Day 9 Gratitude Challenge

Today is Day 9 of the Gratitude Challenge hosted by the Blog Garden of Learning.  Each day I have been challenged to remember to be thankful for all things, large and small, good and bad. Don’t forget to visit and share your own story of gratitude.

What I am thankful for today is slightly different. Today, I am thankful for the problems I had yesterday. 

My day started out by my husband telling me he caught another mouse after I went to bed the night before.  I am upset that we are having a problem with  mice, so this was not welcome news. 

Also, the house we are renting needed both bathroom showers redone because of leaking. We had a handyman come last week and fix the kids bathroom. He was supposed to come back today to work on my bathroom and never showed up. This upset me as well,because I want to get the mess over and done with.

The final straw came when I went to my Dr. appt.  A little background on me, I have a slight quirk in that I am leery of going to the Dr. I have asthma and the last base we were at, the Dr. I was seeing made me question whether I was really having problems and since then I have not wanted to go back.  Well, I am having so many problems that I screwed up my courage and made the appointment.  When I arrived the requisite 15 minutes early ( military hospital requirement) I was told that I was late and couldn’t be seen.  Apparently the appointment clerk told me one time, and booked the appointment for an earlier time. Well, after losing my cool a little toward the nurse insisting that I was “late” and that they couldn’t fit me in, they found another appointment with another Dr. He was very, nice, but mentioned how anxious I was and did I want medicine to take care of it along with the asthma medicine.

All of this long background story to say that I am thankful for the problems. In my problems I am once again reminded to fall on my knees and cry out to God. I know that He cares for me. I know that Jesus died on the cross to forgive me for all my sins. My problems remind me “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7 ESV).

So, today is a new day and I am a new creation in Christ. As Martin Luther taught in his Small Catechism, “the Old Adam in us should by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.”

Thank you Lord for problems that make me learn to lean more fully upon You.