Brothers and Sisters,
Do we live with an attitude of gratitude? When we see that everything we have and everything we experience is a gift from God, freely given to us when we do not deserve such goodness, then how can we not be grateful and thankful to God for His goodness to us?
What is gratitude? It is an awareness of, and appreciation for, the good things in our life and not taking them for granted. It is a spiritual attitude where we accept whatever God offers. It is also internal strength of character that we can develop by acknowledging the role of other people in making our life possible and enjoyable.
In this week’s gospel (Lk 17:11-19), Jesus reminds us of the importance of gratitude to God for the blessings we have received from Him. In the reading from Luke’s gospel, what caught the admiration of Jesus about the Samaritan leper was simply that he, “turned back, praising God at the top of his voice, and threw himself at the feet of Jesus and thanked him.” When was the last time we expressed this kind of gratitude to God? Gratitude to God is an expression of our faith in His saving power.
If we can bring our cares and concerns, our worries and our problems to the Lord, we can, and we must, also bring our grateful hearts, our reasons for thanks to worship God who is the source of all goodness in our lives.
So let us pray that we might be grateful. Let us bring all of ourselves to God in thanksgiving. Let us pray that we might see all of the many things that God has blessed us with, and that we may truly say thank you to God today as we open our hearts to Him.
God Bless,
Deacon Howard
