Embracing Gratitude: The Power of Thankfulness

Devotional

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to experience gratitude and not express it would be like wrapping up a gift and then never actually giving it to somebody. So today we're giving the gift today I want to talk to you about a form of expressing gratitude that involves writing a gratitude letter. [00:01:37]

how often are opportunities to experience gratitude in the goodness of God happen when we're on our way this was not a scheduled appointment this was not on his to-do list at the beginning of the day he was just on his way and somebody needed something. [00:02:14]

one of them when he saw he was healed came back now notice his elaborate preparations to give thanks came back praising not just praising praising God not just praising God praising God with his voice not just that praising God in a loud voice actually in the text it says in a very loud voice. [00:03:41]

the idea today on the Gratitude challenge is not just to feel experience see gratitude it's to express it to another person and the way to do this is to write down words to express your gratitude. [00:05:06]

he used to say the first task of a leader is to Define reality the last task of a leader is to say thank you and in between to become a debtor and a servant. [00:08:16]

towards the end of Max's life when he was ill I read this idea about writing a gratitude letter and so I thought I'd like to do that for Max and I spent a couple of weeks writing it and rewriting it and rewriting it and he was quite ill at this time and was probably close to 90. [00:09:11]

for various reasons Robert Emmon Wright we often don't Express gratitude to those who deserve our thanks we assume they know how much we appreciate them we felt they were only doing their job not realizing that this does not alleviate us of the need to let them know. [00:10:28]

in the letter described specifically why you are grateful to this person how he or she affected your life how often you reflect on his or her efforts what did he or she do and how does that still affect your life this should be someone whom you have never properly taken the time to thank. [00:11:43]

spend at least 10 or 15 minutes on this your letter should be somewhere around 250 words whether or not you actually send it imagine how reading the letter will make the recipient feel very good thing give thanks and what a gift words are that we can express Thanksgiving which we are learning to do. [00:12:48]

we have so much to be grateful for and we're working on the Gratitude channel congratitude channel that was that would actually not be a bad you know I'd set up for that channel I think lots of other channels doing much less worthy things I think I'd I think we ought to make a gratitude Channel. [00:00:52]

Jesus asked we're not all ten cleansed where are the other nine has no one returned to give praise to God except this Foreigner then he said to him rise and go your faith has made you well and the verb he uses theirs um one of those ambiguous verbs so so it can mean to heal cleanse make physically well it can also mean that you have been saved. [00:04:31]

and at her service just to get to reflect on her life and to think of words of gratitude to be able to express was a great gift the person I want to tell you about is a man named Max and Max became a mentor and uh I knew him first when I was a student at Fuller Seminary he was on the board there he was a remarkably wise person. [00:07:38]

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