Thanks in ALL Things

 "Thou shalt thank the Lord thy God in all things." 

We know how important it is to be grateful (wrote all about that here), but how about being grateful for the bad things and the hard things in our life?

Have you ever thought about being grateful for your trials?

Sometimes, once the trial is over we can look back and be grateful for i;, but what if we were grateful in the midst of a trial? How would that change things? How would that change you?

I believe life is a classroom. We've all been sent here to earth to get an ivy league education. Some classes are going to be easy, while others are going to be really really hard. Every experience is a lesson and every person in our life is a teacher. Some things we learn through joyful experiences, and others we can only learn through suffering.
President John Taylor once said,
 "We have learned many things through suffering. We call it suffering. I call it school of experience."

Whatever you want to call it, it's all part of "the plan" -God's plan.

The scriptures teach that "All things work together for good to them that love God" (Romans 8:28). This means that even the bad things, the trials and the sufferings, are working towards our ultimate good. They are like blessings in disguise.

I saw a saying once that said, It's okay to be a glowstick; sometimes we need to break before we can shine." I love this!  "Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extra-ordinary destiny." (C.S. Lewis)

 Being grateful for our trials during our trials is part of having faith -faith that God sees the bigger picture in our life, and is giving us the best education we can get. When we choose to thank Him FOR our situation not IN SPITE OF our situation, we invite God's power into our life, and we can feel peace knowing He is working a mighty change in us (see Alma 5).  

So the next time hardship comes your way, choose to be a glowstick and focus on how bright you're going to shine when it's all over.