Practicing Gratitude
“God is working his perfect plan in our lives, even in the mundane.”
On Tuesday evening, April 26, 2016, Allen Tate had just finished preaching through the book of Ruth at The Well Church by reminding us of the truth above. I was two weeks away from graduating from Russellville High School being certain about only a couple of things. One of them was that I would do anything to be a part of The Well Church. The preaching was sound. The worship band was talented, and I was hoping they needed more drummers. “If I could just hang out with those people, and even play music with them,” I told myself, “I will have the best years in college.”
The first cup of craft coffee I ever had was made from a Chemex in the back of a small building on College Street in the fall of 2015. Reese Shirey served me a pour over after I got a haircut at the coolest barber shop in Florence — Greasy Hands. I didn’t know black coffee could taste so sweet. Some of my favorite Indie rock music was playing, and the vibe was perfect in the room that would become Turbo Coffee.
Thrilled about craft coffee, I immediately bought gear to make it at home. I bought some Kenya Gatchatha from Verve Coffee Roasters in San Francisco. I found so much delight in making coffee. After all, it is such a part of my Guatemalan culture. Could I work as a barista? “If I could just get a job at Turbo Coffee,” I told myself, “I will have the best years in college.”
I got into the rhythm of college, but I was still at Northwest Shoals Community College, commuting from Russellville almost every day. I would go to UNA to see my friends. Magnolia trees and tulip trees brightened the campus. Squirrels slowly creeped around without a care in the day. Students seemed so alive and well at UNA. “If I could just transfer to UNA,” I told myself, “my college experience would be so much better.” If I was attending UNA however, I had to move to Florence. In the summer of 2017, I lived with some of my best friends for a month in Florence, and in Seattle, WA, for a leadership program. Living in Florence with those people (you know who you are) would be a dream.
One day my friend JJ and I were walking around Highland Baptist. We were keeping an eye out for the house on Simpson Street which HBC owned. I looked at him, knowing I was transferring to UNA in the fall. “If we could just live in that house,” I told him, “we will have the best two years at UNA.”
Fast forward.
It is 10:36 p.m., April 20, almost four days to the date of that service I attended at The Well in 2016. I am typing away at the kitchen table at the house I share with two of my best friends — that very house JJ and I kept an eye out for on Simpson Street, now called “The Parsonage”. My coffee gear sits to the left of me on a little black table. I got off work from Turbo at 6 p.m. where Miller, my co-worker and I reminisced about all the great music we have played in our four years working there. And it has been a little over a month since I have played drums at The Well Church because of cancelled services due to COVID-19. I sigh in desperation to gather again.
That sigh, however, can be hopeless or hopeful. Hopeless if I forget that what I once dreamed of is a reality. Hopeful if I practice gratitude in order to remember that what I once dreamed of is a reality.
Ingratitude makes me forget the joys of living in this house. It makes me forget the beauty of friendship. The blessing my job is. The gift that my church is to me. Ingratitude makes what we once dreamed what we now dread. Practicing gratitude, however, is how we realize that our present reality is where time touches eternity, as C.S. Lewis observed. Ignatius of Loyola (1491–1556) taught that our emotions, like ingratitude stem from our desires. For instance, not getting what you wanted (the past), or not getting what you want (the future). Practicing gratitude on the other hand grounds you in the present where neither of those affect you.
“Ingratitude makes what we once dreamed what we now dread.”
Practicing gratitude can even be an “antidote to anxiety”, as John Mark Comer says. He wisely adds: “Anxiety [is] a kind of grasping for control of what we do not have in the future, whereas gratitude is a form of giving thanks for what we do have in the present.”
Ingratitude happens when I forget that what I once dreamed is now a reality. What were those dreams for you that are now a reality? Begin giving thanks, and maybe you will remember. Write down three things you are grateful for after reading this and begin to experience the joy of practicing gratitude for the present. Perhaps it is what your soul needs the most in this uncertain time. Quit looking to the past. Quit reaching for the future. Hold on to right now and give thanks. After all, it is God’s will for your life.
“…give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thess. 5:18, ESV).
Or maybe, the mundane feeling COVID-19 brought has caused you to doubt God is working. What I heard Allen preach four years ago is still true.
“God is working his perfect plan in our lives, even in the mundane.”
Add that to your list of three things to be grateful for.
