As the leaves turn and families gather around tables this season, gratitude fills the air. We speak of being thankful—for health, for family, for work, for moments of joy. Yet beneath every “thank you” lies a deeper question: To whom are we thankful?
True gratitude has a direction. It isn’t content to float vaguely toward good fortune or circumstance. Scripture teaches us that “every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). Every breath we take, every meal we share, every kindness we receive—these are not random blessings, but divine ones.
When we stop at the gift but never look up to the Giver, our gratitude remains incomplete. Like a river that never reaches the sea, it loses its purpose and power. But when our thanksgiving finds its end in God, gratitude becomes worship. It humbles the proud heart, lifts the weary soul, and reorients us from self-sufficiency to dependence on God’s grace.
The world tells us to “be thankful” as a form of positive thinking. But the gospel invites us to be thankful to Someone—the God who “did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all” (Romand 8:32). In Jesus Christ, we discover not just gifts, but the Giver Himself.
So as you count your blessings this month, trace them all the way back to their Source—Almighty God. Let every “thank you” rise heavenward. Because every good gift is a whisper of a better one—the grace of God in Christ, from whom, through whom, and to whom are all things.
To Him be the glory, and to Him, our gratitude.
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