And be thankful.

Colossians 3:15b

And be thankful.

Years ago I heard about an order that had practiced a spiritual discipline unlike any I'd ever heard of. It was called the discipline of thankfulness. Simply, they committed as a community to exercise Paul's call in Colossians to continual thankfulness in prayer through out the day... every day. Now, I often think of disciplines as exercises in restraint and perseverance BUT, in this case, it was a discipline that involved (what seemed like) a continual state of heart. I mean, anyone can say thank you for something (more on this tomorrow)... but to be really thankful means commanding the soul, the mind, the heart. This is not simply an exercise in saying a few words with the appropriate manners - no, this is an exercise in changing the outside SO THAT the inside will follow!

This past week we as a community have begun to practice the spiritual discipline of thankfulness to communicate to our GREAT God how awesome He really is. We are going to attempt to offer one prayer every day for the next month or so that starts with, "Lord thank you..." to see if as we exercise a discipline of prayer we might see a transformation of soul, mind and heart.

Thank you Lord for the gift of You. Amen.