Giving thanks

Lately I have been somewhat in disbelief at how quickly time is passing. Leading up to Thanksgiving I could not wrap my mind around the reality that it was already late in November and just a handful of days until December. I attribute this mostly to the lack of cold weather and snow in Arkansas, as most of my life the entire month of November included cold weather and snow. And while it is getting much cooler, I am yet to see even a single snowflake.

This week we began reading and discussing our new book, Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Quite appropriately, giving thanks daily for small things is major idea in the first chapter.

Bonhoeffer writes, “Only he who gives thanks for little things receives big things. We prevent God from giving us great spiritual gifts He has in store for us, because we do not give thanks for daily gifts. We think we dare not be satisfied with the small measure of spiritual knowledge, experience, and love that has been given to us, and that we must constantly be looking forward eagerly for the highest good.”

I, too, am guilty of looking for something bigger or better to be grateful for. So, as a reminder to myself to remember the small blessings in my life: I am thankful for having a family willing to let me move to Arkansas for a year. I am thankful for having a family, period. I am thankful for the friends that I have. I am thankful that I have been blessed with safe travel for all I have done in the past six months or so. I am thankful for heat, and for waking up morning after morning, for the generosity I have experienced in Booneville, for being a self-sufficient human being and for all the other little things that God has blessed me with that are so mundane and taken for granted that it would bore you to read them all. I hope and pray that from this point forward I can spend my time rejoicing in the small blessings in life rather than get wrapped up in asking for something bigger and better. Everything is a blessing.

I thank you, LORD, with all my heart;
before the gods to you I sing.
I bow low toward your holy temple;
I praise your name for your fidelity and love.
For you have exalted over all
your name and your promise.
--Psalm 138: 1-2