November Prayer Topic: Intentional Gratitude

What am I grateful for today?  What are you grateful for today?  Who am I grateful for? Who are you grateful for? I imagine that you could make a list for both “the what” and “the who”.  During this month we want to be intentionally grateful.

If I stop for a moment and think, I could name a list of those things that I am grateful that is quite long.  It includes everything from waking up today to it being pay day.  I am thankful that I can share my thoughts on this blog. I am grateful that it is that time of year where there is a little crispness to the air, and the leaves are changing colors.  There is a breeze today, and I love the wind.  

These are just a small handful of what I am grateful for today as I write this.  What are you grateful for today?  I can only imagine that you have a lot to be grateful.   Take a moment to name of those things that you are blessed with.  Again, you don’t have to look at just the big things.  It could feeling the sun on your face after working indoors all day.

“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good!  His faithful love endures forever.” (1 Chronicles 16:34, Psalm 107:1, 118:1, and 136:1)

Do you realize that there are four verses in the bible that say the exact same thing?   Look up, 1 Chronicles 16:34, Psalm 107:1, Psalm 118:1, and Psalm 136:1, and you will see that each of these verses say the same thing.  It was a statement that was worth repeating. Give thanks to the Lord, for HE IS GOOD! His faithful love endures forever.

I give thanks to God for my family and friends, and I also thank God for those of you reading these words.   God has also blessed me with an amazing sister-in-law that is going on this journey of this blog.  I am grateful for her as well, and thank God for her.  She is my prayer warrior, who, if I am needing a prayer, is there to offer a prayer or words of encouragement.

           Last, but definitely not lease.  Actually, this is my top blessing. I am especially grateful for God who has my life in His hands.  I have given him my life, and I am grateful that he is the Author of my story.

 “For I know the plans I have for you.  Declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you.  Plans to give you hope and a future.” 

Jeremiah 29:11

          Jeremiah 29:11 is one of my favorite verses.  It does not mean that life won’t be difficult sometimes, or that tragedies will not happen.  To me it is another blessing to have God know the plans for my life.

Who are you grateful for?  Take a moment, and look on your life, and see who you are thankful for.   I am sure that you will come up with a list of people.  This month do your best to let them know what they mean to you.   They will love it.

An idea of how to let them know would be to send them a card letting them know why you are grateful for them.  Maybe, if you haven’t talked to them in a while, call them. Do something personal, maybe taking them to lunch, or buy them a coffee.

 There are countless ways to let someone know you are grateful for them.  It doesn’t have to cost a thing to tell someone that you are grateful for them.  Try it this month, and you will feel better too.

Dear Lord,

Right at this moment, I am not asking for anything.  I want to just thank you.  I thank you for all the blessings, both big and small, that you have given on me.

Amen

Laura Maxson

Living Intentionally!

 My God saved me, and put me back together. If you heard my story, you would hear of a God that is so amazing, and makes what has been broken, whole again. He took me from a broken mess with so much hatred and anger, and turned me into a complete person in Him.   He took a child who had been through something that a child should not have gone through, and made her a new creation.

God wants me to live my life to its fullest.  He has this amazing journey for me.  He knows the plans he has for me.  They are plans to prosper and not to harm me.  They are plans to give me hope and a future. (~Jeremiah 29:11, paraphrased)

Yet, sometimes I take a detour unto the highway of my own way.  I try and live life on my own terms. On that detour, life seems so dull, and I ask myself is there more to life than this.  I become complacent.  Then the Lord will send a song on the radio like “My Story” by Big Daddy Weave.   It reminds me that God is redirecting me back onto His journey for me.  

God has done so much in each of your lives. We owe it to God to live life intentionally.  Every day I have to intentionally live my life that I have been given by God.  God has a plan that He desperately wants to reveal in my life.

It is easy to try and do it our way, or just go through the motions.  We work really hard, and we are so tired –sometimes.  We flop down at the end of the day, and realize that not once that day did we focus our eyes on God.  “Life” got in the way. 

