Community Project #2 | 5,000 Gifts

The story of humanity is a story of God who has created good things. The scriptures are about a God that can’t be confined to spaces; a creator God that comes down to us; a giving God that is deeply Good. Anything, anywhere that is true or beautiful is from this amazing God. Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father. It doesn’t matter where in the world we find this beauty, it’s a gift from God. Our ordinary, mundane lives are completely saturated with God’s good gifts.

I deeply believe that one of our biggest callings and challenges in life is to discover, uncover, or re-discover the God-given gifts in our mundane lives – which, in turn, creates a richness that is anything but mundane!

Be joyful always… give thanks in all circumstances,
for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

A thorough celebration of God in our ordinary lives will produce an experience that can’t be found in the greatest of church services.

What if we stopped often in our day to think about and celebrate every single gift from God that our minds can come up with? A certain smell? A special song? The doorknob on your front door – have you ever thanked God for that? What if we lived our whole life as worshippers? Because worship is exactly what I’m talking about. Every time we pause to notice what God has done for us, that’s worship – that’s praise – that’s thanksgiving.

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

So, the questions start steam-rolling, “Am I living a life that is aware of the Gifts of God all around me? Are there hundreds or thousands of gifts that I’ve never even thought of? And if so, what would change in my life if I stopped often to celebrate God and His gifts too me?

I’d like to invite you to join a MASSIVE, GLOBAL THANK-YOU LIST TO GOD. You can find it at www.5000gifts.blogspot.com. It’s an experiment in gratitude.

Here’s the scoup: We want to collect 5,000 Thank-You’s in time for Thanksgiving Day.

• Go to the website to view the 500+ (at the time of this writing) Thank-you's and to submit your own gift list. It’s painless, it’s free, it’s good for the soul... and you can do it often.
  
• OR – just type a comment into this blog and I will post it on the site for you. If you use this option, it may make this page extra fun to come back too.
• My church is planning a huge celebration using the 5,000 (or more) gifts on November 18 (everyone is invited!). I’m inviting you to participate. I’m inviting your church to participate.
• I secretly hope that 5,000 gifts is too little. I’m hoping to laugh at myself for ever thinking so small.
• Would you tell everyone about this? Your friends, enemies, family, etc. Here is some code to place a banner on your blog, myspace, virb, or website. The banner is identical to the one above
  

Lastly, I’ve posted a video below. Background: If we have any sort of contact, you probably know that I’m rarely without my camera. One reason that I enjoy taking photos is so that I can capture moments, people, things that I’m grateful for. The video is simply a slide show of few things that I’m grateful for. Enjoy.