Psalm 100

The Marshall family is a little… unconventional, to say the least. And when it comes to holiday traditions, we’re even more out of the ordinary. Take Thanksgiving, for example. While most people dig into the traditional feast of turkey, mashed potatoes, and green beans, we skip the usual spread and go straight for Mexican food. Why? Simply because we prefer it. Plus, we usually have the traditional Thanksgiving fare at Christmas anyway. This got me thinking about traditions in general—and especially those we hold onto in the church. Often, we do things simply because "that’s the way it’s always been"—without ever really questioning whether it’s how God actually wants it to be. When we look closely at scripture, we find that it doesn’t just affirm our assumptions about how things are "supposed" to be. It challenges us to see how God wants them to be. As we head into the holiday season with Thanksgiving, we’ll reflect on a psalm of gratitude. This psalm not only invites us to give thanks, but it