Each year it is such a blessing to celebrate this season of thankfulness. It is so easy for all of us to pick apart and complain about everything around us when things aren't just exactly the way we want them to be. I sure do it. In fact, I would say that in some regards we are annoyingly perfectionists in some things, while in others, completely chilled and almost lackadaisical.
So what causes this inconsistency? When Thanksgiving rolls around, we all seem to be so thankful. Are we not thankful the other 364 days out of the year? Of course we are, we just don't express it as much as we do around the holidays and one of the most basic reasons for this is that people seem to only be thankful for the good things, for the things that go their way.... Of course, you say? After all, who would be crazy enough to be thankful for trouble? Well, us... stay with me on this...
In our family, in our company and in our ministries, we strive to show thanks every day, but it's truly difficult to pray if we only give thanks and pray for what's going perfect in our life. Life is full of trouble and challenges and God gives us the ability to overcome WITH His help.
Our goal is to be the encouragers in a dark world of both real and fake distractions. That's why we pray every day, often times beginning with, 'Dear God, thank you for the challenges that you allow us to overcome with your help Lord. I pray that we may be the blessing to someone else's challenges today.'
"When you help enough people get what they want, you will get what you want."
We know that we are far from perfect in every way, so when we say we strive to be perfectionist, it's because of our work culture. As computer programmers, if there is ONE single character that is incorrect or missing in a line of code, the ENTIRE program render useless. Much like the scripture that reminds us that 'even if you keep the whole law and stumble on just one part of it, you are still guilty of breaking all of it.'
We are so very thankful for every last blessing and challenge that this business has presented us with over the past twenty years. Some have not been so fun, like getting hacked by the Chinese in 07' or when the dark foreign superpowers somehow steal domains away from their rightful owners. Believe it or not, we are thankful for bills even it's not any fun when the cashflow from our accounts receivable is trailing the outflow of cash to our vendors. Most people tell us we don't charge enough or that we are too kind when we let some of our customers go for months (and even years) without paying their bill. We understand, they have challenges too and that we are ALL in this together as Americans working to make this country a better place. At least that is our hope.
May every day and every challenge be a blessing to you. Happy Thanksgiving!