The Lord is my strength and my shield; My heart trusts in Him, and I am helped;
Therefore my heart triumphs, and with my song I shall thank Him.
Psalm 28:7

Thankfulness. Even though this is not the post I have been working on to share this week, it seems obligatory in light of the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday to touch on the subject of thankfulness, especially in a year such as this one when many of us might be struggling with feeling thankful.

Even though we may be in the midst of a season of hardship and trial, I do believe it is a good time to truly ponder and consider the idea of thankfulness and what, for a Christian, should be the foundation of a truly thankful person. One who has a reason to give thanks in every circumstance. In light of that, I think the best thing I can do with this space is to share part of something I wrote a few weeks ago. It was originally intended to be shared with my church but I didn’t do that, so I am going to share it here, modified considerably for this setting.

I grew up in church and have been involved with almost every aspect of church life and service in some way since childhood.  But the churches of my youth and younger adult years were rather lacking in solid Biblical teaching.  As a result, when I entered the doors of this (our present) church with my children twelve years ago, I had a very distorted image of who God is and who I was in Him. 

As years passed and my children grew under the solid teaching of our church, my own life became increasingly more challenging and my freedoms more limited. I would hear the words of Apostle Paul spoken over and over … “Not that I speak from need, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am”  and I would be so frustrated, even a bit angry.  How does one do that?  How does one really learn to be content when their days and nights are filled with difficulty and trouble?  When their child with autism screams and rages or keeps them awake night after night?  When close broken relationships can’t be fixed despite following all the counsel you are given?  When life is just one hard thing after another and nothing you do makes it okay? How can I possibly be content?

You know I did not get the answers to those questions then, but I found myself faced with a different question altogether … the question of, Who is God?  You see, as life grew harder and all my old ways of coping with it were no longer effective or reasonable, I was faced with the reality that I did not know the character and nature of my God as I should.  I believed in Him and gave Him my life as a child, but my understanding of him was flawed and broken.  So, I opened my Bible to the very beginning and I began to read, asking Him to show me the truth of who He says He is.  As I read, pondered, prayed, and sought counsel, the Lord graciously began to enlighten the eyes of my heart and to teach me about Himself.  Even though the years have been filled with difficulty, those hard things were essential in helping me learn a proper perspective of who God is.

But you know, even with that growing knowledge, life didn’t get any easier.  Understanding the character of my God helped me step away from areas of sin and trust Him more each day, but I still often fought against the circumstances and hardships in my life.  Yes, I still listened to the voice of my God and grew to love Him more but I would grow restless beneath the trials of this life and the many restrictions that kept me limited.

Over the years I have learned much on the sovereignty of God.   I have long understood the concept of God being in charge and yet, I lacked the practical understanding and application of it.  For you see, if God is fully sovereign, then how do I understand my son’s autism and the many struggles of his life?  If God is fully sovereign, how do I make sense of  broken relationships that don’t improve no matter what I do?  If God is fully sovereign, then that means He chose me and He gave me the life I have for a reason.  I didn’t like that very much because it meant I couldn’t control any of it and I certainly couldn’t fix it.  

This past year has been hard. Between my oldest son’s increased emotional struggles at the beginning of the year and all the uncertainty and difficulty of shut downs due to the pandemic (especially how that impacted my son with autism) and the ongoing health issues of my Dad, it has been an unbelievably difficult and draining year.

When the doors to our church finally reopened (with restrictions), it meant a happy return to some sense of normalcy for many. But for me, one of my greatest concerns of the past year became a reality.  My autistic son, T, had settled into the new ‘normal’ of staying home so even the mention of returning to church  triggered intense anxiety. For the first time in my life, church seemed to me a closing door and, as it closed, I felt as if I was watching my last remaining lifeline slip away.  It was in this place, as life circled around in a frenzy of chaotic craziness, that I began to question everything and wonder if I was mistaken about everything I thought I knew about God. 

I felt abandoned … where was He in all this?

Sounds rather bad, doesn’t it?  But thankfully, my story does not end there.  You see, it was only when I came to the complete end of myself and all I could do to ‘fix’ things, that God Himself stepped in. He used this passage of Scripture from Lamentations 3 to anchor me in height of the storm … 

“Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness.  Surely my soul remembers and is bowed down within me.  This I recall to my mind, Therefore, I have hope.  The Lord’s lovingkindness indeed never ceases, for His compassions never fail,  They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness.  The Lord is my portion, says my soul, Therefore I have hope in Him.  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him.  To the person who seeks Him.  It is good that He waits silently for the salvation of the Lord.”

Aren’t you so thankful for His never failing compassion and faithfulness towards us?

Then the Lord, with all the firmness and tender mercy of a gracious Father, began to walk me through all the years and tears of my life, showing me His hand through it all.  He traced His rainbow through the rain and as I waited, He began to teach me what His sovereignty looks like in reality … in the daily, often hard things of life.  There is no way I can deny the works of His hands.

This is what I am learning: If God is sovereign, then He is fully sovereign.  That means His hand is in my son’s autism and all that entails. Every single aspect of it. It explains even the hard things in relationships that haven’t improved no matter what I’ve tried to do.  It explains why my world continues to grow smaller despite all I have tried to do to change and improve it.  God’s plan for me is something altogether different than I want. But, in His sovereignty, He alone knows the purpose of the hard things and the necessity of them in my life. 

It is a bittersweet truth but I am beginning to see the comfort of resting in the sovereignty of a holy and loving God.

I had mentioned earlier the words of Apostle Paul in Philippians 4, regarding being content, and how they frustrated me so.   I’d like to share them with you now. “Not that I speak from need, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with little, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.”

I was pondering the hand of God in all the day to day struggles of life when those words of Paul came to mind.  As I considered them this time and wondered anew at the deep faith of this Godly man, the Lord opened my eyes to something I had never seen before.

Paul could be content in whatever circumstances  he was in because he understood and rested in the sovereignty of God.  God is sovereign in both trial and prosperity, so Paul could be content and rest in either situation because of that.  ~Still seemed impossible to me~ But then he followed that up with verse 13, ‘I can do all things through Him who gives me strength.’ 

Oh my! That’s a key I’ve been missing all these years. The God who is sovereign and allows/causes/sets into motion every circumstance and situation in our lives is the same God who will give us the strength to live in contentment in those circumstances and situations. 

So then, not only does God gives us His strength to bear the crosses of this life, His strength enables us to live in contentment as well as we trust and rest in His sovereignty and goodness.

I have written and rewritten this piece so many times because it has been difficult bringing clarity of thought to this topic in a format such as this. It is only because I have been up much of the night with my son that I can offer this final edited version … this is the best I can do. However, these have been my thoughts over these last many weeks and what I am pondering in the days leading up to this very different Thanksgiving holiday. Life is not easy and for all of us, it is a bit uncertain. Personally, I am walking through a valley of grief as the Lord seems to be closing chapters in my life and moving me in a direction I never really wanted to go. But this I am learning to hold fast to, God is Sovereign and all His ways are good. I can trust Him in all things and learn to be content, even when I don’t understand. That is the place from which thankfulness comes, for when we can give thanks in every situation and season, we find contentment and rest.

I will give thanks to the Lord according to His righteousness
And will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High.
Psalm 7:17