Choosing Thanksgiving?

Will I choose to give thanks? Even when my heart is breaking? My life (and yours) may be filled with disappointment, unspeakable heartache, and physical pain and brokenness, but there is always reason to choose thanksgiving. Choosing thanksgiving is the path to survival.

To overcoming.
To pressing on through the bleakest of circumstances. 
To not. giving. up.

When I give thanks my heart remembers that despair is not my only friend, that goodness exists, that love is real, and that
there is always hope.


Choosing thanksgiving when loss, pain, confusion, brokenness, or deepest grief speak loudest in my heart is sacrificial. But the irony is that in doing so, in fighting and choosing to search out and embrace what is beautiful and good. To grasp onto those things and say, "thank you." I push back the darkness. Right here, right now, in this dark place the light is breaking in, and I find meaning, life, hope - all things which seemed lost just moments ago.

Giving thanks is not pretending that everything is okay or that the pain is good.
No.
Far from it.

It is a reaching down beneath all that mess and muck to discover that the Everlasting Arms are still the Everlasting Arms. That they are still there.

Firm.
Secure.
Not letting go.

And I give thanks because I am safe. Held. And that security comes to me as a gift. Something I could not buy. Not with all the money in the world. But it cost someone else a great price. Far more than I could ever pay. And because that someone else paid, I am headed toward a Day when all my pain will be eclipsed by glory.

There will be Life. In all its fullness.

Unbroken Joy. Forever
and ever
and ever. 
And for that I cannot help but give thanks.

How Long, O Lord...?

...Will You forget me forever?
How long will You hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and every day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me?

Look on me and answer, O Lord my God.
Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”
and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

But I trust in Your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in Your salvation.
I will sing to the Lord,
for He has been GOOD to me. - Psalm 13

Sometimes we feel forgotten. Sometimes it seems like the sorrow will never end. That it has taken up a permanent lodging place inside with no intention of leaving. Sometimes it seems that the enemy will never be vanquished. That the tormenting thoughts that all is lost, hopeless, or doomed to only worsen will erode us to the point where we feel powerless to wrestle with them one moment longer.

What do we do when it is so dark we cannot see? What if the darkness is so great that our enemies rejoice in our downfall and we never see the light again? What do we do when all inside and around us screams out:

Give up!
Stop believing!
It's hopeless...

We sing.
We sing of the Lord's "unfailing love."
We sing of His endless goodness.

Once again, it's Thanksgiving, and Christmas is waiting around the bend. I never thought that a year later I would find myself still unable to share in the meal, drink a cup of tea, or decorate the house. But this is where I find myself again. I could curl up and dwell on how much I'm missing out, or I could sing. I could recount His goodness. His mercies. His endless, unfailing, unrelenting, steadfast love.

Love. Unshakeable and immoveable. That is what has marked this past year. Yes, pain. Yes, suffering. Yes, questions. But also a love which has pursued me through it all. Which has never stopped providing just what I need. Which has proven to be unchanging even when I forget it's there. Even when I fail to acknowledge its existence. I truly have more than "10,000 Reasons" to praise Him. 

And so this Thanksgiving, I am looking back on a year filled with the unfailing love of the Lord, and because this love has never left me yet, I can trust it will not leave me tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that. It was a love that cost the very life of God's only Son. Do I think He could ever forget the ones He purchased at such a high cost? How quickly I forget but He does not.

And so I am asking Him to help me sing these words today and each day to come:

The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning
It's time to sing Your song again
Whatever may pass, and whatever lies before me
Let me be singing when the evening comes

Bless the Lord, O my soul
O my soul
Worship His holy name
Sing like never before
O my soul
I'll worship Your holy name

You're rich in love, and You're slow to anger
Your name is great, and Your heart is kind
For all Your goodness I will keep on singing
Ten thousand reasons for my heart to find....

Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; Speak of all His wonders.
- 1 Chronicles 16:9