An Answered Prayer

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving celebration in Mansfield with my family this year. The whole fam was there and everyone was on their best behavior for Noah Robert's maiden holiday experience. As part of our Thanksgiving tradition my Father either offers a prayer or asks someone to offer blessings prior to the feast. This year he asked me, and of course I was more than happy to pray, even though I have a perfectly good niece who is a student at Austin seminary. I prayed and Noah, already a severe theological critic, gave his own personal blessing.

Since it was a kind of spur of the moment I pulled out my standard kind of prayer. I prayed the basic bless this, bless that, thank this, thank that, nourishment of our body kind of thing, a pretty standard meal prayer. But, like a lot of moments, given more time to reflect and having a certain amount of piety and sanctimony in my soul I would like to offer this revised prayer:

God -- Thank you for all of our blessings. Thank you for the older lives extended and for the miracle of the new life that is Noah Robert Kinard. You have blessed us with the great fortune and wisdom of parents who are still with us and strong and parents who can't be with us but have made our lives better. You have let us see new life and with it the miracle that is humanity. Through Noah, you have given all of us the chance to see how our life will move on, through him, without us, and we thank you.

Thank you for the brightness I see in my wife's eyes. When I told you I could handle all of the work, the worry and the issues with the disabilities from the stroke; but I needed help with the constant medical issues, you apparently were listening. I feel such relief that Marty has been infection free and feeling strong for so many consecutive weeks. I can't remember a time in my life where you answered my prayers like this. What a blessing. Thank you for continuing to bring her happiness and continued healing. There is nothing in this world that makes life better than to hear Marty engage and laugh. What a blessing that we have had these extra years.

Thank you for my children and their love, support and affection. I know it may be wrong, but we are so proud of all of them. We are blessed by their presence and blessed by their choices of partners. We have truly gone from having two children to four and we feel your grace and love in bringing all of them to our lives. Children are not always such a blessing, ours are.

Thank you for seeing us through another year of great turmoil. I see our blessings, I understand how truly lucky we are. You have blessed us with a loving family, caring friends, and wonderful people helping Marty and me each and every day.

Help us as we go on these next days, weeks and months to love each other. Help us to understand that what is important to us, may not be important to you, and that our life should be one of living in a way that honors not our self, our small ideas, or our prejudices, but living in a way that honors your true ideals and wishes for us. My words always feel so inadequate, so the best I can do is say and feel -- Thank you.

Amen and Amen