Wednesday, November 20, 2024
by: Liz Smith

There is a beautiful psalm that I delight in reading during this season of thankfulness and gratitude. It is Psalm 100, titled, “A Psalm of Thanksgiving.” 

All Lands Summoned to Praise God
A Psalm of Thanksgiving

1 Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth.

2  Serve the Lord with gladness;
    come into his presence with singing.

3 Know that the Lord is God.
    It is he who made us, and we are his,
    we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.

4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving
    and his courts with praise.
    Give thanks to him; bless his name.

5 For the Lord is good;
    his steadfast love endures forever
    and his faithfulness to all generations.

What a joyful and vivid picture can be painted in the reader’s mind when the whole world rejoices to the Lord with gladness and song. The vibrant colors, the exuberance in the moment, the feeling of joy deep in our souls. It is an exquisite moment to meditate on. The psalmist finishes this song of thanksgiving with extraordinary promises to us, “For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever and his faithfulness to all generations.”  There is immense love, joy, and gratitude woven through these verses. What an honor we have to be able to teach our children about the hope that God brings to this world and the promise to be faithful to each and every one of us throughout time. 

Sharing thanksgiving and developing a grateful heart is a practice to learn and develop over time. We can teach our children to have grateful hearts from the time they are young by intentionally modeling thankfulness at home. We can help our kids to recognize things that God has brought into their lives that they can be thankful for. A few ideas for building a heart of thankfulness are included below. 

Add thankfulness to your bedtime routine each night by holding up a hand and naming one thing that you are thankful for as you point to each finger. As kids get comfortable with it, you could add in the other hand and all of their toes. 

Add a thankfulness game to your daily commute in the car. Go around the car and have each person take a turn by saying, “I thank God for” and name one thing that they are thankful for. Continue going until people run out of things to say. Make it more challenging by adding in a memory component. Each person starts with “I thank God for” and then they have to name what was said before them by the other players and add what they are thankful for at the end of their turn. 

As we get close to Thanksgiving, your family could build a Thanksgiving Thankfulness chain. Cut construction paper into 2’ thick strips. After dinner, ask everyone in the family to write or draw (with help for the younger) something they are thankful that God gave them on a strip of paper. Make one strip into a loop and fasten with a staple, interlock the next looped strip into the former loop and staple, continuing with all the paper strips, and forming a long chain as the week goes by. On Thanksgiving, bring your thankfulness chain to the table and highlight some of the loops all together as a family. 

A student favorite from years past was a thankful placecard turkey craft. With adult assistance, tie a string around the middle of a pine cone and dip them in a cup of leftover interior house paint, so they become coated and smooth. Dry them by tying the other end of the string around a pencil, and then putting the pencil across the top of a cup so the pine cone hangs below and drips dry. After a couple days, sit the pine cone on its side and glue feathers to the back of the pine cone so that it looks like a turkey. Cut small strips of paper to tuck into the top of the turkeys. On one side of the small strip of paper, your kids can write something that they are thankful for and on the other side, they can write their name or the name of a guest coming to Thanksgiving dinner. The papers can be changed daily or new ones can be added to the same pine cone. Let your children decide which they prefer. Either way you choose, you have festive place cards for Thanksgiving dinner and your kids are engaged in consistent and active learning about thankfulness this season.