Dream Awakener

that for which i’m thankful

Originally uploaded by slight clutter

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am thankful to God for the opportunity to have a blog and interact with so many people all around the world. I have been encouraged by the kind of response that this blog has been getting, according to StatCounter, Google Analytics and MyBlogLog. I am always encouraged when you make comments and interact with some of the stuff I write about.

I have been particularly encouraged by the response to my post on A Primer of Today’s Missional Church. The amount of comments, links and responses confirmed my sense of call to put those resources together. So what about this idea of experiencing thanksgiving everyday?

EXPERIENCE THANKSGIVING EVERYDAY
According to the Apostle Paul, we can enjoy thanksgiving everyday, (aside from our gluttonous tendencies) which is why he said, “In everything give thanks.” John Henry Jowett, a preacher from England says this about gratitude:

“Gratitude is a vaccine, an antitoxin, and an antiseptic.” What did he mean? He meant that gratitude, like a vaccine, can prevent the invasion of a disgruntled, discouraged spirit. Like an antitoxin, gratitude can prevent the affects of the poisons of cynicism, criticalness, and grumbling. Like an antiseptic, a spirit of gratitude can soothe and heal the most troubled spirit.”

Why is practicing gratitude so important for our lives? Because every day is a gift from God, that we are called to unwrap; yet so often we miss many of the gifts that God gives us, because ingratitude is moral blindness. A blindness to the goodness of being alive, the beauty of creation, the love of friends and the joy of work. It’s a blindness to the fact that life is basically good. The Psalmist said, “Praise the Lord, I tell myself; and never forget the good things he does for me.” Ps. 103:2 NLT

One of the best examples of someone who has learned to count their blessings in difficult circumstances and choose joy is a guy by the name of Tim Hansel. Tim was a Stanford graduate who for the last thirty years, has lived with chronic physical pain. He has authored ten books and each one that I have read I have been thoroughly encourage by. As a man who lives in grueling chronic pain, he exudes great joy, because he has learned that joy is a choice.

In his book You Gotta Keep Dancin’ he writes: “Pain is inevitable, but misery is optional. We cannot avoid pain, but we can avoid joy. God has given us such immense freedom that he will allow us to be as miserable as we want to be.”

He says, “I know some people who spend their entire lives practicing being unhappy, diligently pursuing joylessness. They get more mileage from having people feel sorry for them than from choosing to live out their lives in the context of joy.

Joy is simple (not to be confused with easy). At any moment in life we have at least two options, and one of them is to choose an attitude of gratitude, a posture of grace, a commitment to joy.

There is no question that life is difficult. In fact, it has been said that God promises four things: peace, power, purpose and TROUBLE. For example in John 16:33 Jesus reminds us quite boldly that in the world there will be trouble. There will be tribulation, but we are not merely to endure it but to “be of good cheer for he has overcome the world.”

Many of us have only gotten half the message. We recognize the difficulty of life and drearily drag ourselves through each day, mumbling about our burdens. It can be different – but the choice is ours.”

He says, as I learned after my accident, I could not live by the maxim “When I get stronger, than I will be joyful.” It’s an attitude so many people share, agreeing to be joyful when the circumstances improve.

Tim Hansel’s thoughts are even more meaningful, as I for the last year and a half have had his wife Anastasia in my Fuller Cohort. We shared a small group together and one week she wrote me this e-mail:

I just wanted you to know I am once again facing the possibility of losing my husband. I went to bed at 2 a.m. on Monday morning and at 4 a.m. Tim was calling for me. He could hardly breathe. The paramedics came and off to ER we went. Tim’s O2 level was at 50%! He has been ‘intubated’……..an absolutely horrific procedure. He has a severe case of pneumonia. It seems like his lungs have become his Achilles heel. His body has been paralyzed to keep him absolutely stilled. The opening chapter of the latest book, DANCIN’ ON THE CHAOS! we titled, “No Pulse” because that is what we have lived with for years…….doctor’s diagnoses telling us he’s not going to make it. It will be a miracle this time if he does pull through. Doing my Fuller assignments has been a blessing as well as tough to meet ‘the deadlines’. I’m not sure I made a great deal of sense trying to think through the last assignment. I have a speaking engagement this Saturday on top of all of this……..so, as I would appreciate your prayers that I would not ‘cry my way’ through my talk. I don’t mind the tears but it’s tough to understand someone when they are in tears! As Tim and I have shared with people, life isn’t just difficult as Scott Peck has written…….life can be desperate at times!

The more I have lived, the more that I have noticed that People who say “thank you” to God have a way of looking at life. They see life differently. The good, the bad, the ugly-they see all of it as a part of the package of life-that great gift of life that God has given us. And they know how and who to say “thank you” to. They regularly say “thank you” to God. They know how to truly celebrate the great stuff, like being in love. They have learned to thank God for the stuff most of us overlook. When they see a beautiful sunset, they say “thank you”. When they listen to music they enjoy, they say thanks. When they eat a delicious meal, or when they enjoy an evening with a friend, they are thankful.

They also have a way of being able to live with and live through the hard and difficult and disappointing things. Because for them, it’s all part of the gift of life that God has given. And they live out their thanks to God. Their life is lived out like a big thank-you note to God-a thank-you note to an amazing and forgiving and grace-giving God.

A teacher asked her students to list what they thought were the present Seven Wonders of the World. The students cast the most votes for: 1. Egypt’s Great Pyramids 2. Taj Mahal 3. Grand Canyon 4. Panama Canal 5. Empire State Building 6. St. Peter’s Basilica 7. China’s Great Wall

While gathering the votes, the teacher noted that one student had not turned in her paper yet. She asked the girl if she was having trouble with her list. The girl replied, “Yes, a little. I couldn’t quite make up my mind because there were so many.”

The teacher said, “Well, tell us what you have, and maybe we can help.” The girl hesitated, then read, “I think the Seven Wonders of the World are: 1. to see 2. to hear 3. to touch 4. to taste 5. to feel 6. to laugh 7. to love

This little girl understands something that we all need to remember, and that is the simple wonders of life. Every morning when we wake up and live out our day, we are simply unwrapping God’s gift to us. We have so much to be thankful for.