Thanksgiving

Spent Thanksgiving week in Gulf Shores, AL. Weather was beautiful; beach sparsely populated; skies clear; sunrises and sunsets; and one beautiful moonset. I had some time to be still, alone amid some natural dunes. I meditated on the meaning and experience of gratitude---thankfulness. I know, in my own experience, that, most Thanksgivings, I have talked more about thankfulness than I have consciously experienced. So I sat long, allowing the inner experience of gratitude to well up in me.  As always, when I sit, there is a lot of garbage, smoke and dust that must settle before clarity emerges.  If you've meditated, you know what I mean. If you haven't, I recommend that you do.  Otherwise thankfulness can be just another concept rattling around in a jumbled, monkey mind.  But  when you be still long enough to let the delusionary dust settle, opening to your own life, your own inner being, you may be stricken with an emerging sense of awe and wonder. How long has your heart been beating now? By what miraculous power? How do your eyes discern colors? How gloriously warming the sun can feel on your skin! What is your mind? Is there anything wrong with the cosmos? Or is it just us--our delusions that worry and frustrate us, and cause us to hate and fear? If we sit and meditate long enough we begin to see the futility of all our worries. If, with humility and sincerity, we call upon the God of this universe, He will manifest Himself to us in special and unique ways. We can Hear His voice in the sounds of the ocean, the laughter of seagulls and children playing on the beach. We see Him in the light dancing on the water; the reeds flowing like waves in the wind; orange and pink clouds at sunset. We can begin to trust that He really is Love, like the Bible says. And if He is Love, then all is here because of Love--I am here because of Love; life is sometimes difficult because of Love; death and suffering are allowed by Love; and all things really are working together for my good because the God of this universe is Love and is allowing all things because of Love.
How arrogant of us to assume that, because we do not understand certain things that God allows, He must not be loving, powerful or trustworthy. We must consider that the very mind that is thinking those thoughts has been created by this God that we are judging as somehow wrong. And we do not even understand our own minds; or the conception process; or gravity; or how this planet became life-sustaining. We do not have high enough ground to stand on to judge God. But we do have hearts and eyes, the capacity to love, humor, music, and creative powers---and they have all been GIVEN to us! It is humbling to meditate deeply on the fact that we did not create ourselves--we don't even understand ourselves! We experience everything that we experience because we have been given life!  It is, therefore, very appropriate that, with some sense of humility and integrity, we stand up straight, look Godward, and from a very deep place within us say "Thank You God! Thank You very, very much! Please help me to do something good with this unspeakably awesome gift."
Jesus will, without fail, answer that prayer in the most lovely way imaginable. He will give you confidence and peace in the midst of your worst sufferings because you will know you are suffering for the right reasons. You will cry tears of joy. You will be in touch with the Eternity that you have never been apart from except in the darkness of your mind. He will bring you, through the path of the Cross, to the great adventure of loving people with the Love of God. You will become Light.