The Lord has given, and the Lord has taken away! May the name of the Lord be praised. [Job 1:21b (GW)]
After struggling with the writing of a devotion, it was finally finished. Thankful, I listed its completion in my gratitude journal that night. The next morning, I discovered it was lost—vanished into thin air and nowhere to be found (and believe me, I tried)! Looking back, I probably cut the devotion from my “Work On” file but got distracted and never pasted it into my “To Post” file. Unfortunately, by the time I discovered my error, both files had been saved in versions without the words over which I’d labored so long. When it became clear that those paragraphs truly had vanished into the black hole of my computer, I was annoyed with myself and upset, upset enough to want that thanks entry crossed out in my gratitude journal!
“Hold it!” said that inner voice. “Do the troubles of today negate the joys of yesterday? Just because you no longer have something, is that reason to stop being thankful for once having it? Remember, thanking Him for everything means for both gain and loss!” Oops. Sometimes, God teaches me lessons the hard way!
We all make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes cause us to lose far more than several hours and a few paragraphs—we can lose friendships, marriages, custody, jobs, health or houses. Sometimes, errors can be repaired and lost things recovered but not everything can be mended or retrieved. Nevertheless, we must never stop being thankful for what once was, no matter how briefly we held it. It’s not God’s fault when we mismanage His blessings. That we can learn from our mistakes is more reason for gratitude!
Thank you, Heavenly Father, for all that has happened in our lives—the good, the bad and everything in between. Some events were welcomed as beautiful gifts and others were less appreciated as lessons, but we were blessed by them all.
I’m most proud of the blessings that God has bestowed upon me, in my life. He’s given me the vision to truly see that you can fall down, but you can still get back up. Hopefully I’ll learn from my mistakes and have the opportunity to strengthen and improve the next thing I do. [Martin Lawrence]
His testimony enraged the Jewish high council and he was taken from the city and stoned to death. Stephen was the first of the Christian martyrs but clearly not the last. We’ve all been horror-stricken by the recent news from Egypt where ISIS thugs attacked Coptic Christians on their way to a remote monastery. According to witnesses, the men were told their lives would be spared if they recited the shahada, the Islamic declaration of faith. When they refused to do so, they were gunned down. Since December, more than 100 Coptic Christians have died in Egypt in four different attacks. On Palm Sunday, two of their churches were bombed leaving forty-four dead. It’s not easy being a Christian in Egypt.
The “Last Lecture,” a tradition at many universities, is given by a professor as if it is the last one delivered in the speaker’s lifetime. Hoping to inspire the audience to become better versions of themselves, the lecturer usually reflects on his life’s journey and shares his hard-earned wisdom. New meaning was given to this tradition in 2007 when Randy Pausch, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, gave what truly was his last lecture. Terminally ill with pancreatic cancer, he was dead less than a year after giving it.
The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without a sound or word; their voice is never heard. Yet their message has gone throughout the earth, and their words to all the world. [Psalm 19:1-4 (NLT)]
“We can’t attack those people! They’re too strong for us! … The land we explored is one that devours those who live there. All the people we saw there are very tall. … We felt as small as grasshoppers, and that’s how we must have looked to them.” [Numbers 13:31-33 (GW)]
I recently happened upon a YouTube video about a goose and two police officers. A mother goose kept pecking at the window of a parked Cincinnati police car. When the officer opened the door, the goose led him over to one of her babies; it was tangled up in a string tied to a balloon. Concerned that mama goose would attack if he came close to the baby, the first officer stayed back. His partner was a woman and a mother; seeing the anguish of another mother, she went forward and carefully untangled the little gosling while its mama patiently watched and waited. Once free of the twine, the baby rejoined its siblings and the family swam off with their mother.
Devotions of the Heart 