the hardest thing to say...thank you

I sometimes am reminded about how blessed I am in a lot of different areas of my life. Some people like to call it luck…but I really dislike that term as it relates every good and bad thing that happens to chance. I actually used to think that way a long time ago. I suppose if we believe that we live by chance and total randomness then we live as victims of the whims of fate. Unfortunately, the problem with that is we don’t have to accept any responsibility for anything that happens. We just say that we have good or bad luck. The other problem with living on luck is that you lose your ability to be thankful and have gratitude. This is a big deal to me because it removes God from the equation. I think being thankful and having the ability to recognize where all that I receive flows from is critical to understanding our purpose and connection to God. I tend to look at things very simply sometimes and having gratitude and being thankful is one of those things. I really believe that the reason that people so easily forget this basic etiquette is this unspoken sense of entitlement that we live by. A sense of entitlement robs others of the ability to bless me because I already believe I deserve what I am receiving and therefore am unable to be thankful. The core attitude of being able to give thanks is humility. Humility is defined as, "A quality by which a person considering his own defects has a humble opinion of himself and willingly submits himself to God and to others for God's sake." One can readily see that submission to God and others is a key component. Perhaps this is where the rub lies. This is where we fail to understand. This is where we fall down. We are not submitting to anyone or anything except for our own selfish desires. It is in that submission to God that we recognize the inadequacy of the skill sets and talents we possess and become dependent and reliant on God just as He designed and intended. People, as we are prone to say, like to “live large”. We become legends in our own minds. We are measured by our Facebook and Twitter followers and blog statistics. Social media has become the barometer of our self worth and how we are valued by others. We assume a persona which is another word for a mask. This is not what God intended. We have become Gods bratty children expecting a cosmic “happy meal” with the latest cool toy inside. We have it all wrong. Very wrong. God wants you to have manners like back in the old days when we said please and thank you and may I be excused from the table. God doesn’t want you to wear masks because that interferes with people seeing Him in you. The thing that is... the most amazing part of all this is... that despite our inability to acknowledge the source of everything we have and are and to say thank you…He keeps right on giving. "Thankful people recognize their need, and the generosity and beneficence of the Giver, and every truly grateful person is humbled by the amazing gifts he’s received from God. So I see that true humility will always be accompanied by gratitude, and also, that those who are truly grateful will be growing in the beautiful characteristic of humility. May it be so for us."