Be grateful

November 21, 2022 | 37 comments

If you’d like to see abundance abound in your life, be grateful for what you have!

It’s amazing to the human mind how this rule works, but experience proves that a willingness to see what you have, leads to seeing even more.

Gratitude opens mental doors to God’s abundance at hand that ingratitude keeps closed and thus fails to see.

As Mary Baker Eddy wrote, “Are we really grateful for the good already received? Then we shall avail ourselves of the blessings we have, and thus be fitted to receive more” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 3).

It’s to your advantage to be super grateful today!!

37 thoughts on “Be grateful”

  1. I pray my gratitude for rain every day! On the coast of Oregon last week, we had 4 consecutive days of rain and as I prayed my gratitude for the rain, I asked for a walk-the-dog window of sunshine and we had it for the last 2 days. So very grateful for that as well!! Now I am praying for light, then heavy rain during the night and I am waking up to wet sidewalks and sunshine!
    Are you aware that the Thames, Danube, and Po rivers in Europe are in need of rain? The Nile and it’s tributaries are becoming a desert. Unless the rain comes, famine will follow this desperate drought! The Mississippi is so low that barges cannot pass carrying grain – that is the least expensive way to transport wheat from the Midwest to market. Even the Amazon is drying up in parts. There has been no rain in the rainforest for a month. Mrs. Eddy prayed for our climate stability and we all must as well. Our survival on Earth depends on our diligent work. Let’s be grateful for rain wherever there is extreme drought!!!

    1. Thanks for those thoughts, Lisa. Whereas there has been a drought iun South Africa for some years, this year it may have been well a truely broken (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAcbK-n78Ao). I agree that we should pray for climate stability rather than extremes. She wrote: “Mortals who on the shores of time learn Christian Science, and live what they learn, take rapid transit to heaven, — the hinge on which have turned all revolutions, natural, civil, or religious, the former being servant to the latter, — from flux to permanence, from foul to pure, from torpid to serene, from extremes to intermediate.
      (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, Mary Baker Eddy, pp. 205:31–4)

  2. I am learning to be grateful for my adversaries and adversities. They are bringing me fuller understanding of God’s omnipotence, omnipresence, and omnibenevolence. I am grateful for these blessings. Though mortals may harshly persecute, reject or judge, God simply Loves. I am learning that as God’s reflection, I do have the ability to Love (forgive) and my heart remains intact. I am glad for every scalding tear.

    1. Love, thanks for the word “omnibenevolence” you used to describe God. I haven’t heard that before but it is certainly true. I am grateful for God’s benevolence toward all of us. Synonyms are compassionate, tender-hearted, generous, good, kind, lavish, helpful, generous.

  3. this couldn’t have come at a better time……today our little Gran-dog is welcomed for his first Holiday (with us)!!! Thank you, he’s a mighty GOOD SPORT ! Happy Thanksgiving to you and your church.

  4. i gave thanks this morning. For all that i have and much more which i am about to receive. Demostration is gratitude.
    Thank you Father for all that you have given me and my family.

  5. Evan writes “be grateful for what you have” which to me is the same as “Be grateful for what you are”
    GRATITUDE
    Our thoughts, O God, are one with Thee,
    In praise of perfect Deity.
    We see, with this reflection true,
    That we fulfil the Life that’s You!
    With love, joy, peace, and thanks, we shine,
    As we reveal Your Life Divine;
    And so we sing with all our heart
    Such gratitude for all Thou art!
    Oh happy are our lives as Thee,
    Reflecting Soul’s prosperity!
    When GRATITUDE completes our days,
    Our lives attain Your Word, what PRAISE!

    What fills our thoughts fills our lives…As Evan notes, when we give gratitude we receive abundance

  6. In Science and Health we read 8:14-16 If we feel the aspiration, humidity, gratitude and love which our words express – this God accepts.:
    By aspiring I know that it is done.
    Being humble I leave everything in God’s hands and have nothing to do but wait on God.
    In humility I remove my shoes and stand on holy ground., having nothing to tell any one.
    Feeling loved by God I rejoice.

  7. I had mentioned turning grateful to a heart full
    of great/God
    Mrs. Eddy has in the Lord’s Prayer, Give us
    grace for to-day.
    My Christian Science teacher said, grace is
    spiritual poise.
    We need gratitude to have spiritual poise in
    all situations, or spiritual poise to recognize
    gratitude.

    Hymn p.-3
    A grateful heart a garden is,
    Where there is always room
    For every lovely, Godlike
    grace
    To come to perfect bloom.

    The hymn uses grateful in
    each stanza.
    Happy grace-filled day, every day, Evan and all
    SpiritViewers.

  8. Dear Evan, thank you very much for this so important reminder!
    As soon as I read this SV I sat back in my couch silently (I just was reading the lesson) and immediately knew I can be thankful for uncountable blessings from God. And then I was immensely grateful that today my dear gardenhelper is coming to rake and cut bushes and everything to make my garden clean for the winter.
    Oh can we be grateful for Christian Science that teaches us that all good is coming abundantly from our loving Father-Mother-God!

  9. I thank God, my Father Mother for loving me and all and for His Her protection and provision every moment for all humanity.

    Thank you Evan and everyone sharing their gratitude today, it’s makes me all the more grateful.

    Much love

  10. I simply LOVE Ajayi s typo., in the quote. It is so appropriate. Thank you Ajayi for making me start the day with a smile

  11. Whoa – Love – hold up a second. I’m just checking in to make sure you aren’t performing any sort of mental self-flagellation!

    The scalding tear reference is making me do the big-brother running out to the lawn thing. 🙂

    Because if you are, know that there are two sides to “Love thy neighbor as thyself”. Ie, while love and reflection are requisite first, it does not mean you allow yourself to become a punching-bag or somebody else’s doormat. If forced to take a human footstep to stand up for what’s right, love’s got your back.

