I don’t often write seasonally-appropriate posts.

But I’m finding that thankfulness is a practice that I’ve been trying to get better at and some revelations about it are worth sharing about at a time when we should be practicing it.

To be frank, thankfulness keeps me alive as a person. It is because…

Thankfulness helps me survive the mud flood of American prosperity.

I’m a middle-class Christian and there’s no way around it. One of the things about our little subculture is that we are bombarded by the sentiment that we must have more. We are plagued with the addiction of addition.

We are constantly being sold that we must add more and more to our lives. Buy this, try that, do this, do that-the fear of missing out and the love of comfort drives our spirituality in ways that we often do not see.

I have found that to rest from this pursuit with the next big thing (or the next little thing, depending on your aggressiveness) is like swimming against a tide. Our entire capitalistic society is so entrenched in it, it’s hard to see the mud all over our eyes and faces.

Thankfulness, thankfully, helps me escape this flood of prosperity. It lifts me to a place where I can see more clearly, more culturally-agnostically, into a human expression that is universally life-giving.

It reminds me to remember what I have; not what I don’t have. It reminds me that, if there were a minimum line of survival, I am far, far, far, far beyond that line. It reminds me that what makes truly happy people is not addition but generosity and selflessness.

thankfulness connects me with God.

Thankfulness is not an activity done in a vacuum. As much as we ask what we are thankful for, we must also ask who we are thankful to.

Thank you for this… thank you for that… thank you for this… thank you for that..

These are words that do not happen like a one way street, but rather, they connect two souls together. My soul is with God and God with mine when I have a spirit of thankfulness.

It creates an atmosphere where I am reminded me that all that I am and that I have is truly a gift. Every single dollar I have is from God. Even if I earned it, he has given me the ability to work. Even if I inherited, he has placed me among people who are generous. What do I have that is not from him? And what is from him, that is also not an expression of his great love for me and his caring eyes over my life?

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This season, I choose to be thankful.

I want to be a thankful person for the rest of my life.

Because, honestly, we have more things to be thankful for than words to say it. And I praise and thank my God who generously gives so that we can even be a thankful people.