Thirty-five years ago I was writing a lot of music, most of it not worth the manuscript paper I wrote it on. Every once in a while, however, I wrote a song that had some meaning. A Heart of Thanksgiving is one of those.

As I sat down to write this post, I had an epiphany not caused by indigestion. A Heart of Thanksgiving has only been performed one time, to my knowledge, and that was with a church choir I directed. But before I wrote it, the music didn’t exist. This song, however lowly it may be, unknown and unheard, is in the universe of music because I put it there. Wow!

The same is true with the books I’ve written only one or two people have read. They didn’t exist until I put my thoughts on paper. There was no scandal in Maple Valley until I stirred it up. In fact, Maple Valley didn’t exist until I built it. No one ever heard of Sheriff Pete Terkinberry until I birthed him into the blogosphere.

Creating is an incredible responsibility. I am taking space in the world of words and saying, “Hey! I want a spot for this!” and I have the nerve to write it, print it, and post it.

I’m going to admit something that plagues me. I am addicted to views, likes, and comments. I hate to let that out, but it’s true. When a post goes public I can’t wait to look at my stats page. Ugh. This is dreadful.

I faced this with writing music, and I finally quit. The reason? No responses. No one was paying attention. In the last thirty-five years, I’ve written about four songs. The fact, however, is that every one of the songs I wrote did not exist in the history of the world, until I wrote them. If no one ever heard them but me, I heard the music in my head and I wrote it down. That’s remarkable.

Writing blog posts is no different. The internet says there are over 600 million blogs. My word! What nerve I have to add to that number!

Why clog bookstores with more fodder? Why add to the congested interweb? Why let blog stats scratch at my brain? Because if I don’t write, my stories, songs, and blogs will never live. Living doesn’t depend on what others think. It’s just doing. Living.

That’s writing.

So, here it is, A Heart of Thanksgiving.

With a heart of thanksgiving, we come to the living,
Merciful, wonderful God.
Before you our singing, is hopefully bringing,
The fragrance of wonder and praise.

A sacrifice of praise,
Our hands we freely raise.
We long to be near you Savior so dear,
And stay with you throughout our days.

With a heart of thanksgiving, we come to the living,
Merciful, wonderful God.
Before you our singing, is hopefully bringing,
The fragrance of wonder and praise.

A sacrifice we bring,
Our hearts begin to sing.
To you our dear Lord, in Heaven adored,
To your holy presence we cling.

With a heart of thanksgiving, we come to the living,
Merciful, wonderful God.
Before you our singing, is hopefully bringing,
The fragrance of wonder and praise.

Praise you Lord
Praise you Lord

With a heart of thanksgiving, we come to the living,
Merciful, wonderful God.
Before you our singing, is hopefully bringing,
The fragrance of wonder and praise.

All those years ago, I wrote everything by hand, as I guess most people did. Now, I have essential tremors so bad it’s hard for me to even hold a pencil. I taught myself to write with my opposite hand, but now that one doesn’t work either.

Luckily, I can still find the keyboard and type. I can still play the piano, but I don’t play in public any more, except on very rare occasions.

If you celebrate Thanksgiving where you live, I hope it was wonderful.

Whatever your beliefs or traditions may be, I hope this time of year is delightful to you and yours.