Mere Gratitude

Third Monday / November, ’24

Hello! Third Monday posts are more incidental, personal, and situational updates touching on my life in general and on the possibilities and circumstances of ministry. Let me know what you think at randy@greatheartstable.com or in the comments below.

I

Years ago, when the New York Times headlined its review of Quentin Tarantino’s movie Kill Bill, V. 1 “Blood Bath and Beyond,” I had to at least begin to read the review. So I am well aware of the power of the catchy title and that therefore this post may not survive the instant deletion impulse we have when scanning a crowded inbox.

But some thoughts call for the plain and pedestrian. The season we have entered calls for gratitude. I want to call it ‘mere’ gratitude, to frame it as something calm, quiet, and thoughtful in contrast to everything else in our over-stimulated and over-active age. I want this season to nudge us toward unadorned, reflective, and repeated thankfulness, a discipline too infrequent in my life, and perhaps in yours.

So if you will forgive my redundancy, I’m grateful for this season that nudges me toward gratitude. Mere gratitude. I hope it nudges you as well.

II

Last year I wrote about the Greenwald Thanksgiving ritual of writing things for which we are thankful on rocks and sharing those rocks around the Thanksgiving table. No, we don’t inscribe pieces of granite or pass around chunks of sandstone. Our ‘rocks’ are simply two-dimensional gray pieces of card stock cut in rocklike shapes. We use these to pile our gratitude together, so to speak, remembering that “Thus far the LORD has helped us.” 

I invited you then to join in our ritual by sharing your own three points of pastoral gratitude, which one pastor, David Robert Wright from Austin Texas, did. David expressed thanks to God for the privilege of “the weekly opportunity to bring words of life to God’s people.” Framing our teaching and preaching in this way reminds us that this, which can sometimes feel like a chore, is truly a gift. He also spoke of “how God has grown me in fourteen years of ministry preparation since I began seminary.” Delay frustrates the impatient among us, but delay, he reminds us, is still a gift from the giver of all good gifts. And finally, he is “thankful to serve alongside a session who cares deeply for the flock and shepherds them well.” A session is the gathered elders of a presbyterian church, elders who are meant to share the pastoral care of the church. To serve together with those who fulfill this calling well is certainly something to be thankful for.

Not all of us have the things David celebrates here. Instead, things in your experience may not be the way things are supposed to be. And so your thanksgiving may be tinged with lament and a longing for things not yet experienced. But we all certainly can join together in the knowledge that though weeping may last for the night, joy will come in the morning. 

You can read about our weird rock ritual here, and if you’d like to join in piling up rocks together, you can share your own three rocks here. 

III

Please pray for the Off-Script Kids retreat this weekend, November 22 and 23. This is an event designed for Christian parents troubled by the lifestyle or faith decisions made by their adult children, which you can read about here. And know that Off-Script Kids is the friend of procrastinators! There is room to fit in two more participants. Let me know soon if you are interested!

IV

If you run or aspire to running (and if you are missing that part of your brain that keeps you from doing crazy things) I recommend that you consider running the Battlefield Half Marathon. This is a road race that winds itself through the fall beauty of the Chickamauga Battlefield National Military Park in Chickamauga, GA. It’s a gorgeous run with gentle hills whose start is signaled by a cannon. It hardly gets better than that! (Plus, the medal is cool.) The race, which also includes a full marathon and a 5K, is held the second Saturday of November every year. It’s well worth considering. Check it out!

V

A few months ago, while writing some thoughts about therapy here in my remote corner of the internet, those who occupy a more central place were hashing out similar themes. Thanks to reader Lee Veazey for these links, here, here, and here. 

You might find in these articles, if you can get behind the pay walls, some further fodder for your thinking, or as likely, find more things to argue with. 

If you wonder why so many therapists do not take insurance, perhaps it’s because insurance companies aren’t as good as therapists in determining who needs therapy and how much therapy they need. This concern is explored, if not explained, here.

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May God grant us all the grace to be merely grateful. I know life is trying and the way forward for some seems dark. But, truly, joy comes in the morning. I’m grateful for that hope.