What Are You Thankful For?

A little boy attended his friend’s birthday. Upon his return home from the party, his mother asked him, “Bobby, did you thank Mrs. Jones for the party?” He replied, “Well, I was going to. But the girl ahead of me said, ‘Thank you,’ and Mrs. Jones told her not to mention it. So I didn’t.”

It almost seems that we have to be trained to express gratitude, doesn’t it?

Perhaps circumstances in your life have left you unable to see the many wondrous things God has done and continues to do in your life. Maybe the pain of life has overwhelmed you to the point where you don’t see any more how blessed you truly are.

Maybe Thanksgiving is a time of sorrow for you because this is the first year without the person you loved. Maybe it is just that life has gotten away from you with the busyness that is so much a part of all of our lives. Maybe you are lucky enough to be in that category of people who have been so blessed, that even those blessings don’t look all that good anymore.

How, then, can we overcome our mind-set of apathy and move toward a true spirit of thanksgiving in a culture that teaches us to enter into the rat race and compete for status with a world of unthankful people?

I don’t pretend to have all of the answers, but I do think we need to recognize God’s blessing in all of their many manifestations and give thanks to God even and most importantly when it seems impossible to do so.

In a Peanuts cartoon, Charlie Brown brings dinner out to his dog, Snoopy, on Thanksgiving Day. But it was just his usual dog food in a bowl.

Snoopy takes one look at the dog food and says, “This isn’t fair. The rest of the world today is eating turkey with all the trimmings, and all I get is dog food.”

He stands there stares at his dog food for a moment, then says, “I guess it could be worse. I could be a turkey.”

You know, there is always something for which to be thankful.

For you wives out there, be grateful for husbands who attack small repair jobs around the house. They usually make them big enough to call in professionals who’ll do it right.

Parents, be grateful for children who put away their things and clean up after themselves. They’re such a joy to have around that you hate to see them go home to their own parents.

And parents, be grateful for teenagers. They give you an opportunity to learn a second language.

But seriously, make an effort today to recognize the blessings you’ve come to take for granted. Focus on what you have rather than on what you don’t have, and see if it doesn’t improve your attitude.

A few suggestions:

• Be thankful that you don’t already have everything you want. If you did, what would
  there be to look forward to?
• Be thankful when you don’t know something, this gives you the opportunity to learn.
• Be thankful for the difficult times. During those times you grow.
• Be thankful for your limitations, because they give you opportunities for improvement.
• Be thankful for each new challenge, because it will build strength and character.
• Be thankful for your mistakes. They will teach you valuable lessons.
• Be thankful when you’re tired and weary, because it means you’ve made a difference.

It’s easy to be thankful when things are good. It is easy to see the world through rose-colored glasses when your life is rosy. But, a life of true fulfillment can come to those who are also thankful for the setbacks. As hard as it may be, find a way to be thankful for your troubles, and learn from them so they can become your blessings.

I remind you that the first Thanksgiving held here in America did not come from ideal circumstances. Back in 1621, after a morning worship service, Elder Brewster suggested that beginning Tuesday and continuing through Saturday there would be a Festival of Thanksgiving.

Such an announcement must have caught people by surprise because it had been a ghastly winter. Exactly half of the colonists had died the first winter. You will remember that they made their graves flat so that the Indians, in case they were hostile, would not know how many of their number had died. When Martin Rinkart wrote the hymn, “Now Thank We All Our God,” it was not because everything was pleasant. He had just lived through a terrible plague.

From our point of view the pilgrims and Martin Rinkart had little for which to give thanks. Chances are, however, that their gratitude was much more genuine than ours. Affluence has rendered us flabby and self-satisfied. And as a result, we are much more prone to complain about what we lack than give thanks for what we have.

As we look around us at the land of plenty that we live in, it is my prayer that we will see through new eyes each day the ways that God has blessed us and never take God or those blessings for granted. This year, as we celebrate Thanksgiving, may we each see God for who God really is and see ourselves as who we really are: People who have been blessed beyond our wildest dreams. We have been given Jesus, the Bread of Life; we know this bread and have had our only lasting hunger satisfied. May we now be truly thankful to the God who deserves our thanksgiving.

In his song, My Tribute, Andrae Crouch sings to God:

How can I say thanks for the things you have done for me?
Things so undeserved, yet you give to prove your love for me.
The voices of a million angels could not express my gratitude;
All that I am & ever hope to be, I owe it all to you…