When I was younger, I remember reading a book of poetry on the different months. I like to tease my sister with the description of her birthday month of November (as if anyone can determine the month they are born in anyway). It went something like this: November is a cold, dull and dreary month…that’s all I needed, especially when my birthday month of June was something to the effect of a cheerful and warm month… Despite being dull and dreary, November offers us two holidays to reflect on what we have been given-Veteran’s Day, and Thanksgiving.While thinking about Thanksgiving and being thankful, I offer my following thoughts on the subject.
Everything we have is from God, period. “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.” James 1:17 (you may want to look at Eccl 2:24-25, and 2 Cor 9:10-15 ). Recognizing this (that everything we have is from God) leads to thankfulness and consequently the right perspective in life. You see, when we are thankful we realize that what we have is from God alone. When we realize that what we have is from God alone, this leads us to not become possessive of, or always striving after material things. In other words, being thankful helps us to set our mind on things above (see Col. 3:2) as well as helps us be in the world, but not of the world.
In a way then, thankfulness is kind of like a belief, in that it affects the way we live our life. In the same way that the beliefs that make up our worldview affect the way we live and respond to things that happen around us, so does thankfulness affect the way we view our belongings and all the other things (whether material or circumstantial) God has given to us.
Consider for a moment the story about the ten lepers. Could it be that the one leper truly realized that his healing was a gift from God? This caused thanksgiving in his heart, and it changed the way he responded, or lived life. He turned around and thanked Jesus for what he had done in his life, unlike the other nine.
We as Christians have the supreme reason to be thankful this Thanksgiving. We have the gift of salvation through Christ, given to us by God. Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!
What has God blessed you with?
Daniel Wanschura
