In one of the churches I served, there was a poster in the hallway outside the Sanctuary that never failed to get my attention. More than once it picked me up after a particularly difficult meeting. Sometimes, when I was alone in the building, I would stand there and read it over and over again. It centered me. “100 years from now... it will not matter what kind of car I drove, what kind of house I lived in, how much I had in my bank account, or what my clothes looked like. But, the world may be a little better because I was important in the life of a child.”
When I was very young, I was very small and very skinny. I began wearing glasses at age four. I was the target of taunts and bullying. I loved basketball, as did most boys in Indiana. As small as I was, I tried to play even though I was pushed around a lot. One day we were joined in our neighborhood game by a star high school senior basketball player. He chose me to be on his team and from that day referred to me as "Big Boy." Whenever he saw me it was, "Big Boy." I don’t know what it was that he saw in me. I don’t know why he did it. And I don’t even remember his name. What I do know is that he made a difference in my life when I was a child! To this day I am grateful for the gift that he gave to me.
We live in a world desperately in need of a new way of doing things. The shameful, hurtful, hateful conduct of office seekers during the election will not solve our problems - it will only create a toxic environment that will make solving them next to impossible. We are stewards and we are called to care for the earth God has entrusted to us. We did not inherit the earth from our forebearers, we have borrowed it from those who will follow us. We may celebrate the Good Samaritan, but who will be a neighbor like him today, doing justice, loving kindness, walking humbly with God? But when our children see us as loving and caring human beings, it will transform their lives, and their world, to the third and fourth generation. That is a foundation for gratitude that endures.
Read the witness of Isaiah: “I am about to create new heavens and a new earth;” ... “Be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight.” ... “No more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress.” ... “For like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. “They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity;” ... “They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.” [Isaiah 65:17,18,20,22,23,25] Wow!
This is a song of hope, a promise of a new and abiding future. There can be only one response to what God is promising: “Oh! My God! Thank You!” A new heaven and a new earth - Thank you! No more the sound of weeping, or the cry of distress - Thank you! No more labor in vain, or children borne for calamity - Thank you! None hurt or destroyed on God’s holy mountain - Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Do you want a gratitude that will endure? Just learn how to say thank you to God for what God has done, for what God is doing, for what God will continue to do.
We are moving towards two powerful holiday seasons: Thanksgiving - a national holiday with spiritual dimensions and foundations; and Christmas - a religious holiday struggling to maintain its spiritual roots. We have an opportunity and a choice and the capacity to make them into holy days by showing and sharing our gratitude. What we do will make a difference in the lives of people around us, even for generations to come. In this season let us choose to offer our gratitude to God, choose to live in the grace and love of God, and choose the righteousness that, in Christ, will most certainly transform the world. That is a gratitude that endures.