A thought for Thanksgiving

For those of us who live here in the United States of America, we are preparing to celebrate Thanksgiving.  The time of year where we sit aside a day and give thanks for what we have.  I have heard a lot of people say do we really have all that much to give thanks for?  After all there are many without jobs, money is tight, the economy is not really picking up at all.  Do we really have anything to be thankful for at all?  I don’t want to rain on the gloomy day parade going on here in this country but I think we should look at some statistics and some things going on around world.  First I would like to point out an interesting fact and that fact is that if you make $11,500 you are in the top ten percent of the world’s wealthiest people.  Think about that for a minute, while many of us in the U.S. would say that you can’t live on $12,000 a year’s many people in Africa are living on $700 or less a year (www.financialjesus.com).  Same in many countries around the world and many children are dyeing due to malnutrition, and lack of modern medicine.

While on Black Friday many plan to go buy gifts for their families they will spend what some make in a year, or even two years.   I don’t say all this to make you feel guilty about having so much I say this to awaken you to a problem that many of us even myself up until just recently turned a blind eye to because it was easier to ignore and focus on what I did not have but wanted.  We who follow Christ and have accepted the truth of the gospel have to truly take a look at what we can do to help these people.  Autumn and I have discussed this, together  we have picked out an organization in our city that helps the poor, and also one in Uganda that helps feed and provide medicine for the poor and orphans.  We discussed not getting gifts for Christmas so we can spend more of what God has so graciously given us, to give to those in need.   Paul tells young Timothy in 1^st Timothy 6:17-19; ^“Tell those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which will soon be gone. But their trust should be in the living God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment. Tell them to use their money to do good. They should be rich in good works and should give generously to those in need, always being ready to share with others whatever God has given them.  By doing this they will be storing up their treasure as a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of real life^” (NLT)