20 Bible Verses on Gratitude & Being Thankful

I think my word of the year for 2018 will be contentment. I struggle with contentment and gratitude, and that leads me to constantly overspending. I always just really need that one thing. And then that other one thing. And then that one more one thing. It never ends. My kids have the same problem.

I have a post coming up next week on raising grateful kids because I think it's so important to focus on gratitude at this greedy time of year. Christmas is over, and we can now stop thinking about all the things we hope to get and start thinking about all the things we already have.

Oprah Winfrey has said, "Be thankful for what you have; you'll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don't have, you will never, ever have enough." and I can attest to the truth of that statement. When you are thankful, you see what you have in a new light. It feels like abundance rather than lack.

I have such a hard time with this, and so do my kids.

When I think of my Pandora bracelet, for example, I can focus on the 28 gorgeous charms that I already have, most of which were gifts from my loves for holidays or birthdays or purchased during our travels, or I can think about all the ones that I have my eye on from eBay or the Pandora store in our local mall. It's a choice, and the ones I don't have are very alluring.

But the point is that focusing on what you already have is a much more honest and joyful place to live. I am grateful to God and my husband for blessing me with 28 different charms for my bracelet, commemorating family vacations and Christmases and birthdays and Mother's Days and so on. I feel his love every time my bracelet clinks against my Fitbit. I love that bracelet (which is actually now 2 bracelets because all my charms wouldn't fit on the first one anymore).

Brené Brown has also written and spoken extensively on gratitude. Her quote which guides my gratitude practice is this: "I never talk about gratitude and joy separately, for this reason. In 12 years, I've never interviewed a single person who would describe their lives as joyful, who would describe themselves as joyous, who was not actively practicing gratitude."

A Grateful Heart Bible Study

What does an active practice of gratitude look like, you may be wondering. Well, it can start with a Bible study like A Grateful Heart. It's a 2-week study that I wrote to guide you through some of the most important gratitude verses in the Bible. It's an easy and no pressure way to learn how to study scripture effectively.