The Highest Form of Praise

“Nothing taken for granted; everything received with gratitude; everything passed on with grace.

“You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.

“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.”

― G.K. Chesterton (1874–1936)

Thanks are of grace in the strictest practical operation. It takes a person from a focus on anything else to the higher place of elevated praise. It is the agenda of the person who seeks God with their whole heart. It is the priority of the person who thinks humbly and is always thinking these ways.

Thanks are the privileges of God bestowed on a human being that has given themselves over to him. It is a mindset that a surrendered person is blessed with, having given up all the pride, self-seeking, and reticence of grace. It is a paradigm of peace for the purveyor of perspective.

If ever we were to be troubled by thoughts of anxiousness – as we may frequently or infrequently be – and of planning for tomorrow when today is not done with – we ought to retract to the present moment by methods of thankfulness.

Thankfulness is the grace of truth submitted in the moment. It forces one to reflect on the grace resplendent in that life as in all of life.

Grace is known to us who truly worship God. Thanks are a way to it. And we think of a way that thanks brings poise and a new purpose – those who love life are thankful for it and they bring life to others as God always intended.

Thankfulness is a way to joy for the things remembered; recanted by many manifestation of wonder played upon the soul whose eyes have been opened and ears are attuned to the harmonies of heaven as they are graced to the earth below.

Thankfulness is the way to peace, for the correct attributions have been made, and perhaps favours have been granted even before time, as we pour thankfulness into the lives of those undeserving ones – and they are not only surprised, but blessed.

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Thanks are the finest carriage of grace known to the ordinary life. Everything of divine goodness rains down on the world of the person who uses the therapy of thanks. Is there a better gift? From thanks comes the power of much virtue. Perhaps no other heavenly value can add more joy and peace to our lives than thankfulness.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.