Gift Tags

Need a gift for the holidays? Cathy’s devotional book The Stained Glass Pickup is a thoughtful gift that will continue to encourage throughout the year. Read reviews at Amazon and Christianbook.com

Purchase autographed copies here . Or contact writecat@consolidated.net for prices on two or more autographed copies.

Visit Leafwood Publishers / ACU Press for other gift book ideas.

Leigh McLeroy, author of The Beautiful Ache: Finding the God Who Satisfies When Life Does Not, wrote about the tags that God leaves on his gifts to us. Ms. McLeroy and the Thanksgiving holiday led me to think about 2007 blessings.

Heard any Canadian geese flying south this fall? In their flight pattern, an inked signature from God wasn’t sky-written, but his one-of-a-kind mark was in their V-formation.

Last month, when presenting at a women’s renewal in a forested setting, I saw my first Johnny jump-up plant with delicate violet flowers and purple seed pods, and there in the wooded glen—God’s name tag.

Last year at this time, I mentioned the Thousand Gifts List by Ann Voskamp. She said, “I am daily jotting down items on my ‘Thousand Gifts List.’" The discipline of writing down gifts opened her eyes to things unseen before.

She is “working, one-by-one, up to a thousand gifts. Not of gifts I want. But of gifts I have.” Assisted by my “Thousand Gifts List,” I took a short journey back to January of 2007. A few of my favorites:

The smile that spread across three-year-old granddaughter Jolie’s face when she first picked up a harmonica and “played” it. My son married, bringing his wife, Pam, and her five-year-old daughter into our family. Natalie became an instant grandchild, who immediately called me “Grandma Cathy.”

Other gifts were the funny words of Adam, six-year-old grandson. One hour after last year’s Thanksgiving feast that fed 21, he opened my refrigerator and asked, “Grandma, do you have ANYTHING to eat in here?” My conversations with Grandson Jack, nearly ten, deepened. We still talk trivia, but we also talk about social and political issues.

Other gifts came from our customers. We rarely have trouble collecting monies but have occasionally. As many businesses do, if illness or hard times caused delayed payments, we wrote off the debts.

Two customers who owed money contacted us this year and paid in full. One owed us money for three years, the other for 11 years! Their integrity refreshed my faith.

Among other blessings, my husband and I still have four living parents, each couple celebrating over 60 years of marriage. I especially treasure my husband, who still holds my hand.

Author Leigh McLeroy said God’s gifts with nametags are gratifying, but “it's the Giver who really makes my heart sing. Any gift divorced from its giver is a lifeless thing.”

Preparations for guests, pie baking and turkey stuffing might crowd next week, but carve out a bit of one-to-one quiet time and give thanks to the Giver.

What is the number one thing on your "thanksgiving" list?