Quotable: A Grateful Heart
Excerpts from “About Thankfulness,” an unpublished essay by the late Paul L. Holmer, professor at Yale University and former Covenanter:
“Indeed thankfulness is commanded, but it does not dangle there as an unsupported attitude. It is not a vagrant move of the personality, an immediate gift that some have by sheer force of their wish or disposition. Rather it is both appropriate to what we are as persons and also correct in respect to the reality of things. Christian teachings tear the veil of illusion away and they confute the erstwhile wisdom of experience. What may look like a scandal and an offense to the statistically normal apprehension is no longer a scandal at all – it makes sense. The token of that sense is the new capacity for thankfulness that makes every day worth living and every moment of opposition an occasion for spiritual strengthening.”
“The radical contingency of all things must be acknowledged, for nothing has to be the way it is. We can regret it and spend our time scheming how to beat reality, or we can acknowledge the Lord and Giver of all. With the first, we thwart ourselves and see so little; with the second, we share a perspective that lets us see goodness in suffering and providence in pain. Gratitude is not an escape from reality, it is an access to it. The Christian life is thus a life-long improvisation in the attitude of thankfulness.”
“There is such a thing surely as a state of being thankful, and that state would suggest a demeanor of peace, tranquility of mind, and a quality of present life. A reduction of anxiety, a kind of contentment, and a willingness to be what one is – these are part of that state.”
“Grumbling, envy, malice, and rivalry can only prosper where other people are no longer thought about with any gladness of heart. But if one is genuinely thankful for a wife or husband, for a friend or neighbor, granted their idiosyncrasies and difference, then we can also rejoice in them. Pettiness disappears, and affection gets a little room in one’s life.”
“We are spiritual beings, not just pawns of a material world. Because we are also spiritual, we bring capacities and dispositions to bear upon everything that is. That means dependency upon events is broken, and we can now have health of the spirit even while creation groans for the day of deliverance.”
“Thankfulness is, indeed, commanded. That makes it look almost like a bit of personality manipulation, but it is not. Being thankful for all things also is one of the deepest ways to approach God. To thank Him is to appreciate what He is. This, in turn, is to be fully alert and alive to the way the real world is. Not to be thankful is to have lost touch with reality itself. Besides it means missing one of the most refined and lovely human experiences that we can have. God not only demands thankfulness, but finally He communicates His presence to grateful hearts. This is why a virtue like that is both rewarding for what it is, but more, that in that thankfulness God is able to give Himself to tranquil spirits.”
“Indeed thankfulness is commanded, but it does not dangle there as an unsupported attitude. It is not a vagrant move of the personality, an immediate gift that some have by sheer force of their wish or disposition. Rather it is both appropriate to what we are as persons and also correct in respect to the reality of things. Christian teachings tear the veil of illusion away and they confute the erstwhile wisdom of experience. What may look like a scandal and an offense to the statistically normal apprehension is no longer a scandal at all – it makes sense. The token of that sense is the new capacity for thankfulness that makes every day worth living and every moment of opposition an occasion for spiritual strengthening.”
“The radical contingency of all things must be acknowledged, for nothing has to be the way it is. We can regret it and spend our time scheming how to beat reality, or we can acknowledge the Lord and Giver of all. With the first, we thwart ourselves and see so little; with the second, we share a perspective that lets us see goodness in suffering and providence in pain. Gratitude is not an escape from reality, it is an access to it. The Christian life is thus a life-long improvisation in the attitude of thankfulness.”
“There is such a thing surely as a state of being thankful, and that state would suggest a demeanor of peace, tranquility of mind, and a quality of present life. A reduction of anxiety, a kind of contentment, and a willingness to be what one is – these are part of that state.”
“Grumbling, envy, malice, and rivalry can only prosper where other people are no longer thought about with any gladness of heart. But if one is genuinely thankful for a wife or husband, for a friend or neighbor, granted their idiosyncrasies and difference, then we can also rejoice in them. Pettiness disappears, and affection gets a little room in one’s life.”
“We are spiritual beings, not just pawns of a material world. Because we are also spiritual, we bring capacities and dispositions to bear upon everything that is. That means dependency upon events is broken, and we can now have health of the spirit even while creation groans for the day of deliverance.”
“Thankfulness is, indeed, commanded. That makes it look almost like a bit of personality manipulation, but it is not. Being thankful for all things also is one of the deepest ways to approach God. To thank Him is to appreciate what He is. This, in turn, is to be fully alert and alive to the way the real world is. Not to be thankful is to have lost touch with reality itself. Besides it means missing one of the most refined and lovely human experiences that we can have. God not only demands thankfulness, but finally He communicates His presence to grateful hearts. This is why a virtue like that is both rewarding for what it is, but more, that in that thankfulness God is able to give Himself to tranquil spirits.”
posted by Ingrid at 8:25 PM
1 Comments:
Paul Holmer!! Thankfulness for this post. Thanks, Ingrid.
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