I've really grown to love Thanksgiving.  Truth is I have so much to be thankful for, as do many of the people I love.  I think it only makes sense to set aside a day every year for the sole purpose of giving thanks (truth be told I wish we could set aside a festival week!).  I love too that this purposed time of giving thanks is one that we share with others.  It's when we come together in our thankfulness that we are really able to give a voice to the gratefulness that we feel from day to day.  It's incredibly significant to sit down at a table with friends and family, and to share the blessings of our lives in a purposed way.  To speak out the things that we've come to treasure and to celebrate together the countless ways that God has broken into our lives with 'good gifts'.

This year, I am most thankful for so much.  My new home here on the Island, the time I've had to really rest and reflect on the past couple years, and the way in which God has walked so close to me.  I'm deeply grateful to Him for the restoration that has begun in me, and for the way that He's using our home and life to bring that to others as well.  I'm thankful for family, and the deep ways we've grown in love for each other through the incredibly hard year that has just passed.  I'm thankful too for friendship.  Specifically, I'm thankful for the way God has been so purposefully teaching me what it is both be a friend and to receive the plethora of gifts that come to me through my friends.  I've always said it's miraculous to see God heal a blind man, or to part the sea… but far more amazing to me is the way he brings lives together.  More than anything this year I am incredibly thankful for the people that God has brought into the life of Janna and I.  We are truly blessed to have the friends and family we do, and our lives show the extent of that blessing daily.

Although I'm thankful for many people, there are two that I am most thankful for, as I reflect on the many blessings of my life this past year.  First and foremost I am thankful for Janna.  She has given so much to me, and loved me in ways that have completely changed who I am.  I've always seen her as a gift from God, but the journey of this past year has opened my eyes even more to the depth of that reality.  Secondly…. words can't express how grateful I am to God for my sister.  Jayda was also a gift from God, and her life… her love… and her legacy are a treasure worth far more than anything available to me on Earth.  I miss her, but today I celebrate her and give thanks for the memories and ongoing way that her legacy shapes my life everyday.

Thanks finally, and most of all, to my Jesus.  I've seen you in new ways, and known your presence in some of the hardest of circumstances this past year.  Jayda spoke of you with such certainty, and her witness has strengthened my faith even more.  Your love and faithfulness have been an incredible gift… and I pray that this weekend you'd be blessed as we give thanks.  I pray to, that thankfulness would fill the lives and hearts of those I love, and that this thanksgiving You'd be seen in our praises.