Living in Gratitude

 

Happy Wednesday!

Giving thanks is my favorite form of worship. Years ago, I was taking this class on the enneagram at the church we were currently going to, and the speaker was talking about Fours (I am, of course, a Four). If you don't know what the enneagram is it's an in-depth and super accurate personality test. It's uncanny how much the enneagram gets me as a Four. But anyways, during the class there was a list of key spiritual disciplines for each type to practice or would benefit from. At the top of the Four list was gratitude. I thought that was funny and very accurate because I had been practicing gratitude for years before that. I can't remember a time when I didn't start ever single prayer I pray with thanking God for the day. Every morning when I pray, I always start out by thanking Him for the day. I'm not sure what first caused me to put such an emphasis on thankfulness in my prayers, but when I think back on it I do know there was either a sermon or something that pushed me toward that. I do remember that God had pressed gratitude and thankfulness in on me a long time ago and I realized how much it helped me.

I can easily get caught up in the past or the future, but rarely do I like to be stuck in the present. The past is fun to reminisce about, and it's fun to plan for the possibilities of the future... but the present is no fun at all. It's just doing the mundane everyday things day in and day out. Following the same schedule, doing classwork, helping around the house. Doesn't sound very fun.

That's the thing about thankfulness, though. Thankfulness roots you in the now. It is for the present moment. For me, thankfulness is the discipline of centering myself in the present. Every morning when I pray the first thing, I do is thank God for the new day He's given me. I then try and list at least a few other things I'm thankful for. Sometimes it's deep and meaningful and other times it's literally just the comfy bed I have and the pretty sunrise out my window. It forces you to stop and meditate on all the things you have, and all the things God provides, big and small. You have to stop and be in the present even just for a few minutes while you thank Him.

For others that may have come naturally to them their whole lives, but for me I had to really work at that for a long time. It's become second nature to me now to thank God for every blessing that comes my way, but it took me a while to get there and even then, I thank God for every small blessing, but have a harder time being thankful for the big things. Being thankful for being where I'm at in this present moment. I'm never perfectly satisfied with where I'm at in the present. There's always somewhere else I want to be, something else I want to be doing. Even when I don't have specifics as to where or what that "there" is, I am always looking forward to something more. The present is unsatisfactory, never quite good enough, always needing perfecting. I wish I was at this stage of my life doing this, or I wish I was already doing that instead of having to wait before I'm ready for that season of my life.

I'm still learning the discipline of being thankful and showing gratitude to God for where I am presently at. He has blessed me with so many things, including this present season of my life. Most of the time it doesn't feel like a blessing, most of the time it feels like I'm on a long stretch of highway half way between where I was and where I want to go. But all the same, this space right here where I am is a blessing and God is worthy of being worshipped through thankfulness for that blessing.

I'm realizing through my want and need to be "there" already that thankfulness isn't just an act of worship or a spiritual discipline, though. It's a way of life. It's important for us as Christians to live in constant gratitude. It reminds me of James 1:2 and just the Apostle Paul in general cus he was always giving thanks and always finding joy in his present. His present was usually not a particularly pleasant place either. Usually, it was in prison and yet he gave thanks for the churches he wrote his letters to and gave thanks to God just in general. I couldn't remember where the verse was that I was thinking about, so I looked it up and 1 Thessalonians 5:18 came up which I think sums this all up perfectly: "...give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."

Hannah Brencher's book Come Matter Here is centered around a saying: Be where your feet are. I now know how to do that. By centering myself in thankfulness for everything in the present. For thanking God for the present in general. Being where your feet are means to live in constant gratitude and thankfulness for everything the present holds for you. How can you praise God and rejoice in your present circumstances, even rejoice in present suffering if you aren't thankful for it? Thankful that your present trials and troubles will and are drawing you closer to God. Thankful that God has a plan for your life in these very moments as you read these words. Out of thankfulness and gratitude to God comes praise and worship and joy.

This is something I am still learning, still trying to grow in every day. It's hard... There are some days where I still want to be "there" already, be in a different seeing, doing something else. But I always have to come back to thankfulness and remind myself that God is working even now in the small, mundane parts of life. He does good in everything.

So, as Thanksgiving is tomorrow, let's not just stop and be thankful for our family and for the food at the table. Let's be thankful for 2020, for November, for the day and the season and the life you are living right now. Let's give thanks for where God has our feet planted right now even if it's not necessarily where you would like to be or thought you would be. God has you where you are at for a purpose and that is something to be thankful for.

What are you thankful for this week?