It has been one week since we Celebrated Thanksgiving. Let us always be with a thankful heart with full of praise for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n
We all have holiday traditions that are very important to us. For many years, the extended Graham family would gather at the\u00a0Billy Graham Training Center at The Cove<\/a>\u00a0in Asheville, North Carolina, for Thanksgiving. We would have met together at a house, but my grandparents (Billy and Ruth Graham) had five kids, each of whom had kids. Eventually great-grandchildren came along as well. Before long, our group was far too large!<\/p>\n I look back fondly on those dinners: the family, the food, the opportunity to catch up and renew relationships, and a special time to express thankfulness and gratitude. Those were special days.<\/p>\n Life is different now. My grandparents are in Heaven, I\u2019m in my 40s, and two out of my three kids are in college. Thanksgiving means something different to me this year. At this point in my life, I\u2019m simply excited to have my children home for a few days, enjoying each other\u2019s company.<\/p>\n Do I miss the way it used to be, when my children were young and my entire family was together? Yes, of course. They call them the \u201cgood old days\u201d for a reason.<\/p>\n It\u2019s tempting to romanticize the past and grow sorrowful in nostalgia. However, King Solomon, whose \u201cwisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt\u201d<\/em>\u00a0(1 Kings 4:30, NASB) had some guidance on the matter. In Ecclesiastes 7:10 he wrote,\u00a0\u201cDo not say, \u2018why were the former days better than these?\u2019 For you do not inquire wisely concerning this\u201d\u00a0<\/em>(NKJV).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n It\u2019s been said that memories make us rich. And emotionally we have an amazing tendency to remember the good times while minimizing the bad. However, we aren\u2019t to live in the past, but wisely move forward in the hope of the Lord.<\/p>\n First, we must show gratitude for not only the life we\u2019ve lived, but also our current situation.<\/strong>\u00a0Psalm 100:4-5 says,\u00a0\u201cEnter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name. For the Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations\u201d\u00a0<\/em>(NKJV).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n God didn\u2019t stop being good when your child went off to college, or when your father passed away unexpectedly. The Lord is as merciful and trustworthy now as before, and focusing on your hope in Him is far better than longing for days gone by. Perhaps you feel that today isn\u2019t as good as yesterday, but don\u2019t let yesterday\u2019s nostalgia rob you of today\u2019s blessings.<\/p>\n Second, as you call upon Jesus as Savior, the best is yet to come.<\/strong>\u00a0I hope that you\u2019ve had a wonderful life filled with incredible memories. The fact of the matter, though, is that we are merely on a journey through this world. We are not yet home.<\/p>\n Philippians 3:20-21 says,\u00a0\u201cFor our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself\u201d\u00a0<\/em>(NKJV).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n This Thanksgiving, I encourage you to show gratitude for the days God has given you, the good times you\u2019ve shared, and the memories you\u2019ve made. But don\u2019t stop there. Take a moment to ponder the blessings in your life today, and\u2014most of all\u2014the hope of eternity that awaits you in the presence of the Savior.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It has been one week since we Celebrated Thanksgiving. Let us always be with a thankful heart with full of praise for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We all have holiday traditions that are very important to us. For many years, the extended Graham family would gather at the\u00a0Billy Graham Training Center at The … Continue reading “Will Graham Devotional”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-180061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-prayers"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180061"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180061\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":180064,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180061\/revisions\/180064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prayingpint.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}