This becomes a habit day after day.  We just go through the life on our own terms, and then cry out to God. “Why is my life not where it should be?”  We are so turned around that we don’t know where we are.  Sometimes we are too stubborn to stop and ask for directions from God.

God wants more from us then going through the motions.  He wants us to live intentionally.  He wants us to have a full life here on earth.   There is a plan, and the roadmap for each of us.  We get a turn by turn direction, and know our final destination. 

So, how do we get to living intentionally?  What does that look like?

And find out what pleases the Lord. ~Ephesians 5:10

That is it.  To live intentionally, we have to find out what pleases the Lord, and do it.  The best is yet to come, but we can live a full and fulfilling life here on earth.  God has His plan for our lives if we are open to receive directions from Him.

            We have to be intentional about it, though.  It is an every morning kind of decision.  You could even say that it is a moment by moment kind of decision.  It is not something that is just going to happen.  God will have to be number One in your life.  He will show you the path that He has designed for you. 

It will take action on our part.  It might even be uncomfortable for a little while until we finally realize our lives are so much better because of it.  God is our Roadmap on this journey of life.  If God is our Roadmap and Navigator then our lives are going to rock!  Besides that we will get to where God wants us to go.

“Dear Lord, you have this amazing journey planned for me.  Yet, often I take the detour of my own way.  Sometimes, I get so turned around that I am not sure where I am.  Thankfully, you are patient, and give me signs back to the correct road you want me on.   Every day, You have me on this amazing journey.  I pray that I keep my eyes on You.  Then I will be living—intentionally.   AMEN”

Laura Maxson

I Choose to Live Intentionally...

Intentional is described as an action performed with awareness; done deliberately, consciously, on purpose.  That is what I want in my life.  

Do you sometimes feel that you are just going through the motions of life?  Do you sometimes feel that there has to be more to this life? Do you sometimes wonder if you are following God’s plan and God’s will for your life? Do you intentionally surrender your life every day to God? 

I feel that sometimes I am just going through the motions in life.  I sometimes feel that there has to be more to my life then what it currently is.  I don’t surrender my life every day to God.  There are days that I try and do it on my own.

What does Living Intentionally look like?  It is more than making choices.  It is understanding why you do what you do, or why you don’t.  It is considering the consequences.  It is defining your values and making choices that reflect those values.

“For you created my inmost beings; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” Psalm 139:13-14

God designed us all uniquely.  We are fearfully and wonderfully made.  So, if I live my life intentionally focused on God’s Will, then I will be exactly where he wants me to be.  I will be doing what God wants me to be doing.

If God designed us in our mother’s womb, then He must have a plan for our life.  It is my job to stop going on my own strength.   When I feel that there is more to this life then what it is currently, I realize that my focus is on me.  My focus needs to be on what God wants in my life.  If I listen closely to Him, through prayer and reading of the bible, He will show me where He wants my life to be.  

“For God so loved the world, that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”  John 3:16

​God intentionally gave us His Son so that we could have eternal life.  It is our decision to accept that gift.  It is how we live life.  Do we intentionally live life for our Creator, or do we live for ourselves?

“Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you…” Jeremiah 1:5

​God created us.  In both Psalm and Jeremiah it mentions that God formed us in the womb.  He knew us before we were born.  If God created us, and knows us, then wouldn’t he know better than us the path that he wants for us?  He has given us free will, and we are free to live however we want.  He does have a plan that would be the best life possible for each of us.  

​However it is our choice.  Will you choose to stop going through the motions, and intentionally live life?  Will you choose to live intentionally? I choose to have this be the first day of living intentionally.

​So, this is the first day of the rest of my life.  It is the first day of living intentionally.  I cannot change the past, but that is okay.  It starts today. It is an everyday decision.  

“Dear Heavenly Father, help me to live intentionally.  I want to live my life, and not just go through the motions of it.  You created us in our mother’s womb, and you knew us even before we were born.  You have a plan for our lives.  Please show us the path that you want us to take. Amen”

Laura Maxson