Counting Thanks:

All over the internet I find people doing a thanks a day.  I find it very encouraging to read these words of gratitude.  Reading one, recently, I was surprised to see my name in the list of that for which the writer is grateful.  One virtue of the exercise is it forces us to get past the "easy" thanks that we all too flippantly offer.  For God's people thanks needs to be offered in a way consistent with the idea that the "best things aren't things at all."  There is plenty of work to be done in the area of gratitude for food, clothing, shelter, and toys--too many of us routinely take these things for granted--but robust thanksgiving needs to go beyond the seen to matters of the heart.  A friend, for instance says, "I am thankful for the quality of friends that I have. Friends who pray for me, who encourage me, who make me laugh, who hold me when I need to cry. . . ."  A couple of people offer thanks for the neighborhoods where they live.  Another offers thanks for the beauty of creation.  Sundaywe will focus on giving thanks for God's unspeakable, indescribable gift, Jesus Christ.   

My hope is that this Thanksgiving we'll get beyond the thanks of the little kid who prayed with his eyes open--not a bad idea in itself--offering thanks for everything he saw on the table.  Let's offer thanks for what we see with the eyes of faith.  Let's put some buckle shoes and a cockel hat on Habakkuk and invite him to Thanksgiving dinner.  I'm asking him to start my meal with the words he used to finish his book.

 

'Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vines; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren; even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty, 

yet I will rejoice in the Lord! 

 I will be joyful in the God of my salvation! 

The Sovereign Lord is my strength! 

He makes me as surefooted as a deer, able to tread upon the heights."

AMEN

 

I invite you to join us Sunday, 11/17, as we give thanks for God's "indescribable gift."  Our service will include communion, eucharist, which comes from the word "thanks."

 

 

 

It's STTA.