How to Be Thankful?

Just before our extended family arrived for Thanksgiving, I sat down to check my e-mail. An article title on the Yahoo! homepage caught my eye: "How to Be Thankful." I was a little stunned. Is our materialistic culture so far gone that we need internet articles to teach us how to be thankful? How tragic.

Then I began thinking (as always). From a secular person's perspective, what does Thanksgiving mean? To be thankful, you have to be thankful towards someone for giving you something (hence Thanks-giving). In my family, we express our thanks to God for His bountiful blessings on us. It is a time to celebrate God's goodness with our loved ones. But what about the secular perspective? Is Thanksgiving merely a time to stuff your face and be annoyed by relatives? How empty.

After my family finished eating, we went around the table and shared what we were most thankful for. Dad was thankful for getting a new job and being able to go back to school. Jer was thankful for spiritual growth. Mom was thankful for all of us. Then it came to me.

"Carey, what are you thankful for?"

"Well..." I paused and looked around. "I'm very thankful for the trial the Lord gave me over the past eight months and the growth that it brought. I wouldn't change a thing." That warranted stares from my mom and Aunt Sylvia ("Tía Sylvia" from Guatemala).

This past year has been difficult with a lot of changes taking place in my life, but I honestly wouldn't change a thing the Lord has done. Some things happen that leave you wondering Why? What was the purpose of this? But my Father is good and knows what is best for me. If nothing else, it was to bring about a change in me for the better. It was to draw me closer to my Beloved and to make me stronger. That is a good enough reason for me.

So how is one to be thankful? Perhaps Job said it best:

The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD. (Job 1:21)

>>"To Say Thanks" by Nichole Nordeman<<