Summer Sampler: Gratitude in the Midst
This year’s Summer Sampler theme is “Persevering in a Troubling and Ever-Changing World.” Life can be hard. Sometimes, really hard. How do we persevere through circumstances that threaten to break us? This summer, journey with some women who have been through it and have come out the other side with a deeper faith and confidence in God’s love.
By Susan Moody
In the mid-1980s, “Stress Test Biofeedback Cards” were all the rage. They were plastic cards with a colored scale and a testing square – you held the card with your thumb lightly pressing on the square and counted to 10. The color of the square told your stress score.
I think my stress square might be stuck on black based on the last 10 years of my life. Among other things, the list of stressors includes losing my dad, undergoing multiple surgeries, getting a cancer diagnosis, and making two job changes and two major moves, not to mention that little pandemic thing.
Life in this world is full of trouble – which should be no surprise to us. After all, Jesus promised us that it would be. In John 16:33 (NIV), Jesus tells us “In this world you WILL have trouble.”
Someone asked me the other day how I could be so “unflappable” in the face of so much – to which I wanted to laugh and say, “I’m not – I just fake it well.” But that’s not quite true. In the last 10 years, I have learned that the best response to stress and chaos is to practice radical gratitude. Whether life is going well or everything is going wrong, gratitude needs to be my chosen response if I want to survive the chaos and stress of this world.
Gratitude matters to God. The word thankfulness and other related words appear over 150 times in scripture. But God didn’t command us to express our thankfulness because of what it will do for HIM. God commanded it because of what He knows it will do for US. When we express our gratitude to God, we acknowledge that He is in control and we are not. And that helps us trust Him even more with difficult circumstances.
God knows gratitude is not always an easy choice. I find great comfort in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. There Paul says, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Paul says give thanks IN all circumstances. He did not say give thanks FOR all circumstances.
When I got diagnosed with cancer on the back of my right eye, I did not thank God for cancer. No, I grieved the diagnosis and have grieved the reduced vision I now have in that eye from the treatments. But I have thanked God that the lesion was found in a regular eye exam, and for the miraculous way I got connected with a renowned specialist in this rare kind of cancer, and for how early the cancer was caught, and that the loss of vision has been contained to my peripheral vision so far. Gratitude FOR cancer? No. Gratitude IN THE MIDST OF cancer? A resounding YES! Even in the face of life’s most difficult circumstances, I can express thanks to God.
Gratitude can be difficult, even impossible, in the messy parts of life. But the good news is you don’t need to feel grateful – you need to practice radical gratitude. The feelings of gratitude will come later. Here are some practical ideas for practicing:
START A GRATITUDE JOURNAL: Get an empty notebook and start listing things for which you are grateful. Include everything, from big stuff like running water to little stuff like mini marshmallows for your hot cocoa. Keep adding to the list every day.
MAKE A GRATITUDE JAR: Get an empty mason jar and little slips of paper and a pen. Starting today, write something you are grateful for on the slip and put it in the jar. Aim for at least one every day. Next Thanksgiving Day, as an act of worship, sit and read all the slips aloud and declare your gratitude to God.
ART-FULL THANKS: Make pictures of things for which you are thankful. Choose any medium – watercolors, colored pencils, markers, crayons, even collages of magazine pictures. Cover a bulletin board with your pictures and marinate in gratitude for all that God has done!
Don’t worry about feeling grateful. Don’t stress over how you do it. Just do it! Keep practicing radical gratitude, and you’ll persevere in the midst of trouble.
Susan E. Moody grew up in Maine, where her father was the manager of New England Frontier Camp. She has worked in Christian ministry her whole life and has a BA in Youth Ministry from Gordon College, an MA in Higher Education from Geneva College, and a Master of Divinity from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Susan loves to use humor to help others learn God’s truth, and has done so at retreats, church services, conferences, seminars, and chapel services. She can also hang a spoon off the end of her nose. Her heart’s desire is that everyone would have the chance to know the truth of the Bible, so they can grow in a love-relationship with the One who loves them most and best. She currently serves as the Transitional Interim Pastor of The Congregational Church in Summerfield, FL.