Happy Thanksgiving! from the Van Zoest family

Happy Thanksgiving from the Van Zoest family And when I'm always looking for the next glimpse of His glory, I slow and enter.  Weigh down this moment in time with attention full, and the whole of time's river slows, slows, slows.            - Ann Voskamp Dear Family and Friends, We would like to wish all of you a Happy Thanksgiving today!  Know that we are thinking about you as we thank God for all of the many gifts He has given to us – you are one of them! Below is a testimony about how God has been teaching me about gratitude over the past three years.  I pray it encourages you! Peace and love to you, Lisa (Dan, Rebekah, and Will) Van Zoest Living Gratitude I think that Christmas and my birthday were difficult times for my parents when I was growing up  – difficult because I was not a very thankful child.  I often found something wrong with the things I received – it was the wrong color or the wrong size or I felt that it was something I didn't really want or need.  And I would let them know how I felt.  I have always been known for my honesty. During my years at Calvin College, I was given a nugget of truth about gratitude that I have embraced throughout my life, but had not really known how to fully live it out until recently. I took an 8:00 AM theology class at Calvin with our chaplain and professor Dale Cooper.  I learned from him about how there can be many different motivations for obedience to God and that being motivated by gratitude is the most appropriate and healthy motivation for obedience.  He taught me about how gratitude can develop in me when I continually keep in mind how Christ has saved me from eternal death and continues to save me daily from myself and all that I could possibly do to mess up my life.  When I truly understood this and lived with an awareness of how impotent I am and how omnipotent He is, my response to God would then become obedience motivated by gratitude.  I can still picture professor Cooper with his hand held like this passionately saying "gratitude" at 8:00 in the morning and how I did not feel grateful for his passion or for this reminder to live a life of gratitude. Three years ago, my dear friend Ann Sharp gave me the book 1,000 Gifts by Ann Voskamp.  I read it 3 times because I was so fascinated by the journey of the author and her ultimate transformation.  And what she said God used to transform her seemed so simple.  It was a list – a list of things she noticed during the course of each day.  Things that she intentionally and thoughtfully received as being a gift to her from God.  She describes in her book about how this practice of recognizing these gifts and giving thanks to God for them taught her to live her moments more fully by slowing down to notice what was happening around her.  She began to really see people as opposed to rushing by them.  But most of all, she learned to live life with a heart that was thankful. As I read this book, I thought, "I want this.  I want to live like this.   I want to live out what professor Cooper taught me years ago."  I decided to practice gratitude and thanksgiving by doing what Ann Voskamp did – I started to make a list.  So, I started a list 3 years ago of gifts that God is giving me from week to week.  Gifts like cloudy cool days and the laughter of my kids enjoying each other and how Dan always puts gas in my car and how we enjoyed friends over the weekend and for JIF peanut butter and for a good night's sleep and for how illness redirected our plans and for popcorn.  And in taking the time to write these things down, what I find happens is a slowing of life and a reflection on all that I have.  And the more I practice thankfulness, the more thankful I feel.  The more I gaze upon the green grass in my yard.  And the less I gaze at the greener grass on the other side of the fence. It was not until this past year – after recording these gifts for 2 and a half years that I sensed a shift in my spirit.  I think it is contentment.  A contentment that is now becoming a part of who I am.  And I am enjoying moments.  And people.  And daily gifts.  And I feel less rushed.  And less driven.  And complaining about things just is not as much fun as it used to be.  A few months ago, Dan said, "I can see that God has done a work in you, Lisa."  And I said, "I think He has too!" I will close with some of Ann Voskamp's words that she uses to so eloquently to describe how contentment develops through the practice of watching for glimpses of God's glory and then taking a moment to enjoy Him: Time is a relentless river.  It rages on, a respecter of no one.  And this, this is the only way to slow time:  When I fully enter time's swift current, enter into the current moment with the weight of all my attention, I slow the torrent with the weight of me all here.  And when I'm always looking for the next glimpse of His glory, I slow and enter.  Weigh down this moment in time with attention full, and the whole of time's river slows, slows, slows. I have lived the runner, panting ahead in worry, pounding back in regrets, terrified to live in the present, because here-time asks me to do the hardest thing of all:  just open wide and receive. This is where God is.  He is in the present.  I AM – His very name.  I want to take my shoes off.  I  AM.  So full of the weight of the present, that time's river slows to a still.  I AM.  It is God Himself framed in moment.  I AM. Pictured here is the notebook in which I record the gifts I receive from God each week . . . "the hummingbird friend who visits my porch every morning, Will's insightful note to me last night, Rebekah's homemade pizza, my date with Dan and our good conversation, time to read, watching Dan exercise, laughing at dinner, the cool breeze today, a friend's apology, Will's smile this morning, Rebekah humming while she reads, kissing baby Myles, watching the kids play soccer, ice cream and chocolate with peanuts " . . . a tool that God has used to help me learn how to practice thankfulness.