Bridge Grace

Count blessings and discover who can be counted on.

Isn’t that what had been happening, quite unexpectedly? This living a lifestyle of intentional gratitude became an unintentional test in the trustworthiness of God — and in counting blessings, I stumbled on the way out of fear.

Can God be counted on? Count blessings and find out how many of His bridges have already held.

Had I not trusted all these years because I had not counted?

I glance back in the mirror to the concrete bridge, the one I’ve boldly driven straight across without second thought, and I see truth reflecting back at me: Every time fear freezes and worry writhes, every time I surrender to stress, aren’t I advertising the unreliability of God? That I really don’t believe? But if I’m grateful to the Bridge Builder for the crossing of a million strong bridges, thankful for a million faithful moments, my life speaks my beliefs and I trust Him again.

I fearlessly cross the next bridge.

I shake my head at the blinding wonder of it: Trust is the bridge from yesterday to tomorrow, built with planks of thanks. Remembering frames up gratitude. Gratitude lays out the planks of trust. I can walk the planks — from known to unknown — and know: He holds.

I could walk unafraid.

Is that why the Israelites kept recounting their past — to trust God for their future? Remembering is an act of thanksgiving, a way of thanksgiving, this turn of the heart over time’s shoulder to see all the long way His arms have carried. Gratitude is not only the memories of our heart; gratitude is a memory of God’s heart and to thank is to remember God.

I had read it this morning as I prayed the Psalms, the psalmist giving thanks for the memories. In memory, the shape of God’s yesterday-heart emerges and assures of God’s now-heart and reassures of His sure beat tomorrow. And for the first time I see why the Israelites are covenanted with God to be a people who remember with thanks. It is thanksgiving that shapes a theology of trust, and the Israelites bear witness and I see.

Isn’t this what ultimately Jesus asks of us in the Last Supper? One of the very last directives He offers to His disciples, the one of supreme import but one I too often neglect — to remember. Do this in remembrance of Me. Remember and give thanks.

This is the crux of Christianity: to remember and give thanks, eucharisteo.

Why? Why is remembering and giving thanks the core of the Christ-faith?

Because remembering with thanks is what causes us to trust — to really believe.

Lord God, I claim Christ as my bridge back to You and I trust the Bridge Builder to hold all the moments of my life — and me. Remind me today, Lord, to give thanks to You for always holding. I am relieved of the burdens when I’ve believed in the Bridge Builder.