I Have Decided It's A Wonderful Life by Jenna Vick Silliman

An attitude of gratitude colors how you see your life and how you feel about it. It has been said that a majority of our emotions are determined by how we interpret events to ourselves. As the famous Proverb says, “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.” (See Proverbs 23:7.)

            My favorite movie is “It’s a Wonderful Life.” This movie changed my life. I learned right along with George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) how much I have to be grateful for. Sometimes we have to go through hard times or experience deprivation to realize how good we’ve got it. I think we all need an angel like Clarence assigned to us for a while, for however long it takes, to be trained to look at our lives differently. Some of us would really make our angel work hard to earn those wings.

            Many of us have that “IF ONLY” hanging over our heads. If only I had more income. If only I had a spouse. If only I had a better place to live. If only I didn’t have this problem. If only I had a better job, or better clothes, or better health, or a better car. The “American Dream” is more like the “American Epidemic”. We always want something better or something more!

            My son, Joshua, had a short mission trip to the Dominican Republic a couple of years ago. What my son observed was a life lesson well worth the price of the trip. He told me they have next to nothing—no nice clothes, no decent houses, no cars, no shoes. They have dirt floors and barely any food and the kids run around half naked and filthy, but they are happy! They smile and they sing and they dance. For church on Sunday they danced for hours and Joshua said they danced with them and all had so much fun. Here we have so much and we all want more and we are not grateful for what we have. Wow, I’m getting convicted all over again.

            “Rejoice always…in everything give thanks.” Isn’t this what we are supposed to be doing? “Do all things without complaining… [whining, griping etc.].” Isn’t this what we are not supposed to be doing? Yet, I must admit I dream about going to Hawaii some day. I am also dreaming about a royal blue Honda Odyssey Van right now. I can’t help it! I want, or no, actually I NEED a better vehicle. My old ’88 Chevy, a little blue wagon, is a great little car that has served me well. However, I need to visit my elderly father in Northern California (who has been fighting cancer and had a stroke) and my car just doesn’t have enough power to drive down Highway 5 over Grants Pass at 75 miles an hour. Also, I drive six or seven teenagers to go Folk Dancing in Port Angeles (a half hour away) on Sunday nights. I only have five seatbelts, so several kids cram in the far back. I need a bigger car! So I’m praying about this and thinking about how to earn some extra money to earn my dream van. I’m still grateful for my little Chevy wagon though—me and my teenager friends probably couldn’t go to Folk Dance without it!

            I heard a great quote yesterday by Kris Vallotton, one of the Pastors at Bethel Church in Redding, California. He said something about how those who are positive thinkers try to focus on the half full part of the proverbial glass. However, when we know Jesus we have hope of the eternal filling of our cup. Is your cup being filled, or being emptied? When we know who we are in Christ and have our trust in Him, we will not only have a positive outlook on life we will have supernatural vision and a peace that surpasses understanding and bright hopes for tomorrow!

There is nothing wrong with dreaming and working towards things and praying and waiting on God for better things in our lives. However, let’s be grateful and appreciative and enjoy what we do have already. IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE!

Do you really need any other reason?

“For flowers that bloom about our feet;
For tender grass, so fresh, so sweet;
For song of bird, and hum of bee;
For all things fair we hear or see,
Father in heaven, we thank Thee!”
[Ralph Waldo Emerson]




I'm finishing up a series in the Sunday School class I teach about the major world religions. As we went through the section on Eastern religions (Taoism. Buddhism and Confucianism), a connection was being made on a regular basis concerning the shared principles between Eastern religious thought and some New Age philosophy. Bingo! Sure. With this collective epiphany, it would be easy to sit back and declare my work here is done, but I don't think Satan will scurry away so easily after a single lost battle in a much broader war.  The fight must go on...

My fellow Kingdom Bloggers have posted great stuff this week. Insightful. Inspiring. Deeply personal testimony. I'm going to take a slightly different approach to our subject matter of gratitude today. Call it more a 'James-like' position.

