thanksgiving

Thursday, November 26 – Thanksgiving Day

Opening Prayer: We thank you, most Loving God, that you have chosen us to be your very own.  We thank you for your presence and your promises and your provision that you pour out upon us each and every day.  We are so grateful, O God, for your good gifts and your abundant grace, which we do not deserve.  And most of all we thank you, Lord God, for Jesus, your Son and our Savior.  Amen.

Scripture: Psalm 118:1-29

Journal: What are you thankful for this day?  Write a thank you letter to God today telling him all of the things you are thankful for.

Reflection:

 

     For if you go poking about the world, intent on keeping the candle of consciousness blazing, you must be ready to give thanks at all times.  Discrimination is not allowed.  The flame cannot gutter and fail when a cold wind whistles throughout the house.

     Thanksgiving, thanksgiving.  All must be thanksgiving.

     It took thirty-eight thousand Levites to give thanks to God in David’s day; every morning and every evening the shifts changed.  Four thousand were needed just to carry hacked carcasses of cattle, and another four thousand were needed to sing about it.  The place reeked of blood, was soaked in blood.  The priests stood around gnawing and chewing and giving thanks.  They did not cross-stich their gratitude on samplers to frame and hang on the wall.  They wrote their thanks in blood on the doorposts every year.

     Thanksgiving is not a task to be undertaken lightly.  It is not for dilettantes or aesthetes.  One does not dabble in praise for one’s own amusement, nor train the intellect and develop perceptual skills to add to his repertoire.  We’re not talking about the world as a free course in art appreciation.  No.  Thanksgiving is not a result of perception; thanksgiving is the access to perception. (And the Tress Clap Their Hands by Virginia Stem Owens)

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Thank God because he’s good, because his love never quits.  Tell the world, Israel, “His love never quits.”  And you, clan of Aaron, tell the world, “His love never quits.”  And you who fear God, join in, “His love never quits.”

     Blessed are you who enter in God’s name—from God’s house we bless you!  God is God, he has bathed us in light.  Festoon the shrine with garlands, hang colored banners above the altar!  You’re my God, and I thank you.  O my God, I lift high your praise.
Thank God—he’s so good.  His love never quits! (Psalm 118:1-4, 26-29, The Message)