Rejoice with those who rejoice.
I’ve heard this twice now since Thanksgiving, and today a writer friend sends me an article about being grateful for what I don’t have (but others do), making this the third time the message has floated to me in one week. Be thankful for the good things that come to other people, the article says but in prettier words. Rejoice.
It’s a new facet for the gratitude journal; I could commit whole pages to thankfulness for what I don’t have but wish I did.
I mull it over with my coffee this morning and the same old thought patterns flicker like the lit candle next to me. How long will I wait for:
the thing I’ve bathed in prayer for over two decades?
the dream I offer up to the One who gave it to me in the first place?
the identity I think is for me, yet isn’t something I wear today?
But the Advent season, now upon us, is all about waiting—waiting for the One who hears petitions, the One who plants dreams, the One who is bigger and better than any version of us.
I’ll keep waiting. And I’ll rejoice in the not yet for me, but the right now for others while I’m at it.
*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date
*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.