    I’m sure you know what to do, but for some reason your message alarmed me just a little.

    1. After listening to a lecture recently, there was time for questions at the end. I asked: “If you are just wanting to feel the reality and substance of God’s love, what do you do?” The lecturer responded: “Do you love yourself? We forget to love ourselves.” It was a wake up call for me.

    2. Some lessons seem more difficult to learn than others, and cause perhaps feelings of anguish. I love leaning on the hymns, and often find answers and/or comfort from them.
      Here are some hymn stanzas that came to mind and seemed to flow one into the other:
      Oh, make me glad for every scalding tear,
      For hope deferred, ingratitude, disdain!
      Wait, and love more for every hate, and fear
      No ill, – since God is good, and loss is gain.
      (#207)

      In Thee, O Spirit, true and tender,
      I find my life as God’s own child;
      Within Thy light of glorious splendor
      I lose the earth-clouds drear and wild.
      (#154)

      In heavenly Love abiding,
      No change my heart shall fear;
      And safe is such confiding,
      For nothing changes here.
      The storm may roar without me,
      My heart may low be laid;
      But God is round about me,
      And can I be dismayed?
      (148)

  12. Re: illusion of rivers lacking water. I am reminder if Mrs. Eddie”a healing of the milkman’s well. It is Live that fills the well. The same can be said for all the rivers.

    1. How lovely, Robin!!! Yes, it is Love that is filling all the rivers of the world and drought is an illusion. I am grateful for your great reminder!!! You will be blessed for this helpful thought!

    2. How lovely, Robin!!! Yes, it is Love that is filling all the rivers of the world and drought is an illusion. I am grateful for your great reminder!!! You will be blessed for this helpful thought!

      And grateful to you, Richard of (Sussex) England to know that the rain has finally come! Answer to my prayers!

  13. What a plethora of spiritual wisdom shared here today!
    It is so helpful, as I seem to be dealing with some ‘lack’ issues,
    with drought being one, also. My needs have always been met
    and I have always had just enough and am Trusting this
    abundance for today, as always. “Divine Love always has met
    and always will meet Every human need.” (Mrs. Eddy) Yes!

    1. Notes from the excellent 1980 Sentinel article, “Drought is Not Beyond Our Control: “Mortals expect recurrent drought in much the same way that they expect an occasional epidemic of sickness… But no evil is necessary or inevitable!
      Mortals believe that normalcy depends upon factors beyond their control, and so subject themselves to their environs of limited thought, instead of exercising their God-given dominion… God constantly sustains us, In direct ratio to our spiritual understanding, we can demonstrate that we always have whatever we need,
      As we cease believing in any possible reality in evil cause or effect – because we understand in some degree that God, good, is All-in-all – sufficient water or other resources will be made manifest exactly where they are needed. The mesmerism of drought will dissipate until it disappears.” YEA!!!

  14. What a wonderful article! So many reminders of what it means to trust God’s governing control of everything, including weather issues. We can be so grateful to acknowledge the gifts/promises that are so generously given to all us reflections. I hope everyone reads this 1980 article. It’s so enlightening.

  15. A favorite hymn in it’s entirety, -Hymn #3

    A grateful heart a garden is,
    Where there is always room
    For every lovely, Godlike grace
    To come to perfect bloom.

    A grateful heart a fortress is,
    A staunch and rugged tower,
    Where God’s omnipotence, revealed,
    Girds man with mighty power.

    A grateful heart a temple is,
    A shrine so pure and white,
    Where angels of God’s presence keep
    Calm watch by day or night.

    Grant then, dear Father-Mother God,
    Whatever else befall,
    This largess of a grateful heart
    That loves and blesses all.

    Thank you Brian for your footnote,- I needed that!

    So grateful for all of you!!,

  16. We should be most grateful that every good and perfect gift is already ours. There is no want or worry to overcome. The “ well” is already full.

    1. Thanks Kim, your comment made me think of James 1:17, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning,” Now that’s something to be grateful for!

      Thanks Evan for keeping us focused on gratitude. We’ve recently talked here about how feeling gratitude connects us with out natural state of Joy, I greatly appreciate seeing that connection. Love to all.

  17. Thanks Jenny! My CS mother taught me that – she was a real loving warrior. 🙂

    She noticed when I was being first taught CS, that I had a tendency to allow mortal-mind to simply beat me up and not stand for what’s right mentally – but not go to the other extreme and make it a reality either by thinking you have to fight your way out of everything.

    I suppose in regards to the weather topic, she would have me stand up for perfection, no drought NOW, or ever, and stop looking out the window using mortal-mind as a bellwether of the spiritual fact!

    Strong one she was (is in actuality, although unseen mortally). I rely on her strength as much as God’s.

  18. I just had a demonstration, and am grateful to God for always protecting me.

    Evan’s SpiritView and all the participants have me reading the Bible and S&H with new vigor – a new outlook, relaxed.

    A few hours after writing the above concerning my mother and finishing with
    “Strong one she was (is in actuality, although unseen mortally). I rely on her strength as much as God’s.”

    I felt pretty smug and “advanced”.

    I got a warning. Reading Science and Health with joy, I felt like putting it down and opening the Bible at random. You know, like Mrs. Eddy would do. Oh, boy am I advanced! (sarcasm)

    I opened to I Corinthians 15:33. Standing out in neon lights were the words:

    “be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.”

    Feeling strength from my mother is one thing, but trying to communicate with her like a matter-spiritualist is quite another! I wasn’t intending to, but maybe the temptation was there. That road leads back to square one. No thanks.

    Thank you God. Like a puppy-dog running off into the bushes mentally, I am always led back to the road.

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