Happy Thanksgiving!
This Thursday is Thanksgiving Day. People all over the country will gather together for a traditional meal. Some families will develop a new tradition this year.
Being thankful has many benefits. Have you ever considered why gratitude and being thankful is a benefit to you? Here are four benefits.
First, being thankful is a great stress reliever. We all experience stress. Stress is unavoidable. The secret is – dealing with stress in a healthy way.
In the second place, being thankful is the opposite of grumpiness. Some people seem to be naturally grumpy. When I look at the nine items known as the fruit of the Spirit, I do not find grumpiness. What I do find is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. We will all need some self-control this Thursday if we are traveling anywhere for Thanksgiving. Gratitude and thankfulness is the opposite of grumpiness.
Another powerful benefit of gratitude and thanksgiving is it is the alternative to selfish thinking. Life is full of selfish thinking. Playing dominoes or most if not all games promotes selfish thinking. We want to win! Fourth, and finally, thankfulness is an antidote to bitterness.
The Bible tells us it is possible to be caught or stuck in the gall of bitterness. The Bible calls bitterness a poison to the soul. Bitterness says, “You did not have the right to treat me that way.” Many times you are correct in thinking that way. However, the longer that thought remains in your system, the more bitterness makes an unhealthy impact on your soul.
What can we do to conquer stress, grumpiness, selfish thinking, and bitterness? To say it simply – be grateful. Be thankful. The Bible adds a little to that. It says, “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
Another powerful thing you can do is begin a grateful journal. An old hymn we used to sing says, “When upon life's billows you are tempest tossed, when you are discouraged, thinking all is lost, count your many blessings, name them one by one, and it will surprise you what the Lord has done.”
If you count your blessings, it would probably be good to have a place to record them. Record them in a grateful journal. The idea here is to seek to make at least one journal entry every day; something or someone for which you are grateful.
The third and most important thing to do is - be grateful to God. We would be wise to thank God often for His tremendous gift of salvation. Look up these three passages of Scripture about being thankful. They are Ephesians 2:4-9; Romans 5:6-8; Isaiah 64:6a.
Happy Thanksgiving and consider deeply how much we should appreciate God who paid the ultimate price so we could be saved from our sins and spend eternity with Him.
