Unexpected Blessings Thankful: Unexpected Blessings

By Cindy Rogers, Calynn Warren, Candice Harnage and 28 more

I sincerely hope you enjoy reading the stories of Thankfulness by the Christian authors contained in this book. As I read through these stories, each and every one of them has left an impression on my heart.

God has given us the opportunity to serve him through writing and sharing stories with you. I, myself, have received many blessings, many of which were unexpected. I pray that you will be able to find ways to be Thankful in any circumstance and receive all the blessings life has to offer.

Use this book as a devotional, or a guide for finding ways to become more Thankful. There are 31 Chapters, one for each day. Read one chapter per day, multiples or whichever way you decide.

Thank you for reading our stories in the Unexpected Blessings - Series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Raised Bridges
• Release date: Sep 27, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223926412

Book preview

Chapter Two

I am Thankful

By: Johnny Valenzuela

It was the end of the day. As I walked into the locker room, David, one of our Garbage Truck operators, was putting his gear into his locker.  I asked him if he had had a good day and he responded, Yeah, until I stopped at the fueling station to fuel up my truck. I asked, What happened? He said, The transmission went out, so they had to tow it to the shop. I said, Thank God it happened at the end of the day once you were done with your route. He said, I guess I can look at it like that. This got me thinking of some of the things that I am thankful to God for.

Thankful for every new day

I am thankful to God for every morning that He allows me to wake up to face a new day. I have learned to talk with Him every minute of the day.  In the morning, before I even fully wake up, I start saying good morning to Him. I will not lie, there are times when I get up and get ready for my day and I realize that I didn’t even say good morning to him. When this happens, I immediately say Good morning.  I ask that he forgive me for not acknowledging him at the beginning of the new day that He blesses me with.

Thankful for mechanical knowledge

In my walk, I am thankful that God provides me another opportunity to prevail against the challenges that I face. Today, as I drove to work at 5:30 a.m., the idler pulley on my Jeep broke off causing the serpentine belt to come off.  Being a mechanic, I immediately knew what had happened just by the sound it made and the signs that followed.  My amp meter started going down and my power steering went out. It was hard to turn the vehicle.  I immediately started praying, asking God to get me to the parking lot at work, which was a couple of miles away. As always He answered my prayer.  I was able to get to work and park the vehicle in a parking space.  I was then able to go and purchase the parts I needed and install them after work.  It only took me a few minutes to get it running again.

Several things I was thankful for that day.

God answered my prayer and allowed my vehicle to make it the yard.

He provided me with transportation to go to the auto parts store.

He provided the finances for me to purchase the parts I needed.

He has provided me with the knowledge and ability to do my own mechanic work on my vehicles.

Every time I do mechanic work, I give God thanks for my very first vehicle.  It was a 1972 Chevrolet Camaro with a 400 cubic inch 4-bolt main motor, and a 400-turbo transmission with 3:83 gears. The gearheads reading this will know exactly what I am talking about.  For all others, It was a fast car. I loved that car. It was fast but unfortunately it always broke down every time I took it out on the town. It didn’t help that I was a bit heavy on the accelerator and always looking for a drag race.

My old man was not around so I didn’t have anyone to teach me how to work on vehicles and there was no YouTube back in the nineteen hundreds when I was a teenager. Whenever I was working on my vehicle, God always sent the neighborhood dads to assist me with the repairs.  When they offered their assistance, I would ask them to explain to me how to do the job, and I would follow their instructions. I am thankful for those men that were willing to share their auto mechanic knowledge with me.  If it would not have been for that vehicle and the men that God sent to assist me with learning how to repair my vehicle, I wouldn’t know half of the stuff I know about performing my own mechanical repairs and preventive maintenance on my vehicles. God knew exactly what I needed at the time, and I am thankful.

In Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth, aka the BIBLE, we see many examples of the important role thankfulness has in the life of a Christian, no matter the circumstance.  Giving thanks should not be limited to just a single day. Thankfulness should be a daily intimate practice that centers your mind on the blessings of God.  Giving thanks to God, glorifies Him and focuses our attention on His goodness.

Here are a few verses about thankfulness.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 NKJV-

Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

Psalm 95:2-3 ESV-

Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise! For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.

Psalm 136:1 ESV-

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.