I posted the poem by Emerson to help make my point. Ralph seemed very thankful to God for the things he enjoyed in nature as he expressed in his popular poem. But if he truly had gratitude to our Father in heaven for the things of nature he so enjoyed, how could a founder of transcendentalism also pen the very words that later made him the intellectual father of the New Thought movement?

Let me review a little history...New Thought = New Age = we all are gods

So was Ralph thankful to himself or his Father in heaven? I remembered this piece from high school and my rather astute English teacher wrongly pointing to Ralph having a moment of  spiritual gratitude. She was right about it being spiritual, but the inference it was directed at the same God I worship was just a bit off base...as I would later learn.

I believe Emerson was torn at the moment he penned those words between his true feelings (or lack there of) in matters of God and gaining the popular sentiment of his day. So what he provided was nothing more than lip service to God in order to create a positive, popular appearance. Actually, history records that was the very fact of the matter. Ralph may have cryptically hidden his true feelings in a popularly acceptable message in order to gain notoriety, but once he made the big time...the true Emerson was revealed, and he left his fake gratitude for God out of his writings, speeches and teachings from that point forward.

Here comes my pseudo-James moment...true gratitude will result in sustained biblical actions. If I am genuinely appreciative to God for His many blessings, I will do the things He has commanded me to do with that same heart of gratitude. Not because I have to, but because I want to.

Let's take that to another level...

 If I believe what I claim to believe as a Christian...that God the Creator is omnipotent, omnipresent, the Alpha and Omega, the Healer and Comforter...I shouldn't need a single blessing outside of knowing and accepting who God truly is to have that same constant attitude of gratitude.

Knowing what he knows now, I'm guessing Ralph would redirect his appreciation a little differently...given the chance and new found knowledge that God is the Great I Am...and he most certainly is not.

Thanksgiving in June

Based on the concept of Christmas in July, this week we have Thanksgiving in June.  The dictionary doesn’t make much distinction between gratitude and thankfulness.  I know, I looked it up.  However, it seems there is a bit of a difference to me.  Gratitude seems to be a characteristic that we need to cultivate.  Thankfulness seems more immediate.  At least that’s how I see it.

I have difficulty with gratitude.  Life has beaten me up a lot.  I’ve lived long enough to understand that you can never judge the level of another person’s pain.  You know, someone tells you how bad things are for them and you think.  What???  Is that all that’s wrong with you?  You think wow, that’s not that bad.  But it is to them.  And if you are a good friend you keep your thoughts to yourself.  We all have our own levels of tolerance when it comes to life’s losses.

My husband has gratitude.  I’ve never met anyone so appreciative and so willing to say Thank God for every little thing.  For example, I work hard in school.  It is very important to me.  I get good grades.  When I do, I’m quick to share it.  My husband’s response?  Thank God.  I’m like Thank God???  I did that.  Okay, maybe I’m being too candid for some of you, but no one ever accused me of not being honest.

When our children accomplish something and thankfully they are a pretty accomplished bunch.  They’ve worked hard.  They’ve succeeded.  My husband’s response? Thank God… Last night, supper was a bit off schedule.  I had a phone call and talked too long so it wasn’t ready when he walked in the door.  Usually it’s ready and I’m waiting on him.  We often pray over the food, but again, in all honesty, I have to tell you that we don’t always.  As I brought my plate to the table, he was sitting there staring at the food.  We had grilled salmon with an amazing homemade mango chutney I had made over some rice with peppers, onions, zucchini, etc.  The rice has no name as I made it up J.  I asked him, why didn’t you start?  He said this is so good looking and so wonderful we have to pray and thank God for it.  As we bowed our heads and I prayed thanking God for the food, I realized that even though I had cut all those mangoes, roasted the peppers, spent hours on my feet, etc., without God, none of it was possible.  Everything comes from God.

That’s gratitude.  Looking at every situation regardless of whose physical hands or mind produced it, and saying “thank God.” We need to express our gratitude not just when the the big stuff happens like when someone gets unexpected money at the last minute, or those things that we call miracles.  I believe it is what Paul meant when he wrote in Colossians 3:16:

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.