– Rev. Chris Brady, Capital District Superintendent
“For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land…” Deuteronomy 8:7-18
In our communities of faith and personal lives, cultivating thanksgiving as a regular practice and ritual helps us resist forgetfulness. By its nature, ritual beckons us to engage even when we may not want to turn our hearts toward God.
This week we will gather and employ practices of communal thanksgiving. While the food on the table may differ depending on the household, many of us will share stories of challenges and hopes; in doing so, we encounter the mystery of the mighty acts of God, who has brought us yet again toward the close of another year.
In my family, my grandmother instilled a practice of telling stories of the past year. Storytelling shapes us. We must tell stories, for they help guard against the kind of forgetting the writer of Deuteronomy exhorts hearers not to engage. It reminds the people of Israel that God who was with them in the wilderness is the same God who will be present with them in the Promised Land. We can be sure God will also be with us, even as we journey as United Methodists into a new land of promise.
This season has been one of the valley times, and it will be easy to lament what we lost, but I am reminded of what lies ahead. God’s promises are ever before us – ours is to lean into the practices that cultivate gratitude and thanksgiving by doing justice, loving and living kindness, and walking humbly before God.