Almost a year ago Caleb, my eldest son, and I had discussed ideas for a gratitude journal that could be started at any time of year, and that would be uniquely formatted in a way that allows you to reflect & look back every single day over the cumulative gifts from the previous days and months of your year — so you can see the accumulation of life’s gift over time! It’s with immense joy and a heart full of gratitude that I invite our oldest son, Caleb, of The Keeping Company – to share his experience with this little gratitude journal, a truly innovative and creatively inspiring method to embrace a daily habit of gratitude, grace, and glory through the simple act of recording life’s gifts. It’s an absolute pleasure to welcome Caleb to the farm’s wide kitchen table today!
J
anuary often unfolds as the most challenging chapter of my year.
After the twinkling lights and warmth of Christmas fade into memory, what remains feels stark, almost empty. It’s a bit like stepping out of the enchanting world of Narnia into a landscape where the world has jarred to a somber reality.
It’s a bit like stepping out of the enchanting world of Narnia into a landscape where the world has jarred to a somber reality.
A reality of putaway Christmas trees, unfortunate bathroom scale readouts, and December’s ‘let’s circle back to that’ – coming full circle.
In these moments, I can find myself embodying a bit of Puddleglum, C.S. Lewis’s famously gloomy character, especially during the short overcast days – and long, long, dark nights of a Canadian winter.
The skies during this time are like a gray canvas stretched tight and barren, devoid of the sun’s warm brushstrokes that whisper promises of brighter days.
No color. For days.
Only gray.
Such days can often veer towards seeing only the flaws everywhere, and all the endless things that seem amiss in the world around me.
Yet, in the midst of this wintry introspection, a spark of Pollyanna’s spirit sometimes flickers to life.
Jesus’ teachings, much like the starkness of January, offer blessings in the most unexpected of forms — in mourning, in meekness, in being poor in spirit, and even in persecution — it’s all about divine blessings in the places you don’t expect to find them.
Amidst the snow and freezing and gray, there’s the odd blessing — the freezing means less pests survive to harm the crops, and the cold of our latitude means we go year round almost never touched by the chaos of tornadoes and hurricanes. Snow can’t be that bad, because no one has ever asked to go outside and build a “hurricane man” in the front yard, have they?
The harsher the winter, the more biting the sleet and snow, and the more soul-gritting the grey skies, the more profound the blessings can be, despite being found in the seemingly most unlikely places.
It’s in the heart of this cold, with a wintery chill lightly howling along a door that needs some weatherstripping (…it’s on my to do list, promise) that I’m reminded of Jesus’ radical words from the Sermon on the Mount.
His teachings, much like the starkness of January, offer blessings in the most unexpected of forms — in mourning, in meekness, in being poor in spirit, and even in persecution — it’s all about divine blessings in the places you don’t expect to find them.
Last year, amid the beginning of winter’s grip, I began a practice that has gently but deeply shifted my perspective. Melba, my beloved wife, and I had the honor of creating a gratitude journal, a small yet powerful tool.
When I sit down with this journal, often as the evening shadows stretch long and the world outside my window succumbs to the night’s embrace, I find myself reflecting on the day’s gifts.
Unexpectedly, often, many of these gifts are unearthed from the parts of my day that were the most challenging, or from where I seem to be floundering in the deep end of life.
And sometimes, I really really need that evidence, because in the moment when January gray is so much easier to see, it’s the gentle reminders of past gratitude that can be a warm July sun to the soul.
And honestly? There have been days that I have missed; days that have been filled in the next day with recollected gifts, or – days just left blank.
Despite that, especially when things seem gray and dark, it is helpful to read back up the page, to read the gifts I wrote down on this day in the previous months.
I get to see what had been counted blessings in months prior, and it’s a piece of warm sunshine, to more concretely see a mounting heap of evidence of blessings, of gratitude, of transformation.
And sometimes, I really really need that evidence, because in the moment when January gray is so much easier to see, it’s the gentle reminders of past gratitude that can be a warm July sun to the soul.
In that reflection, in the warm light of seeing that growing evidence of gratitude previously received – I find myself defaulting much less into a January Puddleglum.
(If you would like to join us, we’d love to slip a journal wrapped just like this in the mail for you)
And in practicing those living truths – breathes warmth into the coldest days of my soul.
And maybe that’s what’s needed most, maybe that’s what I needed the most: moments of gratitude sunlight piercing through the January clouds, illuminating the hidden beauties of life…
…moments found by embracing Jesus’ radical teachings. To mourn yet find comfort, to be meek yet live joyful in the promise of inheriting the earth, to be poor in spirit yet rich in the kingdom of heaven, and to find blessing even in persecution.
And in practicing those living truths – breathes warmth into the coldest days of my soul.
Ready for a totally new way to embrace the power of intentional daily gratitude — in a way like you never have seen or known before?
Caleb and Melba, with the Keeping Company, are offering now, a singularly fresh and entirely creative, year-long reflective Gratitude Journal, Gratitude and Beatitudes, that not only gives you a gorgeous space to count 1000 gifts over the course of a year, but is uniquely formatted in a way that allows you to reflect & look back every single day over the cumulative gifts from the previous days and months of your year, to grow your sense of trust and joy in God’s provisions — all while guiding you prayerfully through some of the most life-changing words of all of Scripture, the Sermon on the Mount.
This creative new journal, Gratitude and Beatitudes, resets and reboot your daily habit of gratitude in a completely new way — so you can intentionally count gifts in a fresh, transformative way & find meaning and joy in the seemingly ordinary, turning each moment into a celebration of His divine grace.
