Chaplain Lynne writes:

As an instructor for Living Shield, I am often asked how I maneuvered through seasons of suffering; how I face a new year before me during dark times.

I found there was a key focus… gratitude.  My Hope in God, and gratitude.

Don’t get me wrong though… gratitude is not always easy to hold before you. Especially in loss. Loss of love, end of marriage, death…  loss… loss brings darkness

It can strip away the light and only leave darkness and hopelessness.

My own losses, my Cancer and resulting health issues, always provide me with endless opportunities to complain, to despair, to harden my heart. To turn and focus only on my pain and darkness.  If I am honest, some days have been so dark and the pain so acute that I have  wondered:  “How could there possibly be something good to be thankful for today?”

There is even a grieving of the loss of the easy and gentle times.

I’ve spent the last 35 years in medical offices, hospital beds and waiting rooms. I’ve been poked, prodded, pumped, scanned, and cut ‘til I almost didn’t recognize myself; the times where my body has looked like a literal battlefield. I’ve lost my hair, my very breath and even the regular beating of my heart.

At times, it’s been physically excruciating to dress, turn over in bed, and walk across a room. Medical bills have exceeded our budget. Moments and memories were missed with loved ones that can never be undone. The list could go on and on. Cancer, the losses it brings, has at different points, stripped me (and my husband and children) of everything that is normal, stable, and “good.”

But I have hope. My faith gives me hope.  One of the surest ways to experience that hope foundation within me is to thank God, to nurture a heart of gratitude toward Him. This isn’t just a focus on “positive thinking.” This isn’t being optimistic, or being that “glass-half-full” kind of girl. This is truly, for me, an act of choice. An act of purposeful faith. A building up of resilience and my faith foundation by turning to the grateful parts within.

When we’re overwhelmed by affliction, the simplest gratitude, truly may be all we can muster — and I have discovered that it is enough. Because gratitude focuses our hearts to hope. And hope grows hope. It helps me serve as a chaplain as well. As I hear their stories, my hope is needed to ground me, to prevent vicarious trauma from having too much of an impact and thereby rendering me unhelpful to the wounded. It is part of my self-care “tactical” plan…  gratitude. Do you have a self-care plan?   Gratitude should be a regular exercise for you.

A small, but beautiful moment of faith… even my wavering belief, leads to hope… it gently turns our hearts and heads toward our hope… our faith foundation. For me, it brings me to the feet of a Savior.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come to a desperately dark moment, completely at the end of myself, and I’ve sensed the presence of God speaking to me. Reminding me that I do not walk alone. That He is with me.

Times like when I drive to a meeting…  as the leader… but had to stop, in the rain, on the side of the road, to get out,  and violently vomit from ongoing nausea… to the shock of the woman I was giving a ride to. Yet, as I watched the water swirl around my feet, I knew He stood in the rain with me. Then moved on to lead, as only His Spirit can.

I long to put on gratitude as a full covering, not showing any gaping holes… but I realized, in my weakness, that I needed a plan to keep hope before me, because I was not able to do it on my own.   So I have an ongoing plan.  A plan to spark myself, so to speak. As I am reminded of Him, I’ve then forced myself to thank Him for something seemingly insignificant — “Thank You for this cup of tea,” as I sip from my scripture laden cup.

Maybe at first, that’s all the capacity I have for gratitude at that moment, but more often than not, that simple act of thanksgiving, it inspires me to thank Him for even more of His gifts and His goodness. Then I added something like, “Thank You for the sunshine streaming through my window.” “The view to the world outside” “Thank You for my home, for waking up in a warm bed. Thank You for the warm hand that reaches out to comfort me in a dark night of pain.”

Then, with my growing resistance to the darkness hiding within, my resilience grows…

Resilience helps me move forward and not linger in the darkness, just as it does for those we serve as Chaplains.  As resilience grows, I speak bolder, “thank You for being with me.”  “Thank You for having a plan for me… for my husband… for my family”. I look forward, with hope.

Although my circumstances, in some aspects, may not have improved or even worsened, my perspective has.  God knew what He was doing when He commanded us again and again in Scripture to thank Him. Thanksgiving is the way we enter into and experience His presence (see Ps. 100:4).

To say, “thank You, God” is to perceive Him with us in our suffering. It brings us away from the starkness in the world and delivers us to His presence, helps us to focus on things above, and not the things which the world, and our experience, are shouting at us.

Your darkness, may be strikingly different than mine. But like me, you’ve tasted enough of the goodness of God to want more—even though it requires much at times to redirect our focus. To choose to turn to Him. To help us through our darkness.

Truth is, no matter how small or meager, our thanksgiving will enlarge our hearts to trust Him more, lift our perspective and abide in the reality of God’s fiercely tender presence again.

It will make us better Chaplains.

“give thanks in all circumstances for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus..” ~ 1 Thessalonians 5:18 NIV