Are we still grateful to God when life does not go our way?

Once the Master was at prayer. The disciples came up to him and said, “Sir, teach us how to pray.” This is how he taught them…

Two men were once walking through a field when they saw an angry bull. Instantly they made for the nearest fence with the bull in hot pursuit. It soon became evident to them that they were not going to make it so one man shouted to the other, “We’ve had it! Nothing can save us. Say a prayer. Quick!”

The other shouted back, “I’ve never prayed in my life and I don’t have a prayer for this occasion.”

“Never mind. The bull is catching up with us. Any prayer will do.”

“Well, I’ll say the one I remember my father used to say before meals: For what we are about to receive, Lord, make us truly grateful.”

Are we still grateful to God when the angry bull is charging and we are not going to make the fence? Does our attitude of gratitude fluctuate up and down with our circumstances? How do we stay connected to God with an attitude of gratitude when life is filled with pain and suffering?

The prayer, “Lord, for what we are about to receive make us truly grateful,” is the secret to maintaining an attitude of gratitude.  That prayer is a prayer of acceptance much like the “Serenity Prayer” popular in Twelve Step Groups:

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

When we pray for the grace to accept our circumstances as coming from the hand of God who loves us and is always “for us” we begin to cultivate an attitude of gratitude that keeps us connected to God even when life is hard. 

To accept our circumstances as coming from the hand of God who loves us and is always for us we need to trust God that he will make all things right in his time.

The second half of the Serenity Prayer, that is not as well known as the first half, talks about the attitude of trust that produces an attitude of gratitude:

“Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever in the rest.” Amen. - Reinhold Niebuhr

When the angry bull is charging may our prayer be, “Lord, for what we are about to receive make us truly grateful.”