Gratitude by Cornelius PlantingaSample

Day Two: What Happens to Me If I Am Grateful?

Scripture: Proverbs 21: 2-3, Psalm 32:8, Hebrews 13:15-16

As we learn to practice gratitude our lives start to change.

Gratitude makes us content. Gratitude turns what I have into enough. This works because grateful and contented people are blessed with a realistic outlook. They don’t expect too much. Realistic expectations are an exhibit of humility.

Few will be surprised that gratitude also tends to produce generosity. You may be more surprised to learn that the link between gratitude and generosity is hardwired into our brains. In particular, positive psychologists have documented the correlation between one’s outlook on life and one’s health and well-being. Experience may teach us that gratitude can produce (or at least predict) contentment, joy, and generosity. But gratitude also predicts hope and general happiness—two states unmistakably characteristic of well-being.

In addition, grateful people enjoy an eye-opening number of other benefits.

• They experience less depression and anxiety.

• They sleep longer and better and awaken more refreshed.

• They have lower levels of systemic inflammation.

• They have higher levels of happiness and satisfaction with their lives.

• They are less prone to materialism.

• They are less prone to workplace burnout.

• They are more resilient after traumatic events.

• They are more patient.

We can spot our Creator’s ingenuity in arranging life this way—so that doing what’s right also turns out to be doing what’s healthy and wise. It’s right to be grateful for the gifts that come to us. In God’s world, we also thrive as we do what’s right.

Besides being prominent in Scripture as the fitting response to God’s mighty acts, besides being prominent in worship in prayer and sacrament, gratitude appears to be the single virtue most prominently associated with human flourishing. No wonder Scripture so urgently calls us to thankfulness.

Would you describe yourself as content, joyful, or generous? If not, may I join you in praying: Gracious God, open my eyes to what is good and enough. I feel far from having a grateful heart, but I ask You to begin recreating my heart so that I see your generosity and beauty all around me. Amen.