Thanks America!

Back from Guatemala, one "processes" or reflects, a secondary experience that gives meaning to the primary one. The strangeness of other ways of living that reveal at the same time the sameness of all peoples in basic needs and nature, comes home to me. And coming home is such a joy, because for a moment I don't take for granted all of the blessings I usually forget to be thankful for: electricity, pure water, working toilets, paved roads, clean clothes, access to healthcare. . .

And so one reflection on life in a third world country is of the blessings of our life in the United States. And of how to keep those blessings actively in mind. I am reminded of a statement of George Grant, "Two Theological Languages," quoted in Vol. 2 of Collected Works, p. 60 (and on the frontspiece of Ordering Love, David L. Schindler:

To put the matter in language not easy for moderns, . . . Christianity [is at its center] concerned with grace. Grace simply means that the great things of our existing are given us, not made by us and finally not to be understood as arbitrary accidents. Our making takes place within an ultimate givenness. However difficult it is for all of us to affirm that life is a gift, it is an assertion primal to Christianity. Through the vicissitudes of life -- the tragedies, the outrages, the passions, the disciplines and madnesses of everyday existence -- to be a Christian is the attempt to learn the substance of that assertion."

Coming back to the U.S. helps me appreciate the gifts of living in this country. And being in Guatemala, our Central American neighbor, helps me appreciate the gifts in living that the people there enjoy: family, community, faith and meaning, and the ability to struggle for life's betterment. These are gifts that we have in common as human beings, and gifts we can share and give each other, as friends.

Thank you, America, North and Central, for being here for me! And, thank you Lord!

Listen to Ray Boltz, "Thank You, Lord"

Listen to Bob Marley, "Thank You, Lord"

Listen to Walter Hawkins, "Thank You Lord"