Every now and then I find myself needing to know what day it is.
I can generally cope with the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday thing. I mastered the days of the week - to a greater or lesser extent - some time ago. But I yearn to discover what animal, vegetable or other obscure aspect of life on earth is being celebrated somewhere in the world. And my search engine of choice rarely leaves me wanting!
My favourite days include: National Pig Day in March (to celebrate all things trottered); National Ice-Cream Day in July (make mine pistachio please), National Carrot Day (though sadly there seems to be some controversy over the exact timing of this exciting opportunity to focus on the fact that the average person consumes in the region of 10,866 carrots in their lifetime) and National Hug Day (which conveniently coincides with my birthday). You may like to know that tomorrow is Cherry Popsicle day. I hope you'll plan to celebrate in style!
But while there is some merit in setting aside a special day to focus with thankfulness on one aspect of God's world - and a certain amusement factor about openly rejoicing in the obscure and the mundane - it occurs to me there are some things for which one day of celebration is simply not enough:
God's unfailing love, Jesus' sacrifice, the hope of eternal life might be the types of things that spring to mind. And indeed they are reasons to be profoundly thankful and joyful every day. But I was struck, when going through 1 Thessalonians at church not so long ago, by the fact that Paul was "always" thankful for something else as well... Paul, Silas and Timothy said that they "always thank God for all of you" - for the rag-tag, sinful, doctrine-muddled, frequently-tempted bunch of Christians in the church in Thessalonica.
They were thankful for the church members':
Despite their many, obvious imperfections.
So maybe today - and indeed every other day - ought to be national church-member day. Where we offer up our thanks to God for our brothers and sisters in Christ. They wont be perfect. They may, at times, drive us nuts. But they are our family, our encouragement and a bunch of people who are a privilege to serve and grow alongside. So go on ... why not take a moment now and thank God for the members of your congregation? It's the right day to do it!
