Thankful

I can’t believe that Thanksgiving is this week. Truth be known, I’m still tired from Allume.  Not even sure how that is still possible, but it is.  One of my friends told me that for every hour you’re in surgery, it takes 1 week to recover from it.  So, if there is any equation that begins to be  true for conference planning, I’m gonna say it’s probably true too.

So, big deal in my house lately is that we got a puppy! If you follow me on facebook or instagram, you already knew that. He is seriously a cutie! His name is Titan, and because my family is a people of nicknames, he has already been called Titanium, Titanic, and Tights. I’m sure there will be more over the years.

He is an English Mastiff which means he is going to be a beast of a dog.  Already, he has gained 5 pounds in just 10 days.  So if the same thing happens to you this holiday season, know you’re not alone.  Titan will be standing strong with you.

Also, this week, I purposed to make quinoa that would taste really, really good.  You will be pleased to know that if you saute carrots, onion, garlic, and celery in some flavored oil (I used Harissa Olive Oil) and then cook the quinoa in chicken broth, it’s kinda fantastic.  As in, move over rice, I like this stuff better now, and my entire family agrees.  I felt a sense of pride this morning when my 7-year-old asked me to load him up on it to take to school for lunch.  I feel like I might have just earned the stripes to shop at Whole Foods without feeling like a poser.

I’ve been thinking lately too a solid amount on Thankfulness.  Tis the season I guess.  But the thing is that it should always be the season if you think about it.  Not like November is a better time than April to celebrate gifts.

If you haven’t read the book “One Thousand Gifts” by Ann Voskamp, you really should. It’s a beautiful and poetic shaping of how to cultivate a lifestyle of thanks.  Perhaps one of my favorite things though, is that Ann shares about how the Greek word for “thanks” is the word “eucharisteo.”

I went to an Episcopalian boarding school in high school.  Having grown up in a community church, we always called “communion” well, communion.  But in the Episcopal church they called it “eucharist.”

And the thing that keeps coming to mind over and over as I ponder this season, and the thousands upon thousands of things that I’m thankful for, is that the thing I am most thankful for is the invitation to participate in the body and blood of Christ.  That it is the place from which the capacity for all thankfulness is rooted.  The very word is a partaking…a sharing in the Kingdom of heaven, and an outward expression of that co-laboring.

Thankfulness is a really big deal…for me to practice it, to share it, to walk in it, and to be of a people who are rooted in it…rooted in the blood of Christ.

So this season, as you sit around tables, and gather in the name of thankfulness…be reminded that the root of thanks is found at the foot of the cross….even in the very origin of the word.