I’ve been reading this book. It’s one of those books that you pick up, and you just can’t set it down. It draws you in, the words so raw and ideas so profound, compelling, convicting, that you want to stop reading. But you can’t. It necessitates change.

1. The little boy laughing in his sleep

2. The quiet of morning before everyone wakes

3.  A book to shake me up

The book speaks of Thanksgiving. A life of gratitude captured in the moments of each day; sometimes monumental, sometimes mundane, but always a gift turning our eyes and hearts to our Creator.

It’s no new idea, giving thanks in all things, but this book speaks it so vividly as to compel one’s heart to rejoice. Eucharisteo. This is the premise. Based upon the last supper when Jesus took the bread and cup. Giving thanks. Whenever you partake, remember. The dusk before His death. He gave thanks.

In this book a question is set forth. Can we count 1,000 gifts?

11. Watching the boy play in the yard from my seat up in the tire swing

12. The aroma of freshly roasted coffee beans

“I will praise the name of God with a song; I will magnify him with thanksgiving.” Colossians 2:6-7

When we give thanks, we magnify Him. Is this not our purpose as His creation?

26. The way the littlest one grabs my face with his hand. Studying.

27. A “See you next week.” instead of a Goodbye.

It is how we enter into His presence. How we remember that He is indeed good. All the time. He is good. Enter His gates with thanksgiving, enter His courts with praise!

35. Bird’s morning song. Praise to Creator

When we turn our attention to the details, we ultimately turn our attention to Him who fashioned each intricate design of creation, and continues to fashion the details of our lives.

38. Full belly laughter

39. First day using our new study. Filled with toys within a half hour

“Our salvation in Christ is real, yet the completeness of that salvation is not fully realized in a life until the life realizes the need to give thanks.”

48. Permission–even a call–to slow down

“This act of naming grace moments, this list of God’s gifts, moves beyond the shopping list variety of prayer and into the other side. The other side of prayer, the interior of His throne room, the inner walls of His powerful, love-beating heart.”

51. Lighted garland waiting its debut after Thanksgiving

52. Both boys succumbing to naps at the exact same moment

This is how we see God in the every day. In the ordinary. In the extraordinary. I am seeing him now; seeing Him new.

55. Pasta dough perfect. Stretchy.

56. Garlic in butter. Bubbly.

“How my eyes see, perspective, is my key to enter into His gates. I can only do so with thanksgiving.”

74. Ellis laughs when I laugh

75. A home for my boys to make messy

How is this different from the other times I have attempted a gratitude journal? This is not about a list. This is about a perspective on life; an invitation to drink deeper of the love of my Jesus; to see Him as I never have before.

This is the answer to what it means to pray without ceasing. As I see, I behold, I name as a gift, I record it, I receive it, I see Him throughout my entire day. I am constantly brought back down to my knees to say thanks. To give thanks. Thanksgiving.

“Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” John 1:3

94. A tiny hand eager to hold mine

95. His little words, so few yet so many

This is changing my life–this constant giving of thanks; this prayer without cease.

98. All the work that is raising children

99. A silence rarely caught

100. The abrupt hush after they are both put to bed

101. How I miss my husband so when we are apart

102. A rest worked for

What happens when I reach one thousand? The list is not the point, the perspective is. The change of life is. The offering of thanks to my God is. One thousand means nothing aside from the path it leads me on, a path to gratitude. Counting blessings opens my eyes to Jesus. It opens my heart to praise Him. That is the point. One thousand is only the beginning.

How fitting that I would pick this book up in the season of Thanksgiving. May it carry my giving of thanks beyond the leaves falling and weather turning cold.

“I will praise the name of God with a song; I will magnify him with thanksgiving.” Colossians 2:6-7

Photos taken exploring nature with my sister and niece on vacation

Quotes from “one thousand gifts”, Ann Voskamp