Thanksgiving Status Updates -- part deaux

It has been a crazy interesting month. Earlier in my blogs I had started a "being thankful" blog. It was disjointed and not well thought out and I wanted to try it again.

Over the past month, people on Facebook have been posting "status updates" about what they are thankful for. It has been interesting. Some are grateful for little things that happen through the day, "post" Fort Hood shootings -- people posted about being thankful for safety and thankful for the survivors and such. Overall people have really had a lot of "fun" with this subject. (My husband even posted that he was thankful for his queen sized bed).

In my sermon preparation, last week on "giving" and "thanks," a friend asked "why we give?" I was reminded of this as I sat at our community Thanksgiving service for the Randolph Area Christian Assistance Program. The Pastor used the story Stone Soup to talk about the fact that we are all blessed. Because we are blessed, we bless others.

Sometimes we don't feel blessed. Sometimes we get stuck in a rut. Sometimes bad things happen. All of these things are fact. (or our opinion of the situation, I guess). We don't want to look at the whole picture and scratch beneath the surface. We want to see our glass as half empty. (all cliche's I know).

So for this Thanksgiving, let's scratch the surface. Let us look at the whole picture.

I'll start -- here is my "official" Thanksgiving Status Update
I'm thankful for my family. I have a loving and caring family. Yes we have put up with alot in our lives but we always come out on top. We support each other. We are fighters. We know that at the end of the day, we can all sit around and laugh about the world.

I am thankful that I live in a city that has a proud military existence. I don't know that I ever understood military life until I took my current position at Christ the King. I always appreciated it, yes, but I understand it better now. I lift up our armed forces in prayer at all times. I am proud of the freedom that they help me to have. I am honored to know and love them of all shapes and sizes. (active, retired and family members)

I am thankful to have a job that challenges, uplifts, blesses and provides in abundance. I love the people I work with, love the church that I serve and love all that goes with it. I am blessed to be a part of Christ the King Lutheran Church.

I am thankful to be able to enjoy the things in life that I love to do. I am blessed to be able knit, to be able to play the violin, to be able to exercise and enjoy it, to be able to play in parks with Cade... and oh so many things. There are many in this world that are not able to have fun and I am so blessed that I constantly have that opportunity.

I am blessed by the sights and sounds of this world that remind me that God is great. Being able to experience God's creation on so many levels is a truly beautiful thing.

I am thankful for my friends. My friends excite me. My friends challenge me. My friends teach me. My friends love me. My friends care. I could list them one by one but they all know who they are and I thank God for them daily.

I am thankful for experiences. I am thankful for the highs and the lows of life. All of life is a learning experience and I love that I can learn and grow in my understanding of this wonderful world. I am thankful for the good times that I can praise God for. I am also thankful for the bad times that help me learn something new about myself and grow in that.

I am thankful for so many things. More of those are revealed to me on an hourly basis sometimes. I am thankful for life. I could go on forever probably and still not totally cover everything.

Thank you God that I am able to be in this world and encounter everything that I am given. Help all of us this Thanksgiving understand what we are thankful for and to give thanks for those blessings every day of our lives.
AMEN