You may think that based on the title, this devotional is about sin. It is not.
A few weeks ago, I wrote a Daily Word about prayer. Specifically, it was about helping us to form and organize our prayers to God using the acronym TACOS1. Prayer does not have to be something about which we are nervous. God loves to hear from His children!
On the morning that the devotional was distributed, I received a kind reply from a Parishioner. He mentioned a few of the prayers he uses. One, in particular, struck me as quite wonderful and I received his permission to share it.
“Thank you, God, for all that you do for us both known and unknown.”
What a wonderful prayer of thanksgiving! Usually, when we pray about things known and unknown, we confess our sins, asking God to forgive us for the things we have done wrong and for the sins we are not aware of having committed. Yet, the extent of our unknowing stretches beyond sins — it reaches unknown blessings in our lives.
God has blessed us with so many things of which we are quite unaware. He wakes us in the morning with breath in our lungs. He provides the sun to warm us in the winter and the cool breeze to make our summers more bearable. (For us Houstonians, he has allowed us to live in a time after the advent of air conditioning – a blessing we shouldn’t take lightly!)
He protects us from the myriad of things that could go wrong on Houston freeways daily2. He gives us water to drink and in which to bathe. He provides rain so that food grows from the soil. He gives us rest at night.
We have so much for which to be thankful.
Take a few moments to reflect on the things you forget to thank God for and thank Him for His faithfulness and goodness.
1 Thanksgiving Adoration Confession Others Self
2 I’m old enough to remember an early Amy Grant song (“Angels Watching Over Me”) about God protecting us from dangers we weren’t aware of.
