7 THINGS WE MUST NOT TAKE FOR GRANTED AS WE START A NEW WEEK

You, like I, probably already have your week planned. It’s likely to be busy, I suspect. In the midst of the busyness, I invite you to join me in thinking about these things we must not take for granted. 

1. God will be faithful to His people even when they are unfaithful to Him. He is faithful because of who He is, not because of who we are. We must not take His grace for granted.
2. We have full access to His Word. In our language, even. In our hands, too. All of it, from Genesis to Revelation. Millions of people in the world have no such blessing. According to Wycliffe Bible translators, “1 in 5 people, speaking 6,661 languages, do not have a full Bible in their first language.”^[1]
3. God has chosen to get the gospel to us. I cannot explain why God would choose that we might hear the gospel while others have not yet. All I can do is be humbly amazed in gratitude.
4. Many of us have freedom to worship God without fear or threat. Again, some in the world will pay a price for worshiping God this week. I don’t know how long we’ll have this freedom, but we have it now. 
5. God actually listens to our prayers. In fact, He wants us to run to Him with our praises and requests. That the God of eternity who created all things hears us when we pray is amazing—especially when many people pray to gods who have ears but cannot hear.
6. No matter what we face this week, all will be okay. That’s because God’s always sovereignly in control. Always. He helps us sing at all times, “It is Well with My Soul.”
7. For those of us called to ministry—we are not worthy to do this work. We weren’t worthy when God called us. We’re not now, no matter how much experience or how many degrees we have. And, we’ll never be worthy. For whatever reason, though, God uses us. Let’s not take our privilege for granted this week. 

May all of us honor the Lord this week! He is good. 

^[1] https://www.wycliffe.org.uk/about/our-impact/