Giving Thanks, In the Midst of It All

Greetings to you on this Thanksgiving Day.  

It has been quite a year again for us in Louisiana.

Hurricane Ida crippled southeast Louisiana as the recovery continued in southwest Louisiana. This year, we faced new challenges with crippling job loss and the rising cost of just about everything due to supply chain issues. Meanwhile, the problems of racism persist, along with food insecurity and climate change.  

Yet...

In the midst of it all, there are signs all around of hope - signs of thanksgiving.  

We have been fed by the hand of God time and again. 

When we needed to be nourished in God’s love, we were fed with a bounty beyond our imagination.  

I am reminded of a phrase from the Great Thanksgiving for Thanksgiving Day found in the United Methodist Book of Worship - “Though he was rich, yet for our sake he became poor. When hungry and tempted, he refused to make bread for himself that he might be the bread of life for others. When the multitudes were hungry, he fed them. He broke bread with the outcast but drove the greedy from the temple.”

“He refused to make bread for himself that he might be the bread of life for others.”

Let those words sink in this day and every day.   

I give thanks for you, your love for the church, and your love for the work of Christ in our midst. And like you, I am thankful that in Jesus’ love and mercy for you and for me, he refused to make bread for himself that he might be the bread of life for others.

May we be one with Christ, one with each other, and one in ministry to all the world!

“Now thank we all our God, with hearts and hands and voices, who wondrous things has done, in whom this world rejoices, who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way with countless gifts of love, and still is our today.” - Now Thank We All Our God, The UMC Hymnal

Happy Thanksgiving,

Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey