THANKSGIVING always includes joy and peace. One's thought is always at rest when one's giving of thanks is heartfelt and sincere. Gratitude loosens the cords of the enslaving material senses, whether they appear as fear or bondage to sin, sickness, or lack. How often has a sense of freedom and relief come as one has felt and expressed gratitude! Christian Science reveals to us our natural ability and desire to be grateful to God for His perpetual goodness, no matter what the material condition may appear to be.
Some people say, "When my problem is worked out I shall express my gratitude," or, "I have nothing to be grateful for." Is the latter statement really true? There are many things we can be grateful for if we look deep enough, high enough, or even round about us. It is only when the false sense of self creeps in—that selfish sense which sees nothing beyond or outside of itself, what it wants, and its own problems—that there seems to be an opposer, an obstruction, something that deprives us of the gratitude we may need to complete our demonstration. When one lifts his thought to understand that because Spirit, God, is All, there is nothing that can stand opposed to Spirit, God, he clearly sees he has something for which to rejoice.
Through the teachings of Christian Science we learn that mortal mind or matter, with its sin, sickness, and death, claims to stand opposed to health, harmony, and immortality. Hate, malice, spite, revenge, and. jealousy claim to stand opposed to Love; but do they, if Love is really All? Oftentimes, after much buffeting we begin to see in some measure how to stand with the spiritual fact and feel divine Love's presence and omnipotence around us. Lack, limitation, poverty claim to stand opposed to abundance; but do they, if infinite intelligence, or God, is All? We naturally hold to the rules of mathematics in order to destroy the error that has appeared in our work; then why not stick to the spiritual fact, allowing nothing but the fact to enter our consciousness in order to prove false, unreal, the inharmony, discord, or disease. We gain much quiet strength from scientific reasoning.
