Thankfulness in Personal Reflection and Prayer

Transform your personal prayer life and embrace a newfound peace with the power of gratitude. Join me, Todd Rhoades, on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast as we explore how expressing thankfulness can shift your spiritual journey and daily approach to life's challenges, especially amidst the bustling world of ministry. Discover the profound impact of weaving moments of gratitude into your prayer time, inspired by Philippians 4:6-7, as we discuss why gratitude is not just a cherry on top, but a fundamental part of your spiritual practice.

This episode encourages the practice of starting a gratitude journal—a simple yet transformative tool to chronicle the blessings and answered prayers in your life. By jotting down daily notes of thankfulness, you not only find encouragement during tough times but also create a tangible reminder of God's goodness. As we wrap up this series on gratitude, remember to take a moment this Thanksgiving to reflect on all you have to be thankful for. Whether you're tuning in today or taking a break to enjoy the holiday with loved ones, I wish you a joyous Thanksgiving filled with love, family, and gratitude.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:07

Hey there, welcome to the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. I'm Todd Rhodes, one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom, also your host here on the podcast, and I'm really glad you tuned in today. We're in the middle of a series on gratitude and today's topic might hit a little closer to home than some we've talked to. We're talking about thankfulness and gratitude, but today, specifically, thankfulness in personal reflection and prayer. And we are all busy, way too busy, way way too busy with ministry and family and everything that we've got going on. Sometimes that busyness makes it hard to take a step back and reflect. But finding time for personal gratitude in our prayers can make all the difference in the world about how we approach our day-to-day lives. So we're going to talk about that today. Ministry's hectic, it's meetings, it's emails, it's planning services, it's dealing with all kinds of unexpected stuff, it's dealing with people we love and people that are a burr in our saddle. In the middle of that it's easy to forget and pause and reflect. But I think these moments, these quiet moments of personal gratitude, really are necessary for us to refuel for all the work that we do. Philippians 4, 6, and 7 says don't be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And notice how Paul says with thanksgiving, right there, in the middle of talking about bringing our needs to God, it's like he's reminding us that gratitude isn't just an add-on. It really should be an essential part of how we pray. So here's your bottom line for today. If you're not already doing this practice, I think this would be extremely helpful, and I'm going to try and implement this into my prayer life today as well.

Speaker 1: 2:04

In an even more concrete way. Try to incorporate a moment of gratitude into your personal prayer time this week. It doesn't have to be anything elaborate Just take a few minutes to thank God for something specific before you dive into everything else. We've talked about this three or four times in this series, about just taking the time in not just expressing to others, but also just expressing to God our gratitude for everything that he's done. And if you're up for a little extra challenge, consider starting a gratitude journal. Write down a few things that you're thankful for every day, and then you can go back weeks back and see exactly what you were thankful for and how those things have changed and how God has answered your prayers through those times. It can be a powerful way to remind yourself of all the good things, even on the tough days. And, plus, like I said, you'll have something to look back on when you need a little bit of encouragement.

Speaker 1: 3:01

All right, that's your bottom line for today. Thanks for spending these few minutes with me today. Tomorrow, join us. We're going to end our series on Thanksgiving. It doesn't mean we're stopping being thankful, but we are stopping our series for Thanksgiving. And if you're listening, today is Thanksgiving. If you're listening on the day this is released, I hope that you have just a great time being thankful and a great time with your family, with your friends, and I hope you'll join us again here tomorrow, or maybe you can just take tomorrow off, come back and listen to that on Monday, but I hope you have a great weekend and a wonderful Thanksgiving. Appreciate you, see you.