Thanksgiving Prayer 2018

Father,

There is an enemy and we are in a war. One of the weapons You have given us is thankfulness. You repeatedly tell us to give thanks and to be thankful. Although we set aside a day to give thanks, I pray that you would make us into, as You've said in your own words, a peculiar people, that wield that weapon at every turn. Not just on one day of the year, but every day, every moment.

With that as a backdrop, seven swings of the thankfulness sword...

thank you for amazing food, even if it has restrictions,

thank you for my dad,

thank you for family,

thank you for the Church, Your body,

thank you for life, life that You give abundantly to Your own,

thank you for death, for as only You can, You actually use it to bring forth LIFE! how crazy is that?

and

thank you for taking on flesh and dying a criminals death for actual criminals. sinners such as us, standing before You around this table.

bless this food,
in Jesus name Amen

Thank You

I knew the passing of my Dad would be hard, but it turned out to be difficult beyond anything I ever imagined. I pretty much cried my eyes out for the first week solid. I honestly felt like I didn't want to go on with life without Dad. It was easily the most emotionally trying time I have ever been through.

Looking back on it now, it truly was God using something that you could say was evil, at least from my perspective in the midst of it, to bring about good. The biggest wow moments of my life came upon Dad's passing. God has shown me how much Dad loved me, how much I loved Dad and, as I wrote for the service, I am honored and humbled to be his son. My tendency would be to be angry that God didn't show me these things before Dad passed away. In fact, I did just that initially. I later realized He was gracious to show me what He did and I am thankful that He chose to show me these things now instead of in 10 years, 20 years ... or never.

He also showed me how special this body is to me. In particular, it meant a lot more to me than I ever thought it would, seeing TECer after TECer at Dad's service doling out hugs, condolences and support to me in what ended up being the hardest thing I have ever endured. It was amazing. I thank God for TEC...

Thank you for the meals. Thank you for the prayers. Thank you for the texts. Thank you for the hugs. Thank you for doing Romans 12:15 with me.

I love you all,
tgh