1 Thessalonians 5:18 says “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
Colossians 3:15-17 “And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
Being thankful and expressing it is often hard to remember to do. Especially when it is for “little” things that are easy to forget (asking God for a nice day, asking him for help with attitudes, etc.).
And how often do we remember to thank those around us for the things that they do which we take for granted? The self serve guy at the gas station, the associate at the store who cleans up the messes your kids leave behind, the sample lady/man at Costco (someone actually brought this to our attention once when we asked the boys to say thank you – they mentioned how NO ONE ever says thank you for the samples! So you can bet now I make a VERY big point of making sure we all thank them when we get our samps), the garbage man (ok, maybe that’s a bit extreme, don’t go running down the driveway in your house coat and slippers to catch up to him! He’ll probably just look at you funny and shrug. And no, I do NOT know from experience :D).
Anyway, the point is, I have been trying to come up with practical, physical ways to exhibit and teach our children to be thankful and grateful to others. Aside from the usual, expected “Thank you”. I want them to think outside the box and go above and beyond the call of duty.
So when I saw this post from my friend Jessica, I knew that the cookies would be a PERFECT thank you gift for the boys’ Awana teachers. They have their 2nd last class tonight, so we’ve been working away to put together the cookie people.
Like Jessica, we purchased the Nilla wafer cookies for the heads. Michaels had their Wilton melting chocolate on sale last week, so we picked up a pack of yellow. We already had some of the icing scribblers in my stash, but we ran out and so had to replenish.
Each boy has taken such joy in decorating and choosing the cookies for each of their teachers. I am so proud of seeing how hard they have worked on this project, and their eagerness to show their thankfulness.
My hope and prayer is that we will be able to continue this attitude of thankful/gratefulness and expressing it to others, in order to be a blessing to them.
Praying for opportunities! Please share any ideas you may also have!
