Thanks in All Things

This one makes my heart so tender, it almost hurts.

"Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus"

(1 Thessalonians 5:18).

I've read and heard these words plenty of times, but coming from my 2-year old, they penetrate my heart in a new way.

Aila is pretty good at saying "thank you." Thanks when I put her breakfast in front of her. Thanks when I help her get something she can't reach. Thanks when she's stuck and I "undo" her.

But then there are her thanks over unpleasant things--to the extent I've not seen before in a child. Like when she had something sprayed into her face and I had to flush her eyes out repeatedly for 10 minutes. And as I doused her head over and over and over, she kept saying, "Sank you, Mommy" over and over and over. Or when I took her to go get her vaccinations, and even as we held her down, she tearfully cried out, "Sank you, Mommy." Or when I'm cleaning her skinned up knees with something that I know will help (but stings like the dickens)..."Sank you, Mommy."

It hurts my heart even to revisit these moments, because they all involve my little girl hurting in one way or another. But each of these moments also involve a parent putting a child through these things for her own good. And that her mouth would be filled with thanks in the midst of it SPEAKS VOLUMES TO ME about the thanks that should be in my mouth for the One who allows things--even those things that make it hard to say those grateful words--because they're for my good and His glory.

Thank You for provision

Thank You for help

Thank You for disciplining me

Thank You for redemption

Thank You for disappointment

Thank You for joy

Thank You for pain

Thank You, Lord. In all things, thank You.