My husband, Brad, was speaking at a church. Part of his message included the statement:  When you understand who God really is, you realize you don’t have problems-- you just have opportunities to see God work. During the Q & A time a woman asked:

What if the problems you have are due to your own bad choices?

The pain in her voice revealed the personal significance of the question.

Brad’s response is a great encouragement to us all:

A friend of mine posted on her Facebook page that she was looking at a mountain of laundry on her bed and was thanking God for it.  

Yes, you read correctly!  She actually thanked God for a mountain of laundry!  Why?  Because she saw the mountain as a testimony to the fact that her family has the clothes they need.  I love that!!

The genius of God’s command to give thanks for all things is that in a blink of an eye our focus moves from self and fixes on God.  

God is with you everywhere you go.  Every appointment, errand, conversation, disappointment and accomplishment—from the mundane to the extraordinary—God is by your side.  Sometimes our kids “get it” so much easier than we do!  A friend e-mailed me a story that made my heart smile:

She couldn’t move. High above the forest floor, she clung to the swaying treetop, paralyzed with fear. The fragile trunk wouldn’t hold her and the rescue worker who tried in vain to reach her. She had to come down to him… but she couldn’t move.

Roy robbed banks… a lot of them.  He ran away from home at 13, ending up in a Chicago apartment building known to house prostitutes.  Roy said they “raised him” and thus his life of crime began.  

When we met I was a young, naive, blonde haired, blue eyed co-ed trying hard to work my way through graduate school.  Roy, on the other hand, had just finished serving a 20-year prison term and was trying hard to navigate life on the “outside”. 

Sometimes we learn the most powerful lessons from the smallest among us. Minnie Moorehouse was an amazing little girl with wisdom well beyond her years…