Just to let you know that tonight may be the last blog post for a few days.  Tomorrow is our departure day for Fort Worth, Texas to enjoy the holiday.  My time there will be cut short due to our high school playoff game on Friday evening.  Maps are showing that it is quite the drive from there to Lufkin.  It will be my first time to see my daughter in a month or so.  Everyone else saw her recently but I am having to wait until now.  At this point, it really does not matter what the menu is on Thursday.  Just having a day or two together is more than enough for me.  My youngest will travel with me tomorrow as usual.  What this means is that my radio will be set to his preferred stations for the duration.  Funny how it works that way. 

Many people have all kinds of set traditions when it comes to Thanksgiving.  Our gathering is not quite as keen on doing it all just right.  The already mentioned menu is still unknown.  A very large pot is traveling with us in case we decide to go the boiled shrimp route.  Not many people lean toward this meal as a traditional feast.  What they do not know is just how easy it is to clean up afterward.  You just take the newspapers laid across the table and throw them out in the trash.  Neither do you need all kinds of pots and pans to do this.  One big pot with room for all your shrimp is more than enough.  I am not sure who first came up with the idea for a shrimp boil at our house but it is a great plan.  Maybe our original pilgrims ate some shrimp along the way that very first Thanksgiving? 

Maybe nontraditional is our new tradition?  My family tended to do some of the same things every year.  I am grateful for each and every memory.  Most of our Thanksgivings were held in Louisiana.  Seems like that is the place remembered the most.  The actual Thursday celebration is a bit fuzzy now.  What does come to mind is going to shop on Friday.  One of the marine outlets would clear out room for rows and rows of toys.  It seemed the size of an airplane hangar while growing up.  You could see literally every toy or gadget known to man there.  I don't recall ever getting anything big on that day but you could count on whatever you really noticed winding up under the tree in a few weeks.  Every family seems to carry on various traditions of one type or the other.  There is no one way of celebrating that is better than another.  All of us are different so we carry on our traditions in our unique style.

Guess my point is that every person on the planet is different.  We say that we realize that no two people are the same but we sure seem to resist anyone even slightly different from us.  Paul would tell us in several places in scripture that God plans for life to be this way.  No two people are the same when it comes to how God wires us.  We all live with varied gifts, callings and abilities.  What we do share is one purpose.  Each of us is saved to reflect God's glory in our life.  What any of us may do is no better than another.  Rather than value this wonderful quality of grace our tendency is to resist any creativity in our experience with God.  We are being robbed of a terrific sense of awe as God works in each of us.  Let us try to give thanks this week for all of the many ways God works in us as well as through us.  His life is kept fresh with the Spirit filling every one of us.  That should surely be a great reason to give thanks. 

Bro. Trey