Are you thankful for the good things?

When you make a list of the things that you're grateful for, what is on that list?   Are they all good things?  Typically that's the point, isn't it?  That we are grateful for the good things in our lives.

But what if we started being grateful for the not so good things?  What if we recognized that we would never appreciate the sun if it never rained.... that we would not appreciate food if we were never hungry... that we would not appreciate the lack of physical pain, if we never had any ... that we would not appreciate friends if we had never been lonely.  You get it ... .this list could go on and on.

This song makes the point that we should be grateful for seasons in our lives when there is something lacking -- for the lack of something helps us appreciate it more.  But I think there is another point to all this as well:  When we are grateful for ALL that God gives us, the good, the bad, and the really bad, it demonstrates that we trust Him to know what is best for us in the long term.  He stands at the end of our lives, looking back, orchestrating the things that make us most like Him... which is His goal.  And if making us more like Him involves some things that aren't "good" from our vantage point, then we need to trust Him to know what he's doing.  The hard seasons in our lives are things God can "work together for good" (Romans 8:28).

Listen to the song.  Maybe it will change your #ThankfulThursday list for this week.