Gratitude just can’t be emphasized enough. Radical gratitude means we\u2019re going to walk through life being grateful in every situation, no matter what \u2014 in times of plenty, when times are tight, when times are good, bad, right, or wrong. We can develop an attitude of gratitude by choosing to be grateful in every situation. The attitude of radical gratitude actually can become a ministry when we realize how well it serves others. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We know those clergy “ministers”, but, you and I, as believers, are also ministers. When we minister to someone, we are serving them. The Latin word for minister is “servant”. Every Christian is a minister, which means we serve others. And that ministry can be called the “ministry of appreciation”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here’s what I know about appreciation and depreciation. If you\u2019ve ever bought a car, you know the meaning of depreciation. The moment you drive it off the lot, it\u2019s worth less than what you paid for it, even if it\u2019s a brand-new vehicle. Depreciation means to decrease in value. But, APPRECIATION means to raise in value. When we appreciate our spouse, we raise their value. When we appreciate our kids, we raise their value. When we appreciate our boss and co-workers, we raise their value to us and to the company. When we appreciate our friends and those who serve us at a store or business, we raise their value. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We can make a ministry out of raising the value of people simply by appreciating them. I\u2019ve discovered that everyone needs massive doses of encouragement. I\u2019ve never met anybody who\u2019s said, \u201cOh no! I don\u2019t need a compliment! I have too many. Please, stop! I\u2019m too affirmed. Don\u2019t give me any more.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We ALL have a need to be affirmed, to be loved, to be appreciated \u2014 and so does everyone else. If we want to be used by God, here\u2019s one way: Affirm everybody. Appreciate everybody. Show gratitude to everybody. BTW — I sure do appreciate YOU, my beloved social media friends and family! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cDo not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.\u201d Ephesians 4:29 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gratitude just can’t be emphasized enough. Radical gratitude means we\u2019re going to walk through life being grateful in every situation, no matter what \u2014 in times of plenty, when times are tight, when times are good, bad, right, or wrong. We can develop an attitude of gratitude by choosing to be grateful in every situation.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11373,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15575,15578,15576,15577,1],"tags":[6427,1223,1210,15581,2575,4367,38,15579,4519,15580,13994,15582,3331,8265],"class_list":["post-11372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-appreciation","category-depreciation","category-gratitude","category-ministry-of-appreciation","category-uncategorized","tag-appreciation","tag-attitude-of-gratitude","tag-blog","tag-depreciation","tag-ephesians-429","tag-grateful","tag-gratitude","tag-ministers","tag-ministry","tag-ministry-of-appreciation","tag-radical","tag-raise-value","tag-servant","tag-serving"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11372"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11372\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11374,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11372\/revisions\/11374"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}