Thankful Beyond Words

Thanksgiving is quickly approaching us. In the thick of all the preparations, we tend to lose sight of what we are thankful for. We are not only looking at all the tasks to do for the coming week, but we are also focused on what all we have to do for the coming month of December. These tasks cloud our thankfulness and make us only see our needs.

I’m inviting you to take a break from all your to do lists this morning and read a story of thankfulness from my dear friend, Dani Hardy. Dani is the Communications Pastor of Grace Church. She is passionate about Jesus and it is displayed through her writing and teaching. Her sweet family includes her husband, Dusty, their 5-year-old daughter, and the blessing of a second daughter due to join them on Christmas Day. Her heart is overflowing with thanksgiving and it bleeds over to us.

Maybe you are caught in a lack of thankfulness because of grief, busyness, jealousy, heartache, or loneliness. Let Dani’s story today sink down deep into your marrow. Allow God’s love for you to become the heart of your thankfulness. Dani’s story reminds us how simple thankfulness can be. God’s love for us is abounding and great. It is enough to be thankful for. We don’t need all the bells and whistles this Thanksgiving. Our thankfulness is is placed in His love.

There is a sacredness of authentic thanks that is impossible to articulate with words. It is a kind of gratitude that exists too deep within the soul for common language to reach. The words, no matter how poignant or direct, always seem to fall short of the depth that authentic thankfulness requires. It is a thankfulness beyond words. 

Repeated moments of inarticulate words founded in the deepest of gratitude have become a new sense of normalcy for me these past eight months. 

For me, it began beside a bubbling brook on the back of a massive rock on the side of a mountain among kindred souls who saw me. It was a gentle whisper of a message that broke the silence, like only the Father can, as six simple words pierced my soul with the sun beating warm on my back. “Live loved Dani, because you are.” They seem too simple to be this profound. Yet again, I realize there’s a distinct inability of words to capture the depth of sacred moments like this one. In a singular moment I knew with a greater certainty than ever before how deeply loved I truly was and how free I was to partner with that truth.

The love of my Father swept over me like the water sweeping over the rocks in the brook to my left and the wind sweeping through the trees to my right. It was all around me; His power sweeping through creation to express how seen and loved and known I am. It was an inexpressible moment that cut through the thick layers of me to showcase a love without end that had been pursuing the depths of me for as long as I could remember. 

In a breath, His love for me became the deepest gratitude of my soul that words are unable to define. His love became for me a thankfulness that existed beyond words. 

Weeks and months have passed from that mountainside moment and the words still haven’t surfaced but greater evidence of His love floods in. The sound of a heartbeat from inside my womb where life was declared impossible simply layers gratitude deeper into my soul—a place where only joyful tears seem adequate. An outstretched belly carrying a miraculous life expands the thankfulness of my heart and further exposes the limitations of my words. A family of three finally becoming a family of four after years of waiting, grieving, praying, and surrendering increases the majesty through which we view our God. Yet still, the greatest miracle that anchors my thankfulness to a sacred place beyond words is my heart, forever assured of the love of my Father that holds me and multiplies this life inside of me.  

He is the author of miraculous works and the anchor of my thanks.

Sometimes our deepest gratitude sets itself up in the secret place, existing as a thankfulness beyond words; yet I believe it is from that very place that God hears us best. 

© Thankful Beyond Words, Dani Hardy

Digging Deeper:

Where is your heart this Thanksgiving? Are you entering into this week with a thankful heart or a burdened heart?

How has God shown His love for you this week?

How can you take the time this week to express your love for Jesus?