And a blessing I cannot control but I look forward to is people using the gifts I give them. I love to see my kids wear the clothes I bought them. I love to hear they have incorporated something I've given them into their lives.
I think this must be a bit how God is -- when He gives us a gift He wants us to use it. Many of His gifts we use without thinking about it. We breathe the air He supplies. We walk on the earth He has put us on. We use the resouces He gives us. We raise the kids we've been blessed with.
Our bodies are gifts from Him too. If you can use your hands you're blessed. If you can walk you're blessed. If you can talk you're blessed. If you can see and hear and eat and drink, you're blessed.
One gift He has given us isn't used correctly by many though (and I'd say by all of us sometimes). We just put it on auto-pilot and go throughout our days. I'm talking about the brain, that weird mass of gray matter that doctors still don't fully understand.
Yet, one of the parts we often misuse is our memory.
Sure, we remember what we need to do today. We remember our families, our friends, appointments, obligations. But do we remember what Father God has done for us in the past?
The Israelites didn't.
Nehemiah 9:17b says, "they (God's people) forgot the miracles (God) did for them, so they became stubborn and turned against (God)."
When they forgot what God had done, they got stubborn and turned away from Him.
We often do the same thing. We get caught up in worry, in fear, in anger, in a temper tantrum when things don't go our way. We forget what God has done for us and we question His character which leads to the pit of despair or self-pity.
Oswald Chambers writes, "God does not tell you what He is going to do -- He reveals to you who He is . . . Believe God is always the God you know Him to be . . . Then think how unnecessary and disrespectful worry is!"
We all do this, but we don't have to. Remember who He is. Remember what He's done. Remember.