Challenge Day #1

Well, Sunday was my first day practicing the challenges I issued. I tried Challenge #2. I spent the whole day praising God and thanking Him. I asked for NOTHING! I have to say that I didn’t expect it to be as difficult as it was. I am one of those who talks to God all day. I pray about all the little stuff during the day. Every time I found myself wanting to ask God for something, I just exchanged my request with words of praise.

I ran into a friend at church who had read the challenge. She told me that she was trying it, and when she found herself about to ask for something, she thanked Him for the solution instead. For example: You are going to call the doctor’s office to schedule an appointment for your child. You know that you should have called sooner for a well-child visit and they are probably scheduling two months out by now. You, however, need to have the appointment in the next two weeks. Instead of “Lord, will you please allow an appointment to be available in the time frame I need“, you say, “Lord, thank you for the appointment that you are going to provide me in your perfect timing.” Ha-Ha! That is pretty tricky! You are still kind of asking for something. But you know what? I bet God likes it because you are telling Him you know He can do anything. Isn’t that the way we are supposed to pray anyway?

Back to my day of praise…After church, my girlfriend Amanda told me she thought I was going to come right out of the choir loft during the worship portion of the service. She said, “You were really enjoying yourself. You were definitely praising Jesus. You looked like you just wanted to start hopping.” I laughed, but it was true. I wanted to raise my hands and shout! (I am not normally a hand raiser.) But I was feeling Jesus, it was my day to focus on the praise, and I was going to let Him know how I felt. It was a great feeling. The day left me feeling revived! Can I get an Amen?

Now for the other challenge…I haven’t done anything yet. Isn’t that awful? I keep thinking of things I can do, but don’t do anything. I kept looking for someone to compliment at the mall on Saturday and couldn’t find anyone. I wanted it to be genuine. I did volunteer to take Amanda’s place in the nursery last night at church because she had a migraine, but she declined. I guess that doesn’t count. The day is not over. Check back tomorrow and see what niceness I was able to dig out…