Philippians 4:6-7 ESV-

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Colossians 2:6-7 ESV-

Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

Thankful for tailgaters

One of my pet peeves is being tailgated by another driver.  I used to get upset and slow down or even slam on the brakes when someone was tailgating me. How Christian of me, right? One day as a tailgater was passing me up, I thought to myself what an idiot.  I was immediately convicted by the Holy Spirit, and I heard in my spirit, Why did you just call one of my children an idiot? Instead of cursing them why don’t you pray for them?  After that day, even though a tailgater still gets me heated up, I am thankful God has given me the opportunity to intercede for that person, as well as any other person that might be affected by whatever that driver is going through."

In the future, instead of complaining about the tailgater and slamming on your brakes, maybe you can move aside and let him/her through then pray that they do not have an accident and hurt someone down the road. We don’t know what that person is going through. What is that? Oh yeah.  We know that you have never ever tailgated another driver before.  Be Thankful they didn’t slam on their brakes and have you rear-end them.

Thankful for my grandparents

I grew up in a poor household at least that is what I am told.  As a child, I didn’t realize how poor we were because I never went hungry.  I had a roof over my head, and even though it was an old shack style home we always had heat in the winter and fans in the summer. My grandma washed clothes by hand in a galvanized tub and hung it on the clothesline to dry.

We had to use an outhouse during the day and a five-gallon bucket at night, if we didn’t want to go to the outhouse.  We had a tub inside the house that drained out into a small drainage ditch that my grandpa had made.  My grandparents were poor, and they lived on the property that Mr. Doyle Smith owned.  My grandpa worked in the Cotton Gin, and he also worked in the cotton field and sorghum field on a tractor for Mr. Smith.  My grandma cleaned Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s home and took care of their children.

Along with the necessities like clothes, socks, and underwear, I always got my most treasured gift every Christmas, a Daisy lever action BB Gun.  So, to say that we were poor, I didn’t know it.  I had a fun childhood filled with adventures out in a pasture or walking down dirt roads with the pack of dogs and cat that was on the property.

I hunted different types of game, but it was mainly birds and rabbits. My grandma would praise my marksmanship and hunting skills. But she would fuss at me for practicing my marksmanship skills on her clothespins on the clothesline. She taught me how to clean the game that I harvested and taught me how to cook them over the open flame of a firepit. She taught me how to ring the necks on a chicken and how to process it for supper.  I learned at a very early age to not name the livestock.

My grandma also taught me how to wash clothes, sew, iron, cook, and clean. She always said that she wanted to teach me these skills because she didn’t want me to depend on a woman in my life to do these things for me. I am thankful for these life skills. 

During deer hunting season, hunters would bring their harvested deer to my grandpa to skin, bone, and quarter. They would pay him cash, or they would barter some of the meat for his work.  My grandpa was good at processing deer, so we always had meat on the table. He taught me how to skin and process a deer. I remember he gave me a pocketknife when I was 5 or 6 years old, and I would try to help him cut the skin off the deer.  My grandpa also taught me how to raise, butcher and process hogs for meat.  He would butcher them and sell some of the meat to make money. I am thankful for these experiences.

Thankful for Mrs. Carrie Smith

While living with my grandparents we only attended church when there was a death in the family of someone that my grandparents knew. My grandparents had a small table that had rosaries, statues of religious figures and crucifixes on the wall and candles lit on it. They believed in God but unfortunately, I don’t think that they had the true knowledge of the relationship that awaited them in Jesus. Mrs. Carrie Smith was the first person that ever took me to church. I remember the smell of the crayons when I walked into the First Baptist Church in Odem, Texas. I only went with her a few times, but I am thankful that she took me to church with her. She tried to teach me about Jesus, but I was very young, so I don’t really remember much. I just remember that I really liked being around her. I am thankful for Mrs. Carrie Smith.

Thankful for my mom’s lesson

My mom was always away working because my old man was not around.  As a child, I remember when we were at the store and I would request to purchase a gadget or a toy or a candy, my grandparents would say, We don’t have enough money for that. I learned to not ask for much. I remember asking my grandma one time, How does a person make money? She said, A man needs to work in order to have money. I always wanted to work to try and help my grandparents and my mom pay for stuff. This mind set caused me some issues when I was in school because I didn’t see why I had to be there for eight hours a day and not get paid for it.  I started acting up and ended up getting kicked out of school in the ninth grade.

