Tag: appreciative

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So what happens ?

-When you plan to do certain tasks within a certain period of time only to realize the deadline is either here or past and you didn’t do the assignment.

-When you promise your friend(s),family member(s) or spouse that you are committed to fulfilling a promise but only to realize that you didn’t do your math well before you gave your word,how do you proceed from here ?

-When you promised your children that if they scored the right marks and improved on their grades,you will do anything they ask of,and when they keep their part of the deal and come to you with what you had asked them to do,your face now turns pale,sulky and starts looking for reasons and excuses why you can’t keep your word. So,what happens then with them and you?

-When you didn’t have that wife,husband and struggled alot and appeared miserable, but when you met her/him,your promises were over the roof how your were going to be there for them come rain come sunshine,till death do you part,but no sooner things started shaping well on your side excuses and reasons increased daily why you think you made a mistake or there is too much doubt with this relationship now.So,what changed for sure?

-Last but not least, when you were jobless,only knew one meal in a day,lived in that single iron sheet room with no basic amenities, and walked almost with a mental breakdown, but decided to seek prayer(s) at the church and you made all the vows to God on how if He remembered you,you would stay in His house and tithe faithfully to the church because it stood with you in time of need,but as soon as the Lord laid His favor and grace on you and things started turning green on your side,you quickly forgot that it’s only fools who make vows and fail to fulfill them and God is never pleased with them.So, did you lie to man or God and when did God become your contemporary to play around with?

My final question to you now is

What is really making us do all these kind(s) of somersault, foolish things and how do we expect by any chance that our integrity and character won’t be questioned by the very people whom we first portrayed ourselves to as keepers of our words and actions?

-End-

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Developing the spirit of Gratitude

Let me start today’s blog by asking a simple but profound question? When you wake up in the morning and see the sun risen, rays penetrating through the window, hear the sound of birds chirping while jumping from one tree to another what comes into your mind immediately?

That is why I have decided that today I would want to remind us the importance of developing the spirit of gratitude to both God and those around us.So what is gratitude in a nutshell? It is the quality of being thankful, appreciative for and to kindness extended or received from someone. So are there instances in your life you have been a recipient of kindness? How big was the kindness, how did it touch or transform your nagging and bothering situation?

Let us take an example from the gospel according to Luke 17:11-19 of Ten Lepers Cleansed. These men when heard and saw Jesus in a certain village in Jerusalem, lifted their voices and said “Master have mercy on us” and Jesus’ response to their request was “Go, show yourselves to the priests ” and it was that as they went they were c;eansed.Remember my friend that leprosy was a contagious disease and is talked of so much in the book of Leviticus and how those who had it were treated and the process of cleansing from such.So what happened in verses 15-19,brings us to our discussion today on gratitude for we are told that one of them,when he saw that he was healed.returned,and with a loud voice glorified God.

Quick lesson from this man healed of leprosy; he recognized of the healing upon his body,knew that he would not be separated from other people any longer once he showed himself to the priest,Could mingle with others again and thus accepted into community,realised and recognized the source of his healing and finally felt compelled by the compassion shown to him by Jesus that he needed to be thankful for this great miracle of healing and cleansing.

There are countless good things that God has done to you or thousands of bad things He has saved or protected you from and yet might have not recognized or be thankful about and yet without Him showing compassion to you, you would not be where or what you are today. It is time to pause and do a thorough search of how thankful you have been or how ungrateful you have been for the many blessings or things done for and to you. The one Leper who came back to be grateful to Jesus must be a lesson to us knowing that once you and me were sinners and separated from the family of God but when we called upon His name in sincerity, He forgave us of our leprosy of sin, cleansed us and accepted us back into His great family of believers where we enjoy the family fellowship together continually. Jesus Christ is our High Priest who did it for us once and for all and we no longer need to go and see priests to declare us cleansed for Jesus Christ Himself us cleansed us from all sin.

Let me finish this segment on gratitude with these words ;

“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your achievement, you should include all things in your gratitude” Ralph Waldo Emerson.