I Am Not Thankful

    I am not thankful.  I know that it is thanksgiving and we are all supposed to be thankful.  I want to be thankful.  My life is wonderful.  I have an amazing wife, incredible kids, an awesome job, and a wonderful home.  My family is great and I am at peace with everyone in my life.  How is it then that I am not thankful?  

    Well to be entirely honest, it isn't that I am not thankful per se, it is that I am not thankful in proportion to my blessings. You see, each day I swim in, am surrounded by, and am inundated with blessings. There are blessings I see but don't see, ones I can see but not well enough, even blessing that I cannot see. 

    There is a world of blessings that I never see because they are the blessings that never happen:  The car that didn't hit me because the driver looked up from their phone with plenty of time to see me. The fire that never started in my house because I smelled the hot glue gun that had been left on (actually that happened just the other night).  The terrible accident one of my children never had because I happened to be in the room with them.   I never see those blessings so I never feel thankful for them.  

    There are so many things that I ought to be thankful for but they just blend in to the background.  There is the water that runs from my tap that every time I turn the knob no matter what.  There is the electricity that lights my home without fail. There is the food in my refrigerator that I grouse about having to eat leftovers from. There are infinite numbers of blessings that I overlook daily because I forget that people all around the world go day to day without them. 
    
    Even those that I am aware of, and am aware that I should be thankful for I fail to be consistently thankful for.  I forget in the crush of day to day life that there are things for me to be thankful about because something else takes my time and attention.  I assume that this amazing thing just "IS" and so I forget to be astounded by it.  I think about my incredible wife in times like this and how easy it is in a relationship to forget how richly blessed I am, especially with four busy kids pulling us down the road of life at breakneck speed. 

    I am working every day to be more thankful, because I know that I am not yet thankful enough, none of us are.  Every day is Thanksgiving day, and every day we have to learn to be more thankful, if we don't we lose the race against our ever falling awareness of our thankfulness. Every day new stacks of blessings pile up like presents under our soon to be decorated Christmas trees.  God isn't Saint Nickolas, old St. Nick only works to bring presents one day a year, God does it three hundred and sixty five days a year. 

Mark 9 23-4 Jesus said, “Everything is possible for one who believes.” Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”

Ephesians 5:20 Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, 20 always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

   I am not thankful, at least not enough...but I am thankful that every day God leads me to be ever more thankful.  It is my prayer that on this day God leads you to a deeper level of thankfulness and that we all remember that everything comes from our generous and loving God.  We look to God and say "I am thankful, help me overcome my thanklessness."   And that is enough.