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    I am writing this to YOU right NOW the week before Thanksgiving to talk with you from my heart. Unfortunately Thanksgiving is now just the big dinner before the Christmas season. The stores set out a few displays of pilgrim candles and indian corn to go with their frozen turkeys, then it’s on to Christmas. So let me ask you to do something this year to keep Thanksgiving from being the day before the biggest shopping day of the year. Find a stub of a pencil, and a piece of paper. Now, fold it up, and make sure and have it with you on Thanksgiving Day.

    I have no idea where you will be on Thanksgiving Day, so let’s pretend...

    ...you go to the home of relatives. You get there, take your coat off, greet everybody, explain why you’re still single again this year, drink coffee or tea, talk to people you’re glad you don’t have to live with long-term, eat, eat, eat, eat. Then, as you waddle over to Uncle Thed’s worn old brown recliner (you can sit there, Uncle Thed passed away five years ago), you kick back the footrest, lace your fingers together across your protruding stomach, and watch a football game on an ancient Philco television set. The rabbit ear antenna doesn’t work too well, so there is a lot of static and “snow” on the screen. This combines with the real snow at the football game, so you finally get tired of squinting and go to sleep.

    A few hours later, you awaken to dead silence in the house, and it’s cold and late in the afternoon. At first you panic, worrying that everyone is dead from a carbon monoxide leak or abducted by aliens or some sort of inexplicable disaster. Imagine your relief to find that everyone is only asleep. There is the buzzsaw-snoring of sleeping family members, and the sound of Aunt Gertie in the kitchen.

Gratitude is one of the real secrets of life...

    Here’s what I want you to do; take your pencil and paper, find a place to wake up and begin to list the real, deep, true things in your life that you are grateful for. I mean the Real Deal; what you are really thankful for, because gratitude makes you feel abundant! Gratitude is one of the real secrets of life, and no one really tells you that little secret. But now its out! Take my best wisdom and use it as freely as that butter you spread on your Thanksgiving dinner rolls.

    I’m grateful. I’m full of gratitude. Why? Did I win on Millionaire or strike it big with my penny stocks? Nope. But...

    I am alive. My son is recovering from an injury. My wife is working hard to teach pre-school. I have two kids in college and two at home. I have a roof over my head, old cars to drive, all the coffee I can drink, bookstores not far away, radio stations that play music I can sing along to. My singles group is healthy and growing. I can roll my window down and let the wind blow what hair I have. I can stick my hand out the window as I drive and pretend it’s an airplane. I have a coat, some shoes. I work with other ministers and elders with whom I can laugh and cry.

    I am certainly not rich, but I have a lot of stuff. I have problems, but I have a God who loves me, and who has given me an enduring hope. I have His Word, and prayer, and second chances. I usually feel okay most of the time.

    I don’t have lots of “ecstatic” moments, but occasionally I am overcome with the beauty of life as I drive down the highway. So I am thankful to live in a town where no one looks twice when a fifty year old man dances and twirls in the grassy median at sunset.

    Let me tell you something. Joy is a gift of the Spirit according to Galatians 5, a fruity piece that shows His work in our life. And I find that Joy is really Appreciation plus Gratitude. When I am truly grateful for something, and I also appreciate it, I HAVE JOY!!! I want you to have it too! So did the Apostle Paul. He wants your joy to be complete. And so do all those living in the warm liquid of God’s Love. We want you to have it. We want you to be Grateful. We want you to taste that joy of God’s goodness. We want you to have Happy Thanksgiving, not just this week, but until we meet at the bigger feast that lies ahead in the joy of God.