Gratitude is much more than an emotion …

It’s Thanksgiving Day, which means we are off and running in the holiday season. During this time will come the giving and receiving of gifts, some of which might leave you searching for how best to respond.

Well, here’s some help.

An unidentified person has offered up eight ways to respond when the gift you receive is a little “weird” …

8. Well, well, well, now, there’s a gift!

7. No, really, I didn’t know that there was a Chia pet tie! Oh, wow! It’s a clip-on, too!

6. You know, I always wanted one of these! Jog my memory — what’s it called again?

5. You know what? I’m going to find a special place to put this!

4. Boy, you don’t see craftsmanship like that every day!

3. And it’s such an interesting color, too!

2. You say that was the last one? Am I glad that you snapped that baby up!

And the number one thing to say about the gifts you honestly didn’t like is: “You shouldn’t have! No, really, I mean it, you really shouldn’t have!”

If we simplify it, whenever we receive a gift or find ourselves to be blessed, an appropriate response would be gratitude. We can and should be thankful for what we’re blessed with. But some people, even in the midst of great blessing, find themselves waiting for the emotions of gratitude, or find such emotions to be nominal.

In those times, it’s important we remember that gratitude is not an emotion but will have corresponding emotions.

Put another way, if you find yourself not feeling particularly thankful, examine your thoughts.

I say that because basic human behavior is this —- our thoughts create our emotions, and the combination of our thoughts and emotions create our behavior.

If you’re not feeling the emotions of gratitude, it’s because of what you are (or aren’t) thinking.

For example, if you have no feelings of gratitude for sitting down to a spectacular Thanksgiving Day feast, it could be because you think you don’t have anyone to be thankful to; you reason in your mind that you work hard, make your own money, provide the food on your table … you’re grateful for you!

But if you think that your very life is held in God’s hands, that in Him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28), that your skills, talents, and abilities to do anything are a blessing from God , and so on, then such thinking will generate a full state of gratitude, complete with corresponding emotions and actions.

Is it any wonder, then, that scripture persistently urges us to consider God and all that He does? And to give thoughtful consideration to others?

If you want to be a grateful person, you’ll have to put some thought into it!

But as you consider that “Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father …” (James 1:17a), and you give consideration to others in your life, those thoughts foster the emotions of gratitude, and the combination of those thoughts and emotions provoke us to giving thanks.

Do you want to be a more grateful person? Examine your thoughts.

It’s my prayer that today, as you consider God and others, you feel grateful and express yourself with acts of thanksgiving.

Scotty