Colossians 1:11-14

May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

-Colossians 1:11-14

In light of this strengthening for the purpose of endurance and patience, we are to have joy and thankfulness.  The thankfulness we are to have is toward God.  The reason is because of what he has done.  God has saved us.  I like the way Paul puts it, "He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son".  We were really in need of saving and not in the best of places before God saved us.  I also like the beginning of Ephesians 2, "And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind."  God has taken us out of a really bad place and we are brought into the kingdom.  We also get to share in an inheritance.  This is what we have to be thankful for.  We should be thankful for he great, saving work.  Unfortunately, I don't think the reality of this truth hits me as hard as it should each and every day.  May I be more and more thankful each and every day for what God has done for me.  He is good.