I woke up the other day, and following my usual routine  I went to the kitchen to make a cup of tea before checking my email on the computer.  After I checked my email, I sat down to do my morning devotions.    I use  Portals of Prayer and usually also read from  another year long devotional book, and then I say my prayers.  When I got to my prayers,  it hit me!  My hip did not hurt at all.  I wasn’t limping as I had been doing for many days prior.  I had been praying daily for relief from the pain in my hip, and when I received an answer in the affirmative to that prayer, I did not even recognize it immediately.  I unconsciously  had taken it for granted that my hip worked without any pain.

The fact is that God is answering our prayers every day!  He is blessing us every day.  And more often than not, we do not recognize it, let alone acknowledge it.  We take so much for granted.

I took my good health for granted for 57 years and only truly appreciated it when I contracted a rare disease while on the Peru mission trip in 2004 , which resulted in many physical problems, not the least of which is difficulty swallowing.  Oh, my goodness, who ever thought of swallowing as a gift?  I do now because I struggle with it every day!  We take so much for granted.

Think of the miracle of our body!  Our heart beats, our eyes blink, our food digests, we can taste food, we can walk and talk, and those are the obvious things.  We take so much for granted!

What about the air we breathe?  The wonderful clean water we are fortunate enough to have to drink?  Our homes?  Clothing?  Jobs?  Friends?  Family?  Our church family? The freedoms we enjoy?  The list could go on forever.  Let’s face it.  We take so much for granted!

We are in the season of Epiphany…..the season where Jesus is revealed to the world as our Savior. The season we are called upon to share the Good News. We were so excited at Christmas by the birth of Jesus, but now that have we taken down the tree and packed away the decorations ….are we taking Him for granted?

Let us rejoice and give thanks for the gifts God has bestowed upon us….especially the gift of Jesus our Savior. Yes, He is always with us.   Let us not take Him for granted!