by Rev. Thomas Disrud

A sermon given November 26, 2006

First Unitarian Church

Portland, Oregon

The thanksgiving meal is behind us. The turkey carcass is in the fridge. We might be reaching that point when we are actually getting tired of the turkey and waiting for inspiration for what to do with the rest of it.  Maybe we have already made the soup. Maybe it will soon be time to just throw the carcass out.

We have battled the crowds for the holiday shopping spree—or we have lived by our principles and not battled the holiday shopping crowds.

We have been with family and friends—or not been with family and friends—for better or for worse.

And we are at the end of the thanksgiving weekend. We have done our duty and expressed our thanks, and now we are on to what is next.

I love thanksgiving. I think it might be because the message of the holiday is so simple, so elemental. It is hard not to agree with the sentiments behind thanksgiving. Giving thanks, after all, is just something that is good to do. And I know that every year I am reminded that it is not just something that should happen in late November. It seems like something that should happen a little more often—maybe with fewer calories—but still something that is more routine.

Giving thanks is one of the most religious things that we do. Giving thanks is an acknowledgement of all that we have, all that we have been given.

That being said, I still struggle with how to make gratitude part of my everyday living. Some days are better than others. On those days I am more mindful of how I think about others, how I am with them. On those days I’m more mindful of what is before me.

But all too often these days, if anything, I find myself asking just what we have to be thankful for. Just reading the headlines tends to pull me in all kinds of directions. Every day seems to bring new news about violence in Iraq. And the violence doesn’t stop there—it happens all over the world, and right here all around us. Even shopping is not easy these days. On Friday, fighting erupted among 12,000 bargain hunters at the Fashion Place Mall in Murry,Utah. There were nine separate fights that had to be broken up. One 19-year-old shopper described it as a mosh pit.[1]

It is difficult in these times to know how to be in the world. It is easy to feel like we have lost our way—let alone to live in a place of gratitude.

We all have our ways of coping. Some of us make jokes, some of us shed tears. Some of us throw ourselves into justice work. Some of us just get depressed. But however we respond we come to have pretty low expectations.

When we get to that place we might just miss something even it is right in front of us. Sometimes it is just a matter of perspective.

A woman tells the story of the trip she and her husband take to Hawaii. Her husband, an organized and frugal man, had reserved compact rental cars on each of the four islands they were going to visit months in advance. On arriving on the Big Island and presenting their reservation to the car rental desk, they were told that the economy car they had reserved was not available. Alarmed, she watched her husband's face redden as he prepared to do battle. The clerk did not seem to notice. “I am so sorry, sir,” he said. “Will you accept a substitute for the same price? We have a Mustang convertible.”

Barely mollified, her husband put their bags in this beautiful white sports car and they drove off. The same thing happened throughout their holiday. … After the Mustang, they had been given a Mazda MR-10, a Lincoln Town Car, and finally, a Mercedes, all with the most sincere apologies.

The vacation was absolutely wonderful and on the plane back, she turned to her husband, thanking him for all he had done to arrange such a memorable time. “Yes,” he said, pleased, “it was really nice. Too bad they never had the right car for us.”[2]

I think that sometimes we all find ourselves in that place. Truth is we get the upgrade all the time and don’t notice it. The religious life constantly asks us to discern how it is we are to be in the world. How it is we are to live in relationship with ourselves, with one another, with our god, however it is we might define our god. We are asked to discern how we will walk on the earth.

Meister Eckhart said that if the only prayer we ever learn to say is “thank you,” then that’s sufficient.

And I think that might just be true. There is the kind of primal religious impulse, the awareness that we are alive, that we are part of the world, that all of life is a gift that we have been given. Gratitude is the response to that impulse. It asks us to strip away all the stuff that really isn’t so important and to be first of all aware of all that is in front of us. It asks us to take nothing for granted but to live in the awareness that each new day is a gift we have received. Our job is to use that gift well.

Annie Dillard, borrowing her opening line from Emerson, said it well: “Every day is a god. Each day is a god and holiness holds forth in time. I worship each god. I praise each day splintered down and wrapped in time like a husk, a husk of many colors spreading at dawn fast over the mountains.”

So how is it that we cultivate gratitude? A friend of mine takes time at the end of every day to go over the day and to bring to mind the people and events of the day she is grateful for. It is a ritual for her.

For me, I try to be intentional about how I start my day. I get up, I make my coffee, I read the paper, I often take time to pray and and I try to read some poetry.

I get ready to go to the office, I take my dog Lucy and her friend, Lorenzo, to the park most mornings. Being with the dogs I am aware of life in a particular way and find myself giving thanks. They are good teachers for me. They have a way of being in the world that is often a good example. Throwing a tennis ball has come to be an important practice in my life.

I think it is important to remember that every day of our lives we are asked to make choices. We can make a choice about how we respond to any given event. Sometimes being without, sometimes losing someone or something has a way of putting all kinds of other things into perspective.  At least with time that can happen. Even when things are good, we can choose to look for the beauty around us. We can choose to see the world through as wide a lens as possible. If we can make it a practice to see the world from a place of gratitude sometimes we find ourselves surprised by what is before us. We live from the awareness that what we have will be enough—that it will be all that we need.

