Thanksgiving 2012

With Thanksgiving Day upon us, I’d like to share with you a few of the many things for which I am thankful this year.

1. I am thankful for my wife and children, who love, encourage, and inspire me; I am also thankful for the opportunity to be a friend to those who have little or no family or who are estranged from their family.

2. I am thankful for my sound health; I am also thankful for the privilege of being with and praying for those whose health is unsound.

3. I am thankful for good food to eat, for clean water to drink, and for access to good health care; I am also thankful for those who are working to make those necessities available to people who don’t have them and for the opportunity to help those who are trying to help.

4. I am thankful for the privilege to live in a free nation in which we try to balance individual liberty and corporate responsibility; I am also thankful for nations that are trying to grow toward such freedom and for people who are working for change in those nations whose leaders have no interest in such freedom.

5. I am thankful for a church family with which I can worship God, with which I can share sorrow and joy, and with which I can bear witness to Jesus Christ in our community; I am also thankful for the privilege of being the church in the world so that we can share the love, mercy, peace, and grace of God with people in need of those blessings.

6. I am thankful for this beautiful world in which we live; I am also thankful for the opportunity of doing what I can to preserve that beauty for future generations.

7. I am thankful for the grace of God that loves me just as I am; I am also thankful for the way that grace nudges me to love others just as they are.

8. I am thankful for the great blessing of knowing and following Jesus Christ every day of my life; I am also thankful for those who follow along with me, whether or not I know it.