I sit and I pray, and ask the Lord for wisdom to write this piece. I know that there is a message I wish to deliver to you, my friends, on this Thanksgiving. I am aware that there are hundreds upon thousands of blogs on the Internet, and many people choose holidays to focus their writing on, well, the holidays, and what those holidays mean to them and their families. I don't seek to write to you in vain.
The topic that comes to mind on this day of thanksgiving is gratitude.
Obviously, the rest of the year, we have no trouble coming up with things to complain about in this world. We do a good job even on Thanksgiving of finding excuses to complain. But this is the one day a year, ah, the one season of the year, November through December and a bit of January, that people feel it necessary to think of things they are thankful for, to be generous with the blessings they have been given by our heavenly Father, whether they choose to believe in Him or not.
As I thought about gratitude, immediately into my mind flashed a passage from a book I read some time ago, called Uprising: A Revolution of the Soul, by Erwin McManus.
In this book, McManus calls believers, specifically Christians, to a greater fullness in Christ Jesus, to unleash a revival in our souls, to tap into the hunger that we all feel...and often seek to satisfy with things other than God.
On this journey of revolution, I discovered that God, our Father, created us and this world not for religious and moral obligation, but for our (and His!) pleasure and enjoyment. The Garden of Eden before the Fall was a place of pleasure, not of duty. We had instruction, yes, to take care of the land and to work, but even this was not to add responsibility, but to give purpose to man's time. God created woman, not to add to man's responsibility, but to enhance our enjoyment of living through a new facet of life: Relationship! Love! Expression!
When man fell, greed, lust, selfishness, all the negative things we associate with pleasures of this world, replaced generosity, replaced the wellspring with a black hole.
We all know, somewhere deep down, that we as a people are broken, in need of something more, and we see it in our justification of our greed, our sense of entitlement, our selfishness. In our quest for nobility, if we truly seek it, we will find that God is the ultimate expression of wholeness, and generosity pours out of His wholeness, the desire He has to do things for our good, to prosper and not to harm us, to save us, not to forsake us.
As God sent Jesus and his disciples through the earth, He intended to display generosity to us once again, as a physical expression we could understand, and intended to display his miracles through sacrifice (John 6:5-13), leading up to the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.
I flip through the pages of this book, trying to find the passages that I thought of when I thought of gratitude several minutes ago, and lo and behold, I found several sentences underlined, as if I knew when I read them that I would be looking for them. God knew.
McManus writes:
"The dilemma in our pursuit for wholeness is that brokenness is often laced with ungratefulness. In fact I am convinced that perpetual brokenness is defined by a lack of gratitude...Whatever else we may need, whatever support systems might be helpful to us, whatever insights or truths may aid us in the journey, nothing will heal us if we are ungrateful. No truth, no matter how profound, will find its way into a heart that is absent of gratitude... Gratitude is the pathway of love." (p 114)
The book goes on to describe how this quest for nobility begins with gratitude, bringing us into a place of wholeness with knowledge of the glory of God, ultimately to allow us to pour out that glory in the form of generosity. It all begins with gratitude.
There is more I could write....so much more. But I will leave you with this: Don't let Thanksgiving be the only day that you give thanks for the blessings that God has given you. Don't let this season be the only time that you think of others around you, that you think to give thanks for the people God has placed in your life.
People ask sometimes, "If my focus is to be on serving others, how am I going to get my own needs met?"
In the midst of humbling ourselves and serving each other, truly giving of ourselves to each others' good, we are to cast our cares on the Lord (Psalms 55:22).
I personally find it difficult to do this, so don't think I am speaking from the judgment seat... but as the day draws near when we see Jesus face to face, I hope that we will embrace this call, together, to love justice and mercy, to stand in agreement with the Lord, instead of in opposition... and most of all, to be continually grateful, and to allow that to change our perspective on the world and on eternity.
*I am grateful for the light that Jesus Christ has brought into my life.
*I am grateful that, though the journey is not finished, there are places of darkness that I don't have to walk through anymore, and that I am learning to walk without fear through others.
*I am grateful for my family, both my church family and my birth family.
*I am grateful for all of those who have loved me despite myself, and who continue to love me, encourage me and help me grow.
*I am grateful for God's grace and the things He has provided me with in every difficult circumstance.
*I am grateful for people who choose to love, who choose to do what is right, despite their own judgments and pride rising up.
*I am grateful for revolutionaries.
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