Greetings in Christ,
Here we are entering the holidays, a time of gratitude. Can you describe what you are grateful for this holiday season? You are likely used to asking, and answering, that question, but I have another question for you: What color is your gratitude? If that has you pondering, listen in to the Six Mission Minutes video this month, and perhaps you’ll find a new way to color the atmosphere with thanksgiving.
Did you know that the colors on a turkey’s head change? Those folds of skin that protrude and hang down – the snood that begins above their beak and the wattle that hangs from below their beak and neck – all that skin can change color. A pale white turkey head can turn to blue or to a bright red and back in a matter of minutes. I learned this from a family in my former congregation who raised a few domestic turkeys. They posited that the colors of the snoods and wattles coincide with how the turkey happens to be feeling. If it is anxious, the color changes; amorous, the color changes; or calm, the color changes.
Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 9:11, “You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.” I wonder… if different colors go with different moods, what is the color of gratitude? The liturgical color during Thanksgiving is still green, which reminds me of what Paul said in the verse before that, 2 Corinthians 9:10: “He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.” Our God is a God of seed, sowing, growth, and harvest. So green, then, is a color of gratitude.
This season, color me grateful – whatever color you use. Let that color point you to the reason for being grateful in all things, Jesus Christ our Savior, and let it encourage you to live with a generous spirit. Wherever you go during the holidays, whoever you are with, may you color the atmosphere with gratitude. As Paul said in 2 Corinthians 9:15, “Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!”
In Jesus,
Rev. Michael T. Von Behren
District President, The Northwest District, LCMS
