Gratitude

Foundational

Value

What is Gratitude:

First and foremost, Gratitude is being Thankful to God.

Thankful for your Life, Thankful for your Health, Thankful for the Opportunity to Love, Learn, and Live.

Thankful for our body, our mind, our soul; thankful for the earth, the wind, the sun, and trees; thankful for our family, friends, and communities in which we live; thankful for the chance to experience life and grow into more than whence we started.

It might be for the chance to overcome an illness, it could be as simple as a spring shower, a beautiful sunset, a glass of water, a helping hand when you most need it, clothes, food, shelter, a job, the kindness of a stranger.

Gratitude is realizing that you can’t take the world for granted. However, there are times when we can be thankful for someone picking us up when we fall; for caring for us when we are sick; for protecting us when we are threatened; for loving us when we are alone.

Gratitude is being Thankful.

Examples of Gratitude:

Gratitude is a humbling value.

It requires the strength of humility to recognize one’s true state of need and to further recognize when another has reached out with a helping hand. It is a moment and act of sincere thankfulness.

Some examples of Gratitude include:

A Hungry Child receiving a solid meal for the first time in a week.

A Parent, who’s child has been cured of a life-threating disease.

A Farmer, who is grateful for the Spring Rain and the Summer Sun.

A Cancer Patient hearing the news they are in remission.

Anti-Value: Thanklessness

Thanklessness is the opposite of Gratitude.

To be Thankless is to have an inward, self absorbed attitude, where a person thinks the world revolves around them; and for that reason: they are entitled.

A Thankless person has no gratefulness to others, to benefactors, or even to God.

A Thankless person takes and takes, and never gives.

A Thankless person doesn’t reach out to appreciate the love and beauty which surrounds humanity.

The Thankless person ignores the helping hand or the good fortune that may shine on them; believing instead: they are somehow deserving, and owed.

Thankless people live in their own little world and have little interest in any other.

Biblical References of Gratitude:

Thessalonians 5:18: “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

Luke 17:11-19: “On the way to Jerusalem he was passing along between Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” When he saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went they were cleansed. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice”