Car gets a flat tyre, your child gets gastro, husband loses job and your first reaction is probably not to thank God.  Sigh, swear, complain or even scream are more likely, right? We don’t associate thankfulness with problems or hard times. Bit like, we don’t associate relaxation and reward with low sugar, non fatty foods. But is that lack of association of thankfulness and hard times a healthy one?

Last Purposeful Parenting post we took a glance at the association we build around relaxation/reward and sugary foods. It goes like this: we end a long day with some tele, a glass of wine and some choccy. Then we start ending every day with some tele, wine and choccy. Or our kids create the habit of consuming multiple sugar treats at the end of the school day to reward their return to home base. It’s a recipe for diabetes or some other health issue if not balanced with exercise and better food groups. But as we saw last time, our minds can master our body so that we retune our bodies to associate good foods with relaxation. This means we start to crave, over time and practice, better food choices or exercise rather than just hitting the sugar bombs.

Our ability to have dominion over our bodies, retraining our minds to search for better alternatives, got me thinking about something bigger, namely, how we respond to difficult situations. Challenges in life, discouragement, chaos can bring out the best or worst in us. Watch an episode of Bear Grylls and you’ll see how the ability of a person to be resourceful, dig deep and remain positive gives them the edge to survive. As soon as you turn inward and develop a negative internal monologue, you’re lowering your chance of survival.

So think for a second how you instinctively, habitually respond to challenges and upsets in the week. Do you curse, complain or go sullen? What’s your internal monologue…? ‘Why me?’ or ‘why God’ if you’re a person of faith?

Sometimes we’ll often hear people of all walks and beliefs say ‘you’ve gotta be thankful’. Why? Here’s the usual reasons:there’s always someone worse off

• you’re forgetting all the good things you have (aka ‘count your blessings’)
• you’re focusing on the present difficulties when they are momentary and will pass
• life’s better viewing it as ‘glass half full’ instead of ‘glass half empty’

Now all these things are good and helpful for staving off our mind’s anxious cravings. According to recent research, unchecked, long term anxiety can spiral into some form of depression. By applying ‘thankful salves’ consistently we are trying to short circuit that spiral and keep looking up…keep surviving.

But to what or whom are we to be thankful to? Where do blessings come from? All these useful tips are ‘man-centred’. In the words of REM we can ‘take comfort in the crowd cause everybody hurts’; is there anything bigger?

Thankfulness is always directed to someone. We teach kids to be thankful to parents and teachers. We say thank you when someone helps us or shows us kindness. So to be able to count our blessings or see our glass half full and be thankful we need to come clean and recognise where our thankfulness is directed. It’s kind of nonsensical just to ‘give thanks’. It’s like we kind of like the idea of God being there, but we’ve chopped his head off and reduced him to the benevolent ‘force’ in the universe.

Check out this verse from the New Testament:
Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
1 Thessalonians 5:18

First of all notice the thankfulness is directed toward God. The most fitting human response is thankfulness, but it is God-ward, not man-ward.

Second, ‘give thanks in all circumstances’…now this is the challenging part?
Should the apostle Paul give thanks for being imprisoned when his God given mission was to jet set around the world to share the good news? I’m not sure he did give thanks initially. I think he learnt to give thanks. Especially, when he saw that his imprisonment meant he would share the good news with governors and kings.

Can you hear the Bible’s challenge to associate God’s goodness even with times in your life that are anything but good?

I’m not saying I’m there yet either. But I hear the promise faintly writ behind those words that making such an association is healthier for my soul and those around me. The unhealthy option is to immediately let my fear, anxiety and complaining to take over.  Our kids will learn from our habits. We can model to them a better way.

Let’s break the habit and turn to prayer. It might be a short one, but we will be showing our dependence on our maker and His love for us in all times. We won’t be held hostage to the transient good things we still have nor perpetual comparisons with those less fortunate. Instead we and our kids will be holding onto the eternal and the one who makes ‘everything beautiful in its time’ (Ecclesiastes 3).

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