“Since you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, now walk in Him. Get to know him more intimately and love him more fully. You are deeply rooted in Christ, and your Father is making you more like Jesus. With our eyes fixed on Jesus, and Jesus as the object of our faith, may we overflow with gratitude.” (pp Col. 2:6-7)
Heavenly Father, considering the opulent riches you have given us in Jesus, and the many creature comforts and good things you give us as a loving Father, “overflowing with gratitude” shouldn’t be that difficult. But until you glorify us, our default mode will be forgetting the Gospel, discontent-by-comparison, and “Yes-But-Ing” your grace. “Yes, God’s grace is amazing BUT check out my ‘not-so-amazing-list’.”
(Friends, on this Thanksgiving Day, what disproportionally disappoints us more than the Gospel most appropriately astonishes us? Don’t let this question fuel shame but ignite our gratitude.)
Abba, you commend being “content with food and clothing” (1Tim.6:8). So, here’s the “bread-and-threads” we are most grateful for today. Thank you for giving us bread from heaven—the Bread of Life, Jesus himself as our essential nutrients and eternal feast. Thank you for taking away our wardrobe of sin and shame, and clothing us in garments of your grace—in the very righteousness and beauty of Jesus. Hallelujah,10,000 times over!
Abba, we also thank you today for the multiple freedoms of the Gospel, including these:
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Thank you for your freedom from posing and pretending. Many of us wake up to hard stuff today—like empty chairs in our home through death of a loved one or strained/broken relationships. Your grace frees us to grieve hard things without them debilitating or defining us.
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Thank you for the freedom to lament without our laments turning into cussin,’ contempt, and acting “crazy” for a few hours. We are guaranteed a perfect world, a perfect us, and perfected others—but not till Jesus returns. Give us big grace till that big Day.
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Thank you for the freedom to ALWAYS ask: “How is my Father at work for my good right now in things I call bad and very hard?”
Father, we do thank you, but we are not saved to the degree we’re grateful but to the degree we’re grace-possessed—which is 100% by your doing and delight. So VERY Amen.