Meet Tom. Tom is our little friend who reminds us to be grateful. Each day in November we try to write something we are thankful for on his feather. I was reading them last night and most of them were what you would expect: family, friends, Moses (our dog), church, our house, and a couple of great ones from my 5-year-old like rental cars (?) and sea creatures.  When I came to the one where I had written “Jesus” I stopped. If I am being honest, the day I wrote that, I jotted down His name to check the box. The Name above all Names was just another item on the list. I am forever thankful for Him, but already as the holiday season starts to speed up He is getting lost in the shuffle.

Thinking about that now, I feel a deep sense of conviction. Because the only reason I have all of those other things is because of the Lord. James 1:17 says,

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father…

Without His grace in my life and the salvation made possible through His Son, who knows where I would be?  But often I go through the motions, thanking Him because it’s the “right” thing to do, and I know I should write his name down on that feather.

As we approach this holiday season, let’s be different. Let’s ask God to help us stop pushing Him aside. Let’s ask him to soften our hearts so that we remember that everything we have, even our very lives, are from Him.  Let’s remember that the whole point of this season is because God himself came down as a man to save us when we were dead in our sins. That’s something to be thankful about.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Natalie