Monday, November 09, 2009

Unrelenting Gratitude

It is oh so easy to be thankful for the good stuff that happens in our lives. It is much harder to give thanks for the tough stuff that may actually shape our character and spirit more. I came across this quote today and it serves as a grand reminder to praise God in all circumstances.

"To be grateful for the good things that happen in our lives is easy, but to be grateful for all of our lives--the good as well as the bad, the moments of joy as well as the moments of sorrow, the successes as well as the failures, the rewards as well as the rejections-- that requires hard spiritual work.
Still, we are only truly grateful people when we can say thank you to all that has brought us to the present moment. As long as we keep dividing our lives between events and people we would like to remember and those we would rather forget, we cannot claim the fullness of our beings as a gift of God to be grateful for.
Let us not be afraid to look at everything that has brought us to where we are now and trust that we will soon see in it the guiding hand of a loving God."
~Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey

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