Monday, November 22, 2010

On being thankful

On this Monday leading up to Thanksgiving, I want to leave you with a small passage from the book "The  Holy Wild" by Mark Buchanan that I came across while doing some reading.  This simple story stopped me in my tracks and forced me into prayer.

In a little dirt-floored church on Sunday evening in Uganda, the village pastor asked if anyone had anything they wanted to share.  A tall, skinny African woman from the back danced to the front.  "Oh, brothers and sisters, I love Jesus so much," she said.  "Tell us, sister! Tell us!" the Ugandans shouted back.  "Oh, I love Him so much, I don't know where to begin.  He is so good to me.  Where do I begin to hell you how good He is to me?"  "Begin there, sister!  Begin right there!"  "Oh, He is so good.  I praise Him all the time for how good He is.  For three months, I prayed to Him for shoes, and look!"  And with that the woman cocked up her leg so that we could see one foot.  One very ordinary shoe covered it.  "He gave me shoes."  The Ugandans went wild.  They clapped, they cheered, they whistled, they yelled.  But not me.  I was devastated.  I sat there broken and grieving.  In an instant, God snapped me out of my self-pity and plunged me into repentance.  In all my life, I had not once prayed for shoes.  It never even crossed my mind.  And in all my life, I had not even once thanked God for the many, many, shoes I had.

Jesus, give me a heart like the Ugandan woman, quick to praise You, and quick to humble myself. 

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