Article February 6, 1960 Issue

The Healing Power of Gratitude

[The following Christian Science program of the above title was presented on Sunday, January 31, over the Columbia Broadcasting System "Church of the Air." The speaker was Charles Henry Gabriel.]

Friends, these three powerful words, "Thank You, God," sincerely spoken or silently realized, can open up a whole new world of good for you. To a human father, a loving son would pause frequently to give thanks for kindnesses done or gifts given. How much more does our heavenly Father deserve acknowledgment and gratitude for His unspeakable gifts? For we learn from the Scriptures that "every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning" (James 1:17). And what has God given you? Ask, instead, what has He not given you! God is the great giver of all good, all blessings. Your very life, your intelligence, your health, your unvarying supply of good—all these and more, infinitely more!

But there may be some of you who are troubled by lack or by ill-health and who may feel that you have prayed long without apparent results. The question may come to one in this state of mind, How can I be grateful to God when I have so little? or to another: My health has been poor and I cannot regain it. Is it possible for me to be grateful? Yes strangely enough, this is the very time when gratitude is most needed. For gratitude dissolves fear and discouragement and clears away the mist that would make us believe we are separated from God or deprived of His infinite love. Just as it is impossible for fog to remain when touched by the warmth of the sun, so it is impossible for discouragement or sorrow or sickness to remain where a truly grateful heart is recognizing and understanding the ever-presence of God's love.

Gratitude, then, is acknowledgment. It is spiritual vision that sees beyond the evidence of the material senses and enables us to recognize that God's goodness is constantly unfolding. Gratitude is in itself a prayer, a prayer of affirmation, a prayer that does not ask God to be God, but recognizes that God has always been divine Love, the infinite Giver.

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