I hate turbulence.
I’m currently sitting on my flight to Atlanta, taking a brief intermission from the World Race to attend the funeral of my grandmother…and there is turbulence.
As I was sitting here praying to the Lord to calm the winds, my stomach, and the heart I happened to be listening to a “Praise Like Fireworks” by Rend collective and this lyric stood out to me…
“through joy and pain we worship, through joy and pain we worship; with heart and soul wide open, with heart and soul wide open; your strength will never fail us, your strength will never fail us; we’re not lost in the darkness, we’re not lost in the darkness; you are here!”
Wow.
In life we have a lot of turbulence. We make the wrong choice, someone hurts us, we loss a job, don’t get something we desperately want and/or need, loved ones die. Life is hard, it is messy, and it there are a lot of bumps along the way. But what if instead of praying for God calm the wind we just worshiped despite the wind. What we instead of praying to him to take the hard things away we just praised him and thanked him. How much more bearable would the turbulence of our lives be?
For me I know I can sometimes get caught up in praying for the bad stuff to be made right again that I forget to thank him in the process and for the process. I have been learning a lot of thankfulness in prayer and thankfulness in worship while I have been in India. It is kind of a game changer thankfulness. It brings my focus back to the Father and makes me more aware of Him in all things.
I know that some truly horrible and devastating things in life. But read these lyrics again.
“through joy and pain we worship, through joy and pain we worship; with heart and soul wide open, with heart and soul wide open; your strength will never fail us, your strength will never fail us; we’re not lost in the darkness, we’re not lost in the darkness; you are here!”
Worship and Thank him through all situations. Worship and Thank him when your heart is breaking and when your heart is so full of joy you think it might burst. Worship and thank him when things are smooth and easy AND when they are hard. His strength never fails us, We are not lost in the darkness, and he is here and he is worthy of our worship and praise.
