2 Corinthians 5

Give thanks for what is new: relationship, belonging, place, or experience. Be grateful and attentive to whatever comes to mind, that is new in your life right now.

            Appreciate its presence. Imagine its freshness. Savor its capacity to be put to use or to be discovered. What must you learn about this new and previously-unknown thing or person or place which you are noticing?

            New can imply young. Immature. Just getting started. Something just created or conceived. Or new can signify that it is unfamiliar to you, has just arrived in your life, regardless of its condition, purpose, or its age. With something new comes the possibility of discovery. Of surprise. Or wonder. Of rejuvenation.

            Give thanks for something new in your day or your life. — Rev Gail

“For there is hope for a tree,
    if it is cut down, that it will sprout again,
    and that its shoots will not cease.
Though its root grows old in the earth,
    and its stump dies in the ground,
yet at the scent of water it will bud
    and put forth branches like a young plant.
—    Job 14:7-9

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them. — Revelation 21: 1-3

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!  — 2 Corinthians 5:17

As each day comes to us refreshed and anew, so does my gratitude renew itself daily. The breaking of the sun over the horizon is my grateful heart dawning upon a blessed world. — Terri Guillemets

Jesus calls us to gratitude. He calls us to recognize that gladness and sadness are never separate, that joy and sorrow really belong together, and that mourning and dancing are part of the same movement. That is why Jesus calls us to be grateful for every moment that we have lived and to claim our unique journey as God’s way to mold our hearts to greater conformity with God’s own. The cross is the main symbol of our faith, and it invites us to find hope where we see pain and to reaffirm the resurrection where we see death. The call to be grateful is a call to trust that every moment of our life can be claimed as the way of the cross that leads us to new life. – Henri Nouwen