a lifelong pursuit of the Lord and His ways.”

Written by: Meg Bucher at Crosswalk.com

Published on: May 24, 2019

BreakPoint: Yes, Christians Do Hear God’s Voice

A Washington Post writer once said that evangelicals are “poor, ignorant, and easy to command.” Well, at least he didn’t say we were mentally ill.

Until now that is. On a recent segment of “The View,” Joy Behar took aim at Mike Pence’s belief that God speaks to him. Responding to a comment by another host, Behar said, “It’s one thing to talk to Jesus. It’s another when Jesus talks to you. That’s a mental illness if I’m not correct. Hearing voices.”

That’s a sign of how ignorant elites truly are about beliefs and practices common to something like two billion Christians.

I actually find it surprising that Behar, who claims to be Catholic, hasn’t found time in her seventy-five years to learn a little more about prayer.

Behar’s comment outraged Americans from coast to coast. Twenty-five thousand people let ABC know what we thought of a network that allows an employee to sneer at the way other people practice their faith.

The next day, Behar responded to her critics with a sarcastic clarification, saying, “I don’t think Mike Pence is mentally ill even though he says he is hearing voices.”

Wow. That’s some apology.

I’d like to propose a solution. I invite Joy Behar to spend some time looking into what Christians mean when they say they hear God’s voice.

She might start with the writings of J. Warner Wallace, a Senior Fellow at the Colson Center. In a piece posted by FOX News, Wallace notes that when Christians say, “God spoke to me,” they don’t “necessarily mean that God spoke audibly.”  Christians, he explains, “believe the Bible is the ‘word of God,’ and by reading it, [we] gain access to the mind of God.”

He points to 2nd Timothy, which notes that Holy Scripture is “God-breathed,” and Hebrews 4, which says “the word of God is living and active.” Reading these verses, one could see how Christians might legitimately say, “God spoke to me,” Wallace explains.

Second, God can use wise and mature advisors to teach us about God’s will–people who have invested long years reading and meditating over scripture. Wallace writes that a believer who says God spoke to her “may simply mean that one of God’s children provided them with Biblical wisdom.”

Third, God may speak to us through difficult experiences.  As C.S. Lewis writes in The Problem of Pain, “God whispers to us in our pleasures . . . but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

Fourth, God may indeed speak audibly to His followers. Many people have written about hearing God’s voice in a crisis. And in my own case, God spoke to me through an amazing, mind-blowing dream.

Bible-reading Christians know this. Open your Bible, and you’ll find all kinds of examples of each of the ways God speaks to His people—audibly, through prophets, and through the written word.

Finally, it’s worth reminding our media that, if Mike Pence is crazy for believing he hears God’s voice, then so are George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, FDR, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama—all of whom said they listened for the still, small voice of God.

I really do hope Joy Behar will give it a try.

And for more by J. Warner Wallace on Christian apologetics, please visit BreakPoint.org.

Written By: Eric Metaxas on BreakPoint.org

Published: February 27, 2018