August thanksgiving 7

From the Spiritual Disciplines Handbook:

Thankfulness is a thread that can bind together all the patchwork squares of our lives. Difficult times, happy days, seasons of sickness, hours of bliss--all can be sewn together into something lovely with the thread of thankfulness . . . . We each have the power to interpret the facts of our lives. We make the choices that turn us into bitter or grateful people. Gratitude is rooted in the reality that "bidden or unbidden, God is present." Carl Jung discovered (and popularized) this statement among the Latin writings of Erasmus: vocatus atque non vocatus, deus aderit.

Thanksgiving is possible not because everything goes perfectly but because God is present. The Spirit of God is within us--nearer to us than our own breath. It is a discipline to choose to stitch our days together with the thread of gratitude. But the decision to do so is guaranteed to stitch us closer to God. Attend to the truth that "bidden or unbidden, God is present."
--Adele Ahlberg Calhoun