We can take a lesson from the Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh and his practice of mindfulness.  He calls us to a way of being—into a recognition of being—where it is constantly with us in all that we do.  He writes:

Our true home is in the present moment.

To live in the present moment is a miracle.

The miracle is not to walk on water.

The miracle is to walk on the green Earth in the present moment,

To appreciate the peace and beauty that are available now.

Peace is all around us—

In the world and in nature—

And within us—

In our bodies and our spirits.

Once we learn to touch this peace,

We will be healed and transformed.

It is not a matter of faith;

It is a matter of practice.[3]

Sometimes our practice needs to be getting out of the way to let the spirit do its work.

Writer Rachel Naomi Remen tells a story about her mother, who was 84 years old and newly widowed. Her mother had come to live with Remen and her family. She was quite ill and not expected to live a lot longer. Knowing that her mother did not have long to live Remen thought it was important to give her opportunities to review her life, to have the chance to look at relationships and to make peace in any way that she needed to make peace. So Remen decided to introduce her mother to meditation, even though it was not something her mother had been inclined to try before this time. But her mother agreed to try it and Remen decided to do it with her. So they sat down for 15 minutes at a time. But when Remen would open her eyes her mother would just be there looking at her and smiling. Her mother didn’t necessarily need the meditation but she did enjoy the time with her daughter. Remen decided to give it up.

She continues the story:

“So I was overjoyed when one evening in the living room after dinner, my mother sighed and spontaneously closed her eyes for more than an hour. Once I had determined she was not asleep, I sat in silence with her all that time. When at last she opened her eyes and looked at me, I asked her what she had been doing. ‘Why, I was counting my chickens,’ she said with a smile.

“Meeting my puzzled look with a laugh, she told me that it had suddenly occurred to her as she was eating dinner (it was chicken) that she had eaten a chicken once or twice a week for many years. She had begun to calculate this in her mind; two chickens a week, fifty-two weeks a year times eighty-four years turned out to be more than 8,500 chickens. It seemed to her to be a great number of chickens just to keep one old woman alive. She had closed her eyes then to try to imagine what 8,500 chickens might look like. It had taken some time, but she had finally gotten a picture of them in her mind. It had been overwhelming. ‘All that innocent life,’ said my mother.”

Her mother began to wonder whether she had been worth all this sacrifice. So she had begun to review her life, looking at as many relationships in her life has she could. It had taken her a long time but in the end she realized that despite the ups and the downs she smiled at her daughter again and said “I believe I have been worthy of my chickens.”[4]

So often it is the case that when we are thrown some kind of curve ball that we ask questions like whether our lives have been worthy.  Sometimes life just seems to bring us up short. Sometimes that is the invitation that we need.

But the truth is that everyday can be a kind of invitation, an invitation to be in the world with all of its beauty and also all of its tragedy. It asks us how we will be in the world and how we will use our gifts in the world. As we are able to be in the world fully it becomes more and more clear how we are to best use our gifts.

It is not that we just look through life with rose-colored glasses—quite the opposite. We are asked to be open to meaning all the time, to make sense of how we are in the world, how we can use our powers for the good. We are called to live with a sense of reverence—that all of life is sacred, that our lives are sacred. And with that comes a recognition that our living is connected to everything else. Part of our job is to show up, to pay attention, and in paying attention to cultivate that sense of gratitude. And as we do that—as we become more and more mindful of our lives—we see life in its fullness. What we put out to the world starts to come back to us. As we cultivate gratitude, more comes back our way. It is a world where possibility lives, where hope and forgiveness are possible, where justice can be made manifest. It is in times like these, when hope can seem far away, that we particularly need this mindfulness. It is in the depths of despair, sometimes, that the buds of hope begin to show up.

Every day is a new day. We cannot know what will be in our path any given day. We cannot know what will be asked of us at any given time. What we can do is live with the awareness that what we have will be enough.

Words of David Whyte:

Enough. These few words are enough.

If not these words, this breath.

If not this breath, this sitting here.

This opening to the life

We have refused

Again and again

Until now.

Until now.[5]

We are headed into the season of advent beginning next week. Advent is a paradoxical time in so many ways. The days now are shorter and shorter. It is a time to go inward, a time to prepare ourselves for what will come. We prepare for the miracle that is to come—for the birth that will come out of such difficult circumstance. We prepare for the time when hope will enter the world when it seems the least likely to enter.

But no matter what the season we are asked to live with a reverence for life, with a sense of gratitude for all that we have. This is how we might be sustained—and how we might better live to sustain the world. This is how we build the house we call gratitude. May we give thanks in all of our days, over and over again and may every day be glad.

May this be so. Amen.

PRAYER

Let us pray: God who moves in us, among us, through us, we give thanks for this day. Call us to live each day in awareness of our potential in the world. We give thanks for sunshine and rain, for these autumn days, for the things we can understand, and for all those things we cannot. May we open ourselves to see all that life offers us. May we live in hope. May we live in joy. May we live with a deepening sense of gratitude. Amen.

Benediction

As you leave this place this day, remember that you are a blessing to the world. Use your gifts well, in service. Go this day in love and go in peace. Amen.

---------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2006, Rev. Thomas Disrud. All rights reserved.