SEEDS OF GRATITUDE

Deuteronomy 8:18 “But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.”

Imagine for a moment an elderly man, Moses, standing atop a high mountain, looking across a river valley into lush and green land. His lips are bent in a slight smile. You look a bit closer, and you notice that even though he is smiling, his eyes betray a hint of anxiety. He has spent most of his life in the wilderness, a dry and waterless land. And now he gazes across the Jordan River into the land promised by God to his ancestors. It’s a good land. There are flowing streams and fertile fields. There will be no excuse for hunger in that land. Everyone will have enough. In his mind’s eye he can see vineyards, and olive groves, and children playing without fear, and fine homes—the people he had led would lack nothing in that land across the river. What a wonderful vision of a day soon to come. And yet, despite the bounty he saw before him, Moses could not help but worry. Yes, the people would have enough and more—but oddly, that was what was troubling him. Moses worried that because God’s people would lack nothing, they might become forgetful.

So what was Moses to do? His time of leadership was drawing to an end and so Moses gathered the people together and told them the truth of what lay ahead: The Lord your God is bringing you into a good land … where you will lack nothing. You shall eat your fill and bless the Lord your God for the good land that he has given you.” Did you catch it? Let me repeat it. Moses told the people to bless the Lord their God for all that God had done for them. He was sowing seeds of gratitude by teaching them now to give thanks and bless the Lord for the bounty they would experience in the future.

So, where does gratitude begin? Gratitude begins with an honest self-assessment that leads to the realization that in fact the blessings we enjoy today are not solely of our own making. That’s why Moses so fervently pleads with the Israelites to take care that you do not forget the Lord your God. Do not allow yourself to forget how God has put people and opportunities into your life and how those people and opportunities have enabled you to become the person you are and to enjoy the things you enjoy. Gratitude begins with a fine tuned memory. There is a French Proverb that states: Gratitude is the heart’s memory. That’s so true. Sow seeds of gratitude in your own heart: Sit down sometime and write out a history of your life. What do you think you would discover? My guess is that, even if you have had a hard life [and God knows that many people have had difficult lives] that still you will discover instances where “water flowed for you from flint rock” and when you were “fed in the wilderness with manna.” In other words, you will rediscover the many times you were helped along the way. You will remember people from the past whose guidance pushed you fruitfully into the present. You will also see clear evidence of God’s loving providence operating in your life in many, many ways. Seeds of gratitude are best sown in the fertile soil of honest memory—a remembering of how God has shaped who you are by the people and events and opportunities that God has put into your life.