The other day I was talking to the bus driver who said, “It seems like it has rained ever since I was
born.” Of course she was joking but it tells how we forget the good things when we are going through things that aren’t so good.

I said, “Do you remember what a beautiful October we had? It was sunshine every day and when the leaves were falling, they crunched beneath our feet. And the colors of those leaves! Oh they were so beautiful! We should be thankful for our eyes so we could see that grandeur.”

“Yes, it was beautiful,” was all she said but I could tell from her expression that she was remembering last October.

I thought about that this morning as I turned on the faucet and water gushed out. I didn’t have to wait, water just came into my hands. I didn’t say, “Thank you, God!” or anything. But I remember how hard it was to get water back when I was growing up. We had a stoneware jug sitting by our kitchen door and it became my brother’s and my job to keep the water jug filled. Now the town pump was down the road a bit and across a meadow so it wasn’t just outside! Not only that but we had to carry hot water in winter to prime the  pump before we got any water to run after we pumped a while. The pail filled with water wasn’t easy to carry home either.

I guess I am thankful that now we have faucets to turn on but I don’t think about how thankful to God I am. I usually just expect the water to be there. And that’s not the only modern convenience we should be thankful for. How about our ways to travel these days. I imagine walking was probably good for us  but I remember how cold it was to walk all the way to school every day! My dad often had to walk ahead of us making a pathway through the snow for us. Now, we have cars, trains, buses and airplanes at our feet so we don’t  have to walk unless we want to.

We have so much to be thankful for. Let’s not think about the bad things going on in our country just now. Instead, thank God for all he has provided, our homes, our families, heat to keep us warm and food enough to fill our tummies. If we dwell on the good things, the bad days won’t seem so bad after all

Yesterday was Veteran’s Day. I know school was out and no one brought your mail, but did you give thought to our veterans? Did you think of the many thousands who died on the battlefield, giving their lives for our freedom? Did you think of those thousands who came home armless, legless or just plain tired and not able to live like normal people again? Or did you consider you had a holiday, a day to shop or get something done at home? I thought about my husband, now gone home to Jesus, But he was a veteran of World War II and the Korean war too. I thought about the Thanksgiving dinner he had in a foxhole. A plane flew by and dropped big bags of Spam sandwiches. The men were so thankful for them! How little it took for those men to be thankful!

Of course we should be thankful for our veterans but we should also remember those who are fighting today for our fleeting freedoms, and for their families who are waiting somewhat impatiently for them to come home. And we should be thankful to God and his great gifts to us. I have decided to use these three weeks before Thanksgiving Day in my blogs as ways to be thankful.

I was listening to Luis Armstrong singing, What A Wonderful World, the other day only I changed the title to What a wonderful God. It works! The thoughts in the song goes like this: The leaves of green, the skies of blue and  red roses all make a wonderful world. Friends meeting on sidewalks, shaking hands, but really saying, I love you, makes a wonderful world too, doesn’t it? And babies born and growing up knowing much more than we’ll ever know, that makes a wonderful world too. The song is great but these things were all made by God and there is so much more. There is  the mountains, the plains, the oceans, the rivers, the sunrises and the sunsets. all given to us by God. Shouldn’t we be thankful for these things?

Let’s wake up each day thanking God that we have another day even if it’s raining. The rain is a gift from God too, you know. And as you go through your day, you will find so many things to thank him for. Before you climb into bed at night, don’t forget to thank him again that you have a bed to climb into. Oh and don’t forget to thank him that you can help someone who has no bed to comb into.