Redeeming Thanksgiving

*Republished from November 1, 2017. Thanksgiving has been my favorite holiday for a long time! I love everything about it: The food, the fellowship, the family, the fall, and all the wonderful feels. (Hehe, I didn’t even mean to make those all words that start with F until the end. Fun! Haha)  But the past few years have taken a big ole dump all over my Thanksgivings.  In 2015 I caught my husband in an affair (the first time I had discovered an actual physical affair) days before Thanksgiving. I don’t remember much about that Thanksgiving Day, other than feeling completely shell-shocked. Like the world was still moving silently around me, but in slow motion – while I was frozenRead More →

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving praising God with the ones you love! It’s time to wrap up this Redeeming Thanksgiving series, and begin to prepare our hearts for Christmas. I gotta tell ya, writing this series has been such a blessing to me! While I started this month out with some trepidation over this holiday with the potential to trigger excruciating memories, I stand before you now in humble gratitude to the One who has truly redeemed this precious day. I am in awe of His mercies to me despite my continual lack of faith. His blessings never cease.  Hebrews 12:28-29 – Since we are receiving a Kingdom that is unshakable, let us be thankful and pleaseRead More →

I can’t believe Thanksgiving is this Thursday! That means we’re already in the third week of this Redeeming Thanksgiving series. If you missed out on the first four installments, I encourage you to go back and read them. We’ve had a wonderful time learning to cultivate a heart of thanksgiving to restore what has been broken, and to re-ignite hope, joy, and a peace that passes all understanding. Today, let’s examine another powerful side effect of thankfulness – it makes the enemy flee!  Learning from King Jehoshaphat  In 2 Chronicles 20, we find the account of one of many mighty miracles performed by God for His people. It’s an exciting story that holds a wonderful lesson forRead More →

I hope you’ve been redeeming thanksgiving with me this month! If you haven’t noticed, Hope for Today has also been focusing on developing a thankful heart all month. My prayer is that by the time Thanksgiving actually rolls around we’ll have set the world on fire with our exuberant praises for the Lord God Almighty! Last week we learned how a thankful heart can produce hope and joy. Today, let’s look at another by-product of thanksgiving:  The Peace of God  Philippians 4:6-7 – Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done. Then you willRead More →

I hope you read Cultivating a Heart of Thanksgiving to Restore the Broken last week. In it I explained why I feel the need to take the month of November and dedicate it to learning everything we can about thanks-giving. The practice of giving thanks has a much grander role in the life of a believer than one celebratory day a year could encompass. Still, that one day is special to me, and it has been abused in recent years. I want to redeem this wonderful holiday, or rather, I want to allow my great and mighty God to redeem it. I hope you’ll join me allRead More →

  A Poem of Thanksgiving  I’m going to do something a little different this week. Bear with me. Life has been moving so fast lately. I feel like Bilbo described in The Lord of the Rings, “Like butter scraped across too much bread.”   So I’m going to take a moment and just breathe.  I’m going to take time to reflect on my God, and to praise Him.  Through the month of November, I will be doing a series on Redeeming Thanksgiving, but I thought it would be fun to get us in the mood a little early this year with a poem written from my heart to the Lord. Enjoy.  When life speeds up, andRead More →