I’m thankful for candles, coffee and blogging. Something mysteriously good happens when you utter thanks. The Bible says to give thanks, and that’s certainly common knowledge, and you’ve experienced what gratitude does for you personally.

I’m really thankful that my daughter gets home today after being gone for a week. I love that young lady beyond my ability to express it in words. I’m looking at a birthday poster she gave me my last birthday, and all the things she expressed with candy wrappers I could multiply by a million for the way I feel about her. She’s creative, inclusive, smart, athletic, a Jesus lover, family loving lady who embodies 1 Timothy 4.12 everyday. Here’s that passage in case you don’t have it memorized.

Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, life, love, faith and purity.

If that doesn’t describe my daughter then I don’t know her, and I assure you I do. Knowing is a powerful thing we all engage in everyday. Knowledge is something we should be thankful for as well, and I add wisdom to that because we must know how to apply the knowledge we receive. If we are just a mind full of knowledge, but we don’t have the wisdom Solomon specifically requested from God then I would argue we are a “resounding gong” (1 Corinthians 13). I know that phrase was used my Paul in the context of love, but someone who filibusters to hear themselves talk without asking themselves if their receiver needs or wants what they have to share then they need to learn that timing is very important when it comes to knowledge. Experience and wisdom show us that. I like the New Testament passage that speaks of the tongue being a powerful tool that can destroy or create.

My daughter, who is fourteen, has learned this quite well. She’s got a long way to go in her journey to apply knowledge and wisdom, but man I wish I was where she’s at when I was her age. The most important thing I can say about her is that she follows our LORD and Savior Jesus Christ, and she has an uncanny ability to represent that to everyone she interacts with. There is not greater thing that can be said about a person than that. She puts God first, and she loves her neighbor as herself. God is moving mightily through her mom and dad as she embraces the seeds we plant in her life. We plant, but God makes them grow, and how thankful I am I get a front row seat to see that.

I can’t wait to pick that girl up at the airport!