Here it was… year 3 of being in Japan for Thanksgiving while my husband was sailing the seas. The previous two years had NOT been what I had hoped for or wanted. Between the purple potatoes and the McDonalds cheeseburger I was struggling to find a way to be positive. I honestly didn’t realize just how bad my attitude was until my mom suggested she might come for the holiday that year.
We prepared that year with more handmade crafts/decorations. We made a “tree” of construction paper and taped it up on the wall. Then, we cut out what felt like a gazillion leaves. Each day we all wrote down something we were thankful for and added it to the tree. It was a great visual reminder to me of all we had been blessed with. It’s so much easier to be thankful when you focus on the blessings and the good things happening all around you instead of constantly comparing your situation to what you wish it would be.
Our Thanksgiving celebration that year was truly a celebration. We spent the week gathering shells at a local beach and going to a zoo that was built on the side of a mountain (which meant there were NO level paths). We were able to take my mom to one of our favorite yakiniku restaurants – the ones where you get to cook your own food right there at your table! The girls put on their “special occasion” dresses and we hit the town. We finished the night not with pumpkin pie, but Starbucks treats instead. Best of all, the week ended with the ship returning a few days early.
Our circumstances were roughly the same. We were still living overseas. My main communication with friends and family back home was still email due to the vast time difference. My husband still deployed twice each year and was still gone EVERY Thanksgiving. It felt like each time we got used to being a family of 4, it was time to once again begin preparing for the next deployment.
What had changed was my perspective… I could finally see the good all around me. I was able to travel home each summer (while Keith was deployed) to see my family. I had a good community of friends – and they had kids my kids could play with. I had found “my people” at the Lighthouse and went weekly for fellowship, a meal and Bible study. Our family learned to enjoy where we were and began to take advantage of learning a bit about a culture that was very different from our own. We had even requested to stay in Japan for our next set of orders… shore duty that meant Keith would be home for holidays.
I had finally learned what it meant to “give thanks in all circumstances”. It’s not so much that I am thankful for each crummy thing that happens, but instead that I can remember God’s faithfulness through past crummy experiences. When I finally took the time to look back at all our family had been through – and see God’s hand guiding us along the way – I was able to honestly rejoice always, pray continually, AND give thanks in all circumstances.