You mustn’t wish for another life. You mustn't want to be somebody else. What you must do is this: 'Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks.' I am not all the way capable of so much, but those are the right instructions.
– Hannah Coulter, Wendell Berry
I’ve had a new way of looking at the commands of God lately. Commands like the one in Wendell Berry’s quote, in everything give thanks. We can be tempted to see God’s decrees as arbitrary or constraining. But if God is who He says He is, Creator of the world, source of living Truth, then perhaps we should see his commands as the most solemn secrets. He leans down and whispers to us, live like this because I’ve made the world like this.
His decrees are windows into the workings of the universe. The more we walk in them, the more we’ll see the true nature of things and grow into the people He first willed us to be, when he breathed life into fine-crafted dust and awoke the pinnacle of his creativity.
If God tells us to give thanks in everything, might He be trying to show us that all of life is worth our gratitude? It would make no sense, after all, to be thankful for something of no value. If He commands appreciation for our days, it is because those days, particularly this one right in front of you, is brimming full of goodness.
But that goodness is not a light thing, nor a thing often easily perceived. Today, it may be at the back of boredom or pain or anxiety or loneliness. We certainly walk in shadowed lands, and perhaps for you, those shadows are looming large and blocking any errant ray of light.
There are sleepless nights and spilled coffee. There are severed friendships, unanswered longings, and deep grooves of injustice. There is despair welling up on a Monday morning. There are the unheeded cries of the innocent and those who live in bondage to the opinions of their neighbors.
And yet.
Gratitude isn’t blindness or a lie. It is not a blatant denial of reality.
Gratitude is grasping hold of that second sight, the inheritance lost by our first parents and reclaimed by the new Adam.
It is a constant turning toward our lives, opening ourselves up to both the surprising moments of grace glimpsed clearly and to the hardships where grace is working out our transformation just outside the reach of our senses.
It is a trust in the goodness of our Creator, who speaks in everything give thanks as a promise, pulling us ever onward toward resurrection.
And while none of us are all the way capable of so much, the first step is to believe these are the right instructions.
Kari