Tuesday, June 8, 2010

being thankful

Today I was pondering on some things that have been happening lately. I was faced with a choice. Be thankful or complain. Since the children of Israel were severely punished for murmuring and complaining in the desert, I chose to think instead on what I could be thankful for.

My dryer is not blowing hot air. It's not completely broken, just not drying the clothes.

Well, I have five clothes lines outside to hang my clothes on...but...

It's been so humid lately that it takes all day to dry the clothes...so...

I got behind on my laundry...but...

My mom lives about an hour away and graciously allowed me to bring a ton of laundry to her house over the weekend and do it all...so...

I finished my laundry and now only have to put it away...and...

Had a nice visit with my mom (and my girls and youngest son)...and...

Today the humidity was down and the clothes are drying on the line way faster than last week.

ALSO

We are faced with moving...soon.

So. I can either lament or complain, worry and fret.

OR...look forward to what the Lord is going to bring in our life.

There are so many things that we have to decide (the main one being where exactly to go)...but...

Things seem to be falling into place...and...

I look forward to writing a post soon on how everything has worked out...so...

I am choosing NOT to complain or worry about this move.

In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
- 1 Th 5:18


Until next time...


6 comments:

Celee said...

Yep, we can't control our circumstances, only our reaction to them. I commend you for your choice to praise God and make the best of it when things aren't exactly going your way.

Humble wife said...

Good attitude:)...by the way, by the time you are done hanging clothes up the first clothes you put up are dry in NM...no kidding!!
Jen

Kat said...

Hi, JenT.

I read this a few days ago just couldn't leave a comment. I kept it open on my firefox so I wouldn't forget and here it is still staring at me. I had to laugh, not because I think there is anything funny in your hardships at this time, but because we seem to be going through the same sort of thing.

You wrote a few weeks ago that your dryer was going and at that exact moment my hubby was installing our new dryer. My friend's went a few weeks before that and I told her she could bring her laundry over here and do it. We spent all day long trying to figure out why the first load wouldn't dry before Allen declared the dryer dead. I felt awful that I had offered her help and wasted her whole day getting nothing done.

Anyway, I thought, well at least it is spring and I could laundry out... which I LOVE to do. Except that it proceed to rain for the next 14 days! By then you can imagine the pile of mildew mess in my laundry room.

Then we drove to an outlet in Delaware and dumped $500 on a new dryer. The trip took more than double the length of time it should have because of very bad traffic and an entire day was shot. But at least I got to be with my honey for the drive.

We invested in a high efficiency because our washer can do way more laundry than the regular dryers can keep up with, which is a big energy waster. And a probable cause why ours burned out.

Well, he hooked it up and I spent the weekend trying to wash and dry only it seemed to take FOREVER to dry anything. They sent a repairman last Friday, two weeks later mind you, who said no its fine that's how the high efficiency dryers work. They don't run heat all the time in order to save energy. I don't quite get where the savings is if it takes twice as long to dry every load but it makes sense to someone anyway.

Just the same, I know it is no fun to have everything going wrong at the same time... but what a blessing that we know the God who is in control of it!

Hugs,

Kat

LibbyLibbyLibbyLibbyLibby said...

I need to catch up here, last I read you were wanting to move... but i"ve missed the inbetweens that you are moving and to where. :)

Katrina said...

How funny...our dryer went out recently, too. Such a bummer. I got so behind in laundry. I will admit that I did not thank the Lord for that. Maybe I should have, but it just never occurred to me.

Just 12 days ago, however, I miscarried our tenth child at 11 weeks. This was the first time we had lost a baby. I was so sad. During the miscarriage...I prayed and thanked the Lord for everything I had been blessed with, including this baby and the miscarriage that I was going through. I thanked him for the experience, knowing that even though it was so emotionally painful and that I would miss this little one forever, I knew that now I would be able to help anyone else who turns to me if they experience a miscarriag, something that I had never been able to do before, because I had never gone through it myself. I thanked him for giving us this baby for this first trimester, and then calling him/her home to be with Jesus because now our little one will not know any kind of pain that this world offers, but will only know the peace and confort of Heaven. I thanked him for this lesson that my family will go through. It's a sadness that my children have never experienced, and I can see now, in the days afterwards, how they have come together to comfort me and each other. I thanked God for this little baby that I never got the chance to meet, because I know that I will meet him or her in Heaven one day, and my family will only be that much bigger once I get to Heaven. I prayed and thanked him during the miscarriage, and I had such peace during the entire process...something that I would think should have been traumatic, was instead peaceful, and I have Him to thank for that. Because He was with me, those 2 hours... He was with me. It's hard to explain my thoughts on this because my words don't do the experience justice, and plus I still can get so emotional when I talk about it. Ahhhh, you just gotta love those hormones....

Anyway, just reading your post about the dryer going out and how you thanked the Lord for that...well, it reminds me that I need to thank the Lord for things like that, too.The big things and the little things....to give thanks. There's good in everything. There really is. Even if you can't see it right away, there is God's will in everything, and it's all for His glory.

Kat said...

Ha... just an after thought. My washer went last week, too. While it is a bummer to have to replace both... this is the first time in my life I've had both new at the same time... just thought you would get a chuckle out of that.