Thankful!

K'vetch, k'vetch, k'vetch!  I've done more than my share of complaining and most would not describe me as a complainer.  Did you know complaining is a sin?  I don't really stop and think about it when I'm doing it, at least I didn't use to.  For the past several months, and I've still had a few slips, but guarding what I say has taken real priority.  Swearing wasn't that big of a problem for me.  Even as a heathen, I didn't have a large four letter vocabulary, just a couple of stand-bys, which quickly went by the wayside when I confessed Y'hshuwah Messiah.  I see fellow believers type words on social media walls that I didn't say as an unbeliever.  This isn't about the vocabulary choices of others.  Understanding that coarse language and blessings could not come out of the same mouth seemed obvious.  Abba gave me victory over my four letter vocabulary very quickly.

My ability to verbalize dissatisfaction wasn't even considered to be a problem.  Now, I'm not suggesting that Abba didn't have a problem with it, as a matter of fact, the fact that I discounted complaining created two problems.  One, He was not happy to hear my complaints and two, I didn't have ears to hear what I was really doing.  This was not an easy understanding in which to come.  I honestly thought expressing some of my dissatisfaction was questioning myself, not complaining to our Creator.  I honestly believed when things didn't happen as expected, I'd missed the plan . . .  I was honestly, wrong!  This isn't about little annoyances and unexpected hindrances like spots on the carpet or dead batteries in winter.  I mean big life events that seem to be unfolding in the wrong direction or not unfolding at all!

I remember the first year of homesteading, when I was going to raise young wethers to sell as meat goats.  In the calamity that ensued, as nearly losing the entire herd, I discovered in Torah, I was not to alter the animals as they had been created.  It's not in my nature to do a great deal of complaining.  When things go wrong, I usually go the Instructions.  When I can't find the solution there, I go to the Author.  What I didn't realize was my attitude when I went boldly before the Throne of grace.  Sometimes what I called boldly, Abba saw as complaining and complaining is disrespect to Him.  He inhabits our praise!

Even though we may not identify what we are doing as complaining, and we have some sort of euphemism, our word is not final!  We are never to be complacent, but we do not always have to be striving, either.  Being thankful and giving praise for what we do have and understand is highly overlooked, even by the most spiritual among us.  Constantly analyzing and looking for the special revelation is just tiresome!  Most of us are always thinking, but we have a choice as to what we focus our thought on.  "What ifs" and "whys" can actually be a lack of faith, in that we are promised to be given the right words or the strength when we need it.  We are also told that someday it will all be made clear, so meanwhile, we walk by faith not by sight.

Even if everything hasn't fallen into place as first envisioned, there is always something for which to be thankful . . . Forgiveness for complaining comes to mind.