I started hearing about some of the shady guys in school hanging out behind the bleachers smoking pot. I asked one of them where they got it from, and he said they bought it from one of the older guys. So that got me thinking. I live on a farm and there is plenty of land out there. I knew that any seeds I planted would produce product. I decided to become an entrepreneur of sorts.  I asked one of these guys if he could get me some pot seeds so I could grow it and sell it.  He got some for me and on the very day that he gave me those seeds the drug sniffing dog was brought into our school system for the very first time. Well, guess who ended up in the principal’s office. I was asked to empty my pockets, but I refused to. Not even the threat of going to jail made me empty my pockets.  My mom came to the school, and I knew that she was going to be mad, but I refused to empty my pockets. I was suspended for the remainder of the school year so they could make an example of me. I told my mom that I wanted to go to work so that I could help her and my grandparents with the bills.

She had a friend that worked in construction, so she had me go with him the following week to work. I was excited to finally be making some money.  Monday came and we drove from Corpus Christi to Pasadena Texas.  We arrived at the job site, and I was handed a sledgehammer with the instructions to break about a 12-foot section of sidewalk that was being replaced.  I immediately started hammering away at the concrete only to realize an hour later that was not going to be an easy task. My hands were blistered and hurting when my mom’s friend came over and gave me some gloves that were way too big. I continued chipping away at that sidewalk but after lunch I was ready to go back home. This was not the way I wanted to make money. I told my mom’s friend I wanted to go back home, and he said that we would be leaving Friday after work.  I got really upset but had no choice but to remain there and commit to the week’s work.  By the end of the week, I realized that I didn’t want to work this hard again for the rest of my life. That weekend, I was told by my mom and her friend that I needed to get used to working these types of jobs, because this was the only type of job a man without an education would get.  I made the decision to return to school to get my High School Diploma.  I am thankful for the lesson my mom taught me during my rebelliousness.

While writing this chapter, I came across an article that gives reasons to be thankful. Here are a few reasons.

Counting blessingsboosts your health.Research shows grateful people have less depression and stress, lower blood pressure, more energy, and greater optimism.

Slow down the aging clock.In older adults, a daily practice of gratitude even slowed down some of the effects of neurodegeneration that often occurs as we age.

Put the brakes on stress.Cortisol is often called the stress hormone, and when our bodies produce too much, it can deplete the immune system and raise blood sugar levels. A study conducted at the Institute of Heart Math Research Center in California found that positive emotions like appreciation significantly lowered levels of cortisol.

Being thankful helps you bond.Research by U.S. psychologists Sara Algoe and Baldwin Way indicates that gratitude also can lead to better relationships. The explanation may be connected to increased production of oxytocin, sometimes called the bonding hormone because it fosters calm and security in relationships.

With benefits like these, maybe we should practice being thankful on a daily basis.

I am Thankful for Melissa Valenzuela.

I had my first apartment, a fast car, and a motorcycle by the age of 17.  I worked long hard hours and by the age of 24, I was in a bad place.  I had been married and divorced for a few years and I was not happy at my job.  My mom owned a bar and asked me if I wanted to work for her as a bartender, so I accepted.  It was the best decision I have ever made in my life.  About a month into my bartending gig this beautiful goddess walked in looking for a waitress job, and I immediately fell in love at first sight.  Little did she know that she was going to be my wife.  We went out for about a week, and I asked her to move in with me and she accepted.  That was over 30 years ago.  We have been through some tough patches in our 30+ years of marriage, but we have persevered.  We have two beautiful daughters, Jennifer, and Jacqueline and a grand pup.

I am very proud of my beautiful wife, Melissa Valenzuela. She invited me to write this chapter in this book. We both came to Christ back in 2008 and it has been a journey.  I have seen her become an amazing woman of God.  She is involved in the lives of many people.  She is a Chaplain with a Hospice company, and I enjoy hearing about her experiences as she works with her hospice patients.  She has been the best wife, partner, and mother to my children that I could have ever asked God for.  She has stuck with me through thick and thin and for that I am thankful for Melissa Valenzuela.  Thank you for including me in this writing adventure. I love you Melissa.

Meet the Author

Johnny Valenzuela

In 2008, Johnny Valenzuela received Jesus into his heart. He confirms it has been the best life decision he has ever made. In 1990 God blessed him by sending his beautiful wife, Melissa Valenzuela, into his life. They have two beautiful and amazing daughters and a grand pup.

Johnny received his Bachelor’s Degree in Theology and Biblical studies in 2014 and a Master's Degree in Pastoral Counseling in 2016. He recently completed training in Lean Six Sigma and will be receiving his Yellow Belt Certification in September 2023.

Johnny works as a Superintendent for the City of Corpus Christi, Texas in the Solid Waste Department. He acknowledges that he works with some amazing men and women, and truly enjoys ministering God's Word to the people he meets.