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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Full Life: Thankful Hearts


"You will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all of your heart," Jeremiah 29:13.


My daughter loves life. She loves to smell flowers. She collects clover and dandelions in the spring like they are clusters of precious jewels. She told me just today that she loves the cold winter wind blowing across her face (and then she refused to wear her coat in our 30 degree weather...ugh).

I wonder why I don't love those things as much anymore?

Sometimes, in my hurry to the next thing, I forget to marvel at the wildflower. I forget that each flower contains a miracle of microscopic wonder. Why have I grown weary of pondering the pistils and stamens of the world? And why do I turn up the collar of my coat and resist the refreshment of the wind?

Is it this childlike wonder that makes for a full life? If it is, I want it back!

I want to see that each fleeting moment holds a tiny miracle to appreciate. Ann Voskamp says in her book, One Thousand Gifts, that living life fully begins with the giving of thanks. But to be thankful I must first recognize the things that I should be thankful for. That means I have to slow down and intentionally enter life moment by moment.

Ann also says that thanks makes now a sanctuary. "But the busyness of life often leaves little time for the source of your life," says Voskamp. (find out more about Ann and her book here: http://www.aholyexperience.com/).

"In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." John 1:4.