Seasons
Thanksgiving
For when you feel: thanksgiving, thankful holiday, gratitude season
Go ye into his gates with praise, into his courts with hymns: and give glory to him. Praise ye his name: For the Lord is sweet, his mercy endureth for ever, and his truth to generation and generation.
The MinuteHomily
The table is set, the kitchen is loud, and somewhere under the noise you are taking inventory of the year. Psalm 100 gives thanksgiving a doorway. You enter His gates with it; gratitude is the way in to everything else. And notice that the psalm's reasons never once mention your circumstances. "For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations." Some years the turkey shares the table with an empty chair, and the psalm still stands, because it was never built on a smooth year. So go around the table and be specific, since mercies have names and dates. And if this year was hard, thank Him anyway, from the gate. That is not denial. It is defiance: goodness gets the last word.
By the MinuteHomily editors
A prayer for this moment
Good and faithful God, we enter with thanksgiving: for named mercies, for everlasting mercy, for truth that will outlast this table and hold our grandchildren. Amen.
“In all things give Him thanks.”
St. Teresa of Ávila
Hymns for this moment
“Now Thank We All Our God” · Martin Rinkart
written amid plague and war, the ultimate hard-year thanksgiving
“For the Beauty of the Earth” · Folliott Pierpoint
One small step
Before the meal: everyone names one specific mercy from this year, with its date if they can.
Share this moment
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