November 24, 2008
For What are you Thankful?
A simple question for those you are coaching.
A question Americans will mull over this coming Thursday as the nation, once again, celebrates Thanksgiving. Most of us are familiar with the origins of the holiday as was played out in our elementary years with pageants of construction paper hatted Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians likewise festooned with crayoned feather head dresses mutually gave thanks for a successful harvest of 1621. As the celebration gained wider significance congress declared the 28th of November 1782 to be the first nationally observed day of giving thanks to Almighty God for his many blessings upon the fledgling country. But it was in the midst of the darkest year of that country, now only “four score and seven years” old, 1863 that President Abraham Lincoln requested the forth Thursday of November be a day set aside for the giving of thanks despite the horror of civil war in the deeply divided nation. It was his conviction that despite trials the people should learn to give thanks for the purpose of perspective and intercession.
When coaching it is often helpful to ask, for what are you thankful? And then to celebrate with them those things which God has bestowed upon them. Sometimes, however, this can be very difficult for those who are traveling the difficult passages of their journey. Challenge them to dig deeper if they think they have nothing for which they can say thanks. Ask the one you are coaching to brainstorm a list of possible things for which they could be thankful. Be persistent. Be patient. And above all be thankful.
How are you helping those you coach grow in their capacity to be thankful?
From the Staff of CoachNet we are very grateful to God for each one of you and pray you have the most blessed and happiest of Thanksgiving Holidays.