Lifting up your hands and thanking God is spontaneous and easy when you have just received a wonderful blessing: “God, I can’t thank You enough for this miracle!”
“Thank You Father, for answering my prayer!”
“Father, thank You for the windfall!”
Perhaps you came close to being in a fatal accident, but God plucked you out of danger just in time. Or your grandmother, an unbeliever for many years, finally received Jesus as her Savior and got healed of a long-term disease.
But there are times when you don’t feel like lifting up your hands to thank and praise God, yet you do it. Perhaps you feel very discouraged lately. Perhaps everything is going wrong for you and you feel like your life is in a mess. You can’t hold back the tears. Yet, you make a conscious decision to lift your hands and thank God for being in the situation with you. You open your mouth and begin to praise Him even though you really don’t feel like doing it.
In the midst of the trial that you are going through, you praise Him that He is your righteousness in spite of all the mistakes you have made. You thank Him that He is your Prince of Peace, and that His peace will arise in you and still the storms in your life.
My friend, God sees and appreciates such times when, despite feeling so discouraged, you offer a freewill thanksgiving offering to Him. In fact, your thanksgiving during such times is more highly prized by Him than your thanksgiving during those times when you are feeling joyful because you have just been blessed.
And when you choose to thank Him for His unfailing love, and His faithfulness to deliver, protect and provide for you even when you don’t see the blessings yet, before long, you will find yourself experiencing and enjoying the blessings! So lift your hands and praise the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endures forever (Psalm 106:1)!
"I'M HERE TO TELL YOU EDITOR'S NOTE
The Lord's enduring mercy does endure forever. It's there when you don't see it. It's there when you don't need it. It's there always and especially when we run out of our own power. God loves to show us His enduring love. We like to do things on our own and only when we need help, we turn to God. This isn't right. We must learn that we can do nothing without our Lord. He is controlling our very breath and blood pressure. It' Jesus that made and holds everything together. Nothing was made that was made that He didn't make... and now controls. Your life and everything that happens today is dependent upon Jesus. So, why wouldn't we thank Him for it all? All the time? The Lord made you and saved you and redeemed you and loves you. Always, day and night and in any situation, look to Him to be your everything. Today, pray to the Father that you will have total confidence that Jesus is your everything and that because of His love we can always and without ceasing say 'Thank you'.
