We need to have a grateful heart. There are a few simple things we can do to develop a grateful heart.

• PAY ATTENTION FOR OPPORTUNITIES

One is to pay attention and look for opportunities to show people you care about and appreciate what they did for you.  Simply meaning it when you say thank you. If you were raised right, your parents taught you to say thank you when someone helped you. This is often just an automatic reaction to say. It’s not that you don’t mean it when you say it.  But think about the words when you say them, show sincerity.

Example: Have you ever gone through a drive-thru at a fast-food restaurant? The cashier hands you the bag with your order inside and says, with a tone like they don’t care, they mumble, “Thank you. Have a nice day.” You don’t feel like they meant it but were being coerced to say it.

But you go through another time and the person is friendly and smiles. When they say the words, they are intentional and act like they mean it.  It makes you want to go back to that restaurant.

We need to pay attention to our attitude when we say thank you to God and be intentional with our words.

• TALK TO GOD OUTSIDE OF PRAYER TIME

Make a habit, before your feet hit the floor each morning to focus and thank God for waking you up. Thank him for the blank slate ahead of you. Depending on your day, this could also be a good way to get your mind set ready for your devotional time and prayer time.

Some people get all legalistic that you should read your bible and do your study at the beginning of the day. But not everyone is wired to do that and not everyone’s life is structured so that can happen. I think God understands if we don’t spend two hours in devotions every morning. As long as we start our day with gratitude and with prayer. But we need to find time in our day to be intentional about our study of the word and devotions.

You don’t have to be knelt down at an altar or on the floor to pray. It is good to not be distracted by anything else.

I used to drive an hour each way to work and back. That was my time to talk to the Lord and reflect on the things that I needed to do. I always have worship music going anytime I am in my car. I would sing and worship the Lord.  Many prayers have been said behind the wheel of my car.

Sometimes I have had to pull over when going through something that made me need to dig down and pray hard. There is nothing wrong with pulling over in a safe place and focusing on prayer and worship. I had days that I considered that to be enough. It is like I checked off my prayer box for the day. But I now know better. It is not an obligation, like the cashier saying thank you.  But it is because we really want to talk with him.

Our walk with God is not a checklist. It is the way we live our lives. Prayer time should be about lifting up others and asking God what he wants in our lives. This should come before any request we have of our own.

The second point under this category is at night after your day is done. After you’ve said your prayers. Take a moment to simply thank God for your day. If it was good, then thank God for a good day. If it was a hard day or what we would consider bad, Thank God for it. (In everything, give thanks) We can thank him for helping us through it. We can be grateful that it was not worse. Then say I release the stress of this day to you Lord. Because he is better able to deal with it than we are capable. I am thankful for a good night of rest ahead.

• KNOW WE HAVE VICTORY

I COR 15:57 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

We have victory. There are times when we may not feel very victorious. Even in those times we have victory because of the blood of Jesus. We often don’t see things clearly because of our emotions. We can’t see the big picture of how things are going to work out. We feel like we are defeated, but that is the enemy’s way of distracting us from the goodness of God.

God is faithful to pull us through anything we face in life. When bad news hits us like a semi-truck, we don’t feel victorious. We feel pain that has flattened us and taken the wind from our lungs. God is right there making sure we have air in our lungs to just keep breathing.

He already sees the way we will rise from our ashes and hurt. He sees us victorious. Even when we cannot imagine ever being in a place of victory. The same thing goes for anyone struggling with an addiction. God sees them on the other side of that struggle. He sees them victorious. But they cannot imagine a time when they will have victory.

Job is the perfect example of this; he had the victory. God knew that he would not let his circumstances dictate his victory. Satan tried everything. To everyone things looked like Job would never have victory again. But he held onto God through the process. He came out the other side victorious. Victory was always there; they just couldn’t see it for the circumstances. (We walk by faith and not by sight)

We need to be intentional with our prayers and our Christian walk. We never know when we are being watched by someone. The way we live can be a light to the world if we are walking with integrity. Looking unto Jesus in all things.

Until next time, BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS.

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