Blackwater
12-26-2016, 01:02 AM
One of the lessons I relearn every year at this time is how neat and appreciated the "little things" in our lives are. Gave my DIL, who's the hardest person in the world to shop for, a good, "tactical" LED rechargable flashlight that she can keep in her car against some car trouble one stormy night. It has bright, med and dim settings, a strobe setting, and a "night light" that shines from the butt when you don't want much light. She gets any and everything she wants, and doesn't like things she doesn't figure she has a place for. She absolutely abhors "clutter." But this was something she really seemed to appreciate. She's not very knowledgeable about flashlights, and said the boys are always getting hers from her vehicle and "forgetting" to put them back. This one is plenty tough enough to be able to rely on.
And at the thrift store my wife manages, it's always illuminating to see the poor and working poor come in, trying to "stretch their money" at this time of year. The joy in their hearts and on their faces, when they find some little something that they want or need, is truly illuminating. Most of us are so blessed that it's hard for us to identify with these people any more. But if we can and do, there's a wonderful lesson in it for us all.
And one thing I believe it teaches us is that we are typically FAR too prone to overlook "the little things," and how much they mean to so many people in our world today. So one of the lessons I relearn every year at this time, is to simply appreciate all the little things in our lives that make us so happy. Truly, we take FAR too much for granted. A simple word here, a smile there, and .... well, it just plain matters. And that's really all there is to it. We in our nation today have adopted a rather cynical and pessimistic attitude. There are many explanations and reasons for that, I know, but the more cynical and pessimistic we get, the more of the "big things" we come to regard as "little things." That's just how cynicism and pessimism work.
So, for this and so many more good and valid reasons, let us all take inventory, and review our own attitudes. Chuch Swindoll has said and shown us how crucial our attitudes can be in this life. Let's re-adjust ours, one by one, so that we can see more of what's right in front of our eyes this coming year. I suspect we're going to need all the attitude checks and reviews we can muster up within us. It is starting out with great promise, but it's going to be a lot of hard and sometimes unappetizing work, to bring that promise to fruition. And we CAN, if we retain our cynicism and pessimism, allow it all to slip away through our fingers. We are at a critical time in our nation's history, and if we allow that to happen, we'll deserve what transpires as a result of our own neglect.
Praise God for giving us a great "fighting chance" to make our nation more like what it was always intended by God to be. May we all be up to that job. Praise God for the promise of this coming year!
And at the thrift store my wife manages, it's always illuminating to see the poor and working poor come in, trying to "stretch their money" at this time of year. The joy in their hearts and on their faces, when they find some little something that they want or need, is truly illuminating. Most of us are so blessed that it's hard for us to identify with these people any more. But if we can and do, there's a wonderful lesson in it for us all.
And one thing I believe it teaches us is that we are typically FAR too prone to overlook "the little things," and how much they mean to so many people in our world today. So one of the lessons I relearn every year at this time, is to simply appreciate all the little things in our lives that make us so happy. Truly, we take FAR too much for granted. A simple word here, a smile there, and .... well, it just plain matters. And that's really all there is to it. We in our nation today have adopted a rather cynical and pessimistic attitude. There are many explanations and reasons for that, I know, but the more cynical and pessimistic we get, the more of the "big things" we come to regard as "little things." That's just how cynicism and pessimism work.
So, for this and so many more good and valid reasons, let us all take inventory, and review our own attitudes. Chuch Swindoll has said and shown us how crucial our attitudes can be in this life. Let's re-adjust ours, one by one, so that we can see more of what's right in front of our eyes this coming year. I suspect we're going to need all the attitude checks and reviews we can muster up within us. It is starting out with great promise, but it's going to be a lot of hard and sometimes unappetizing work, to bring that promise to fruition. And we CAN, if we retain our cynicism and pessimism, allow it all to slip away through our fingers. We are at a critical time in our nation's history, and if we allow that to happen, we'll deserve what transpires as a result of our own neglect.
Praise God for giving us a great "fighting chance" to make our nation more like what it was always intended by God to be. May we all be up to that job. Praise God for the promise of this coming year!