Sunday, July 16, 2006

I worry too much. Hey, you can stop nodding. I admitted it – you don’t have to rub it in. This week has been a week packed with character building opportunities. Not the kind that you as an outside audience can really see, but definitely the kind that kept me close to home and journal and nearly made my mind explode. And for those of you who get to hear from me on a daily basis, I apologize if some of it leaked out and almost made your minds explode too.

Yesterday I was working on a writing project that is still in the very early stages. God nudged my attention in the direction of Ephesians and told me I had some learning to do, so I dug a new notebook out of the corner of the closet and sat down with my Bible. I’m to the beginning of chapter one, verse three. This project has the potential to take a very long time.

But anyway, when I hit verse three, I saw these words: Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.

I didn’t even get out the journal yet. I am still in the thinking stages. And apparently God wanted to drive home the point He is trying to make, because at the end of our Pastor’s sermon this morning, he talked about being thankful each day – even if it wasn’t a monumental day. So the whole praise and thanks thing has me thinking…

…that I worry way too much. And in so doing, I don’t spend nearly enough time dwelling on the things I have to be thankful for. Something tells me that until I learn to do that, I’m probably going to be sitting on go, not collecting $200 or anything else.

So as I’ve been sitting here thinking over the past week – I thought of the following things I’m thankful for – and it’s just a starter list.

I have a Dad who knows how to hang chair rail and a Mom who knows how to sew – and a set of parents (the same people…just to clarify) who were willing to share said talents with a daughter who possesses neither. And because of a couple of days of very hard work, my brand new bedroom is dangerously near completion.

Free coffee. I was sitting at my desk this week, grumbling inside that because of a stupid decision I’d made earlier in the week, I was going to end up missing half price latte night at Tree of Life. Mid-complaint, one of the girls in my office strolled in with a rather enormous frappuccino from Starbucks with a mound of whipped cream on top. It was an extra drink they’d given her for free – did I want it? I guess God understands the need for coffee more than I’d given Him credit for.

Caller ID. Oh how I’ve missed it. It was one of the frivolities of life that I’d given up when Angela moved out, but a recent series of events has made me realize that it might not be a bad idea to get that back. No more spending $1.50 per call on *69 because I’m too OCD to not know who just called and hung up on me.

My haircut lady, Kelly. I visited her this week for the first time since the great hair disaster of 2006. (That was the coloring disaster that was my fault, not any sort of cut disaster on her part.) I walked in resembling a cross between Vanessa Huxtable in that one rather awkward season she had and Mia Thermopolis before she was made into the Princess of Genovia. I’m very thankful for people who know how to thin and cut hair! And of course, I had residual thankfulness for how she saved me from going to my reunion the color of Ronald McDonald’s love child.

Air conditioning. I get very cranky when I’m hot. Just ask the people in my office, as they’ve had to deal with me in the on-again-off-again air situation this summer while our building undergoes construction. On a day like today when I hear the heat index is somewhere around 400 (okay maybe a slight exaggeration), I’m thankful to write this to you from directly in front of the air flow and a thermometer that clearly reads 67. Life is good.

Selling articles. I got a check in the mail this week for two articles I just sold. If you could see my legs and arms, that have been through the war zone of Braeya’s loving claws, you’d know how thankful I am to have the money to rush her to the vet the very minute she’s eligible to have those suckers ripped out.

A patient God. This week He has heard the whole range of emotions and seen everything from giddy smiles to a few tears. And in every book I’ve opened, in every Bible study I’ve attempted, He’s had something to say to comfort me. I’m sure I’ve exasperated more than a few of my friends this week and I know I’ve flat out exhausted myself, so I’m thankful that He hung in there with me and kept meeting me with kind words.

I hope for the sake of your sanity that you’re not quite the worry-wart that I am. But whether you are or not, it never hurts to take a few minutes to be thankful and offer God the praise that He deserves. He really does put up with a lot from all of us. He might enjoy hearing words of appreciation for it.