Being thankful for the way God made us
- Kyle Snyder: Live on Purpose
- November 21, 2022
- 543
“You have to be yourself.” —Young Thug
One day a gardener was out walking among his plants. It was a bright, sunny day, and he couldn’t wait to get his hands dirty. He knelt down and saw one of his roses crying, and he asked what was wrong.
“See the morning glory?” the rose said. “She is so beautiful, standing proud and tall. People stop to smell her, and she doesn’t have a suit of thorns. I just wish I could be a morning glory.”
The gardener walked over to the morning glory, and she also was crying. “What’s bugging you?” asked the gardener.
“Oh, I have just been thinking I have to be held up by this wall because I don’t have a great root system. Why can’t I be more like the dogwood? He stands on his own and has pretty flowers. I want to be a dogwood.”
As the gardener was approaching, he heard the dogwood say he can never be an apple tree. “Why do you want to be an apple tree?” the gardener asked.
The dogwood answered, “I see people pick and eat his fruit, sit under him and get some shade, but I will never be like the apple tree.”
Hearing all this, the gardener just couldn’t understand it, so he rushed over to the apple tree, and to his dismay, the apple tree was crying.
“Why are you crying?” asked the gardener.
“People pick my apples,” was the answer. “I give them shade as they rest, but no one calls me wise, mighty or strong like the oak.”
Now the oak tree was the oldest and the tallest tree in all of the garden. Surely he would know what was wrong with everyone. The gardener asked what was wrong with all the other plants in the garden. After letting out a big sigh, the oak replied, “Oh I don’t know, but I myself am a little blue. You see I have been here longer than anyone. I have kids climb on me. People get married under me. One person even carved their name into me. However, no one can pick me and give me to a loved one. I just want to be a rose.”
My friends, isn’t that just like life? We buy into the lie that the grass is greener on the other side. Well, there are at least two sides to everything, so what side are we talking about? Note that no one ever tells us the side that has the greener grass. That is because no one living has ever found the greener spot yet. On this side of heaven, we will never find it. The answer is to be thankful for who we are.
No, that is not pride. To like who we are is to like what God has made. I think most of my readers will agree we are made by God. So why shouldn’t we be thankful for who we are? He is the one who gives us life, so we should honor him by making the most of the life he gave us. We need to realize everyone has their fair share of problems, and it is not a far stretch to say the people who seem to have it all together may have bigger problems than us.
I believe life is mostly how we look at it. We can choose to look at all we don’t have, but we also can look at what we do have and be thankful. It is really just a waste of time to want to be someone else because that is just not possible. What is it we want out of life? I think for most of us, the answer is to be there for our family, have some adventures, and see our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren grow up.
Why not start now? Stop working like a dog and spend time with loved ones. Trust me. They would rather have you than what you can give them. Just keep it simple and enjoy life.