Thanksgiving Prayer

Without going back into the archives to make certain, I'm quite sure that last year I posted the following prayer by George Herbert. Yet, for many Thanksgivings of my life it has been a prayer of mine. It is the cry of my heart. So here it is once again, the fragment of a larger poem.

This year we as a family have so much to be thankful for. We are so abundantly blessed. These blessings none of us take for granted I know. There are challenges ahead - and these are those that are known. What we also know and are continually renewing is the fact of the faithfulness of our God, the additional fact that He meets us -always- at our point of need, and that His mercies continue to be new, fresh, surprisingly precious each new day. We can only fall before Him in adoration.

Thou that hast given so much to me,

Give one thing more, a grateful heart...

Not thankful, when it pleaseth me

As if thy blessings had spare days;

But such a heart, whose pulse may be Thy praise.

Are there ever 'spare days' where His blessings are concerned? Never.

So then, the prayer is for a heart whose very pulse praises. Always.