There's an interesting "Daily Devotion" written by Pastor Kerry Nelson last Wednesday on the topic of thankfulness. It's not the sometimes typical scold about our affluenza, how much we have and others don't, but rather a reminder that we can be thankful for what we have - and that it is not so much what we have but what we do with what we have, that matters. He writes -
Today I’m grateful for my “stuff.” My things. The house I live in. The clothes I wear. My furniture. My toys, my television. This computer that I’m typing on. The Internet that connects us as if we were sitting together in the same room, reading Psalm 112 together. All of our “stuff.”...
I realize that we are often scolded for our materialism and “affluenza.” That is no doubt rightly so. It isn’t right that such a small percentage of the population of the world should control such a large percentage of the world’s resources. That can’t go on forever and it won’t. At the same time, we would do well to remember two things about our “stuff.”
First, on the other end of everything we have are the people who thought of it, built it, marketed it, sold it, and shipped it. And behind all of that is God who was working in, with and under the entire enterprise from beginning to end. Our “stuff” is a reminder of the cooperation of the human community.
And second, it isn’t only what we HAVE that matters but what we DO with what we have. There is nothing wrong with possessions unless they begin to possess us. The twin remedies for that are gratitude and generosity. So today I’m thankful for our “stuff.”
We pray that our eyes might be opened to see the gifts that surround us, that link us to others, that enable us to live in a spirit of gratitude and generosity. We thank you for the gifts of human inventiveness and cooperation that provide us with so many wonderful things.
