12.03.2003

Thankgiving Rewind and Unwind

As our family gathered around the Thanksgiving table this year with hands linked and heads bowed, my dad brought up a strangely comforting point concerning giving thanks. He reminded us all that the Pilgrims did not gather to thank God for "good" blessings. They had suffered tragedy, death, hunger, cold, lonliness, and hardship. Imagine what it must have been like to first suffer scorn in your homeland, where going to a completely new land was actually better than staying home. What faith it took! Picture books make the scene look so glossy, the corn so yummy, and the territory so friendly. The point is... they gave thanks inspite of their situation! Paul understood it when he said we were to give thanks in all things. That can sound so trite when lightly used, but it couldn't be closer to the truth. In easy made America today, we tend to be thankful for only the good things, because we know so many of them. When are we truly thankful for the hard things that come our way? I'm not even talking about monstrously destructive events like tornadoes, cancer, or bankruptcy. What about the broken relationship, or the difficult coworker, or the professor whose vocabulary doesn't include "fair and unbias"? It might not be on the level of Pilgrim suffering, but it doesn't matter. God made the Pilgrims suffer for His own reasons, and for the same, He brings you through what He wants you to experience. Simply because He is in control, the only response we can give is "thank you."

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