Happy Gratitude Day

I know you were expecting Thanksgiving and you will probably get that, thanks I mean. On Thanksgiving you will either be cooking or eating someone else’s cooking and you will be thankful for your meal. I know I will because I will be doing the eating part and not the cooking part (thank you Linda.).
True story when I first got married I decided to do the whole traditional Thanksgiving meal, so I bought the turkey, got completely nauseous having to take the bag of gook out of the turkey and then read the directions to wash the turkey. I literally washed the turkey with soap. You see now why I let my friend Linda cook.
Some people will go around the table and share what their thankful for or some other family traditions. I like to have baked ziti no matter what holiday it is. Some people will be feeding the less fortunate and helping them to have a good day. Some of you will park in front of the TV with your jeans undone watching all the football games and be thankful that it’s a day you won’t have to explain why you’re watching TV all day. Hopefully we will give thanks to God for all the blessings He has given us and most of all to Jesus for what He did on the cross. There are a lot of things that will happen on Thanksgiving, good things, treasured things, expected things. At the end of the day you will be thankful for it and most likely thank the person or people you shared it with then you’ll go back to your world and Thanksgiving will be just a memory until next year.

I decided to start this Holiday by looking into what the Bible has to say about thanks. I also decided to find the original Greek meaning of the word so I looked it up. Thanks Greek root word yaw-daw’ - especially to revere or worship (with extended hands) intensely to bemoan (by wringing hands)
That has a much more intense meaning than just your common thanks.

For example:
I really don’t like turning left, I don’t know what it is, if I have to pick between going right or left I will always pick right. I know God was messing with me about this the other day, He does that you know. I was going to a store and I had to use my GPS because I’m still learning the roads here and it said turn right at the light. I was actually glad that I was going right and didn’t have to turn left. So I turn right and immediately the GPS says “make a U-Turn” it was going to make me go left anyway. I was like what the heck. The only thing worse than making a left at a light is making a left on a busy road and you are at the mercy of the other crazy drivers to let you out. When a nice person finally does I’m grateful, wave the official “thank you wave” and move on. I’m thankful they let me out but I don’t spend the rest of my day being grateful. Ya know what I mean? I don’t get to work and through out the day stop and think, I am so thankful that guy let me turn left today. I don’t think about it at all.
When I say thank you to someone I know I am not feeling all the emotion the Greek word implies. Wringing hands? You know when someone is so overcome with emotion and they are wringing their hands, that’s the magnitude of this word thanks in the Bible.

Now let’s look at Thanksgiving, Greek root word to-daw’ - adoration specifically a choir of worshipers, confession, sacrifice of praise, thanks.
A choir of worshipers.

So basically if we had a biblical Thanksgiving Day it would be children of God so filled with emotion, gratitude and thanks that we would literally be wringing our hands or lifting them up to the Heavens praising our Lord like a choir of worshipers. WOW!!!

I pray this Thanksgiving with all our traditions we will make a commitment to have gratitude for all God does for us 365 days a year and that we will be truly grateful for the sacrifice God made in order for us to have Jesus Christ. I pray that we will be so grateful that we will follow Christ command to love others, that we will offer a sacrifice of praise by scarifying our time and agenda to bless someone else.

1 Corinthians 8:3 But if one loves God truly [with affectionate reverence, prompt obedience, and grateful recognition of His blessing], he is known by God [recognized as worthy of His intimacy and love, and he is owned by Him]. Amplified Bible

I want to be owned by God!!! Happy Gratitude Day gems, and Thanksgiving too :)

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