One of the truly great blessings of our lives is the simple act of giving thanks. Something about the act itself is restorative and healing. No matter how utterly desperate our circumstances are we can always give thanks because goodness is bound inherently into reality and into matter. To take the time to give thanks – to name our blessings and offer gratitude – puts our souls back into joint. We are realigned with truth and restored to sanity and soundness of mind. Fear diminishes. Pain lessens. Anxiety becomes quieter. And hope comes closer to our conscious. In ways we may not even fully understand, thanksgiving as a practice and state of mind is a defense against darkness.
It is good for us to give thanks and we are made to do so.
This thanksgiving I pray that your hearts will be filled with gratitude and the awareness of blessings that are truly everywhere around you.
I promise you, friends, I as I give thanks today and throughout the rhythms of the year you are among the blessings I am most grateful for.
Thanksgiving is one of my very favourite celebrations of the year. I love the simplicity of its focus – food, family, friends, and acknowledging what we already are given. No shopping frenzy required! Just an opportunity to pause, make beauty in our homes and make time for each other. What could be more needed or welcome?
Giving thanks is the perfect herald for entering into Advent. There is no Joy without gratitude first.
Blessings to you and yours always!
Lancia E. Smith is an author, photographer, business owner, and publisher. She is the founder and publisher of Cultivating Oaks Press, LLC, and the Executive Director of The Cultivating Project, the fellowship who create content for Cultivating Magazine. She has been honoured to serve in executive management, church leadership, school boards, and Art & Faith organizations over 35 years.
Now empty nesters, Lancia & her husband Peter make their home in the Black Forest of Colorado, keeping company with 200 Ponderosa Pine trees, a herd of mule deer, an ever expanding library, and two beautiful black cats. Lancia loves land reclamation, website and print design, beautiful typography, road trips, being read aloud to by Peter, and cherishes the works of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and George MacDonald. She lives with daily wonder of the mercies of the Triune God and constant gratitude for the beloved company of Cultivators.
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A Field Guide to Cultivating ~ Essentials to Cultivating a Whole Life, Rooted in Christ, and Flourishing in Fellowship
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So many reasons to give thanks to God: http://cinderellasang.blogspot.ca/2016/09/let-redeemed-of-lord-give-thanks.html
May your thanksgiving overflow to calm the storms and clear the clutter of the worlds distractions and leave the peace of truth to shine!
“Thanksgiving flow when how I see shakes hands with truth.”
Kirk
Yes indeed there are, Sandra! We are each so blessed and kept in mercies more than we can count. Thank you for being one of those blessings here are Cultivating. I appreciate you! Blessings to you and yours!
Thanks, Kirk. Clearing the clutter is an imperative to cultivating the conditions for peace and for hope. So much beauty rests all around us full and present if we can but clear the way to see it. Blessings to you, friend!
Psalm 84:10 comes to mind, “…I would rather be a street-sweeper on the avenue for the Lord then be lost in the clutter of the boulevard of my own Babylon. (or something like that? : )
I love that! “…I would rather be a street-sweeper on the avenue for the Lord then be lost in the clutter of the boulevard of my own Babylon.” Fabulous word imagery.
Beautiful poem, Sandra. 🙂
I love this, Lancia, the whole thing, but this line especially resonated with me: “goodness is bound inherently into reality and into matter.” Yes and amen!
Thank you, Kimberlee. I’m glad to know it resonates. 🙂 I’ve thought a lot about that issue of goodness being bound inherently into matter. Some of my thinking has been sparked by Malcolm Guite’s work in his sonnets where he references “God’s good earth”. When I have struggled most with darkness and depression, meditating on the goodness bound deeply even into suffering, even in death, has changed the way I see. It hasn’t always brought immediate light into the moment of struggle, but it has allowed me to accept the moment with less fear and trust more calmly that the light will come back. The idea of all things being sacred is true, particularly from this perspective and helps me understand at least a little glimmer of what the Lord means when He says He will work all things together for good, for those who know Him and are called to Him.