Thankfulness Project

Posted by Sheri | 0 comments

After a very rough year I vented on my blog and I received a few comments telling me I had it good.

Truly, I knew I had it good, I just wanted a few minutes to let it out and instead I was bombarded with well-meaning comments letting me know exactly how off base I was.

Yikes! And a good morning to you too!

I was extremely upset by the comments and edited the post 1,2,3…4 times before I gave up on it. I tried to answer the comments and explain that it was a momentary lapse in judgment, a quick little blip on the “thankful” screen and even that I was just human, I was just talking, letting it out, like a teapot who has to whistle or boil over.

No answer I gave was “the right one” and as is typical for me I continued to try to explain, tumbling over my words, digging myself deeper and deeper.

Finally I deleted the whole thing and wrote something like this:

I know that every cloud has a silver lining. I usually have no problem seeing the silver linings, but today my eyes got tired of looking up and instead I looked down. It was my fault. I looked away.

I decided the only way to fix the problem was to take the blame. Blame myself in a “how dare I’ moment. But then I reread what I wrote. I read the final sentence. “I looked away” and that spoke to me. No matter how tiring it is looking up it is something we must do:

Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always. -I Chronicles 16:11

So I began to think about it and although the words hurt I knew I had to be more thankful. This confused me. I WAS thankful. But I realized I wasn’t vocal about it and I needed to be:

Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. -Ephesians 5:19-20

In response to this I did the best thing I could. I began “The Thankfulness Project” to date this is a small group of bloggers who post what they are thankful for daily in the sidebars of their blog. As you play along you become more and more thankful and notice the small things. I have yet to be thankful for the rough year, but I am certainly thankful that the Lord helped me through it. I hope you’ll join me in my year of thankfulness.

Sheri (with the help of her fabulous husband Mike) began homeschooling her four children in 2001. She spends her time creating whatever she can out of nothing to make her house more homey, creating lesson plans, and listening to her son’s garage band and writing how God is carrying her out of the depths of depression. You can catch up with Sheri at her blog, be sure to check out the on-going Love Story she and her husband are writing while you are there!