Category: Book Excerpts (short)

Excerpted from my new book, Communicating with Grace and Virtue (Amazon):

We have many reasons to be grateful. Instead of allowing ourselves to become critical persons, we should think about whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy (Phil. 4:8). By dwelling more on life’s goodness, we fill our hearts with gratitude and nurture servant communication.

Rabbi Abraham Heschel says, “There is a built-in sense of indebtedness in the consciousness of man, an awareness of owing gratitude, of being called upon at certain moments to reciprocate, to answer, to live in a way which is compatible with the grandeur and mystery of living.” He says that the “truth of being human is gratitude; its secret is appreciation.”

One reason to be grateful is the gift of our communication capacity. Even though we have to learn how to communicate, the capacity is an astonishing gift from God. We do not create that capacity; we accept and develop it.

A second reason for being grateful communicators is that we can communicate about our communication—metacommunication. Other creatures cannot. As Kenneth Burke puts it, dogs do not bark about barking.3 God enables us to understand and improve our communication. We are not limited to stimulus-effect signaling; we are not governed by animalistic habits. We can learn and grow as thankful communicators, talking about and improving our communication. This book is a journey into biblical metacommunication.

A third reason for filling our hearts with gratitude is because we have the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is our advocate, sent from the Father in Jesus’s name (John 14:16). The Spirit helps us in our weakness and intercedes for us according to God’s will (Rom. 8:26–27).