How You Can Have a Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving through New Year’s can be a rough time for many, especially if thoughts of home create more nervous tension than eager anticipation.

In Colossians 3:12-15, Paul unpacks his recipe for how we can find peace within us and around us during the holiday season.

“[12] Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,
[13] bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
[14] And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
[15] And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.” (ESV)
 
Here’s what can we learn and apply from these four simple verses:

• If I am frustrated, I choose compassion, kindness, and patience (vs. 12)
• If I am sinned against, I choose to respond with the forgiveness of Christ (vs. 13)
• If I am weary of trying again, I choose to choose love (vs. 14)
• If I am suffering wrongly, I choose to respond with gratitude because of what Christ had done for me (vs. 15)

Sometimes when writing an article you find someone who says it better than you ever think you could. This powerful quote from Chuck Swindoll is one of those quotes that helps us find the right mindset walking into a potentially difficult holiday season.

“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, the education, the money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company… a church… a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past… we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you… we are in charge of our Attitudes.”

This Thanksgiving week, choose an attitude of gratitude by remembering what God has done for you! He is faithful to us, even when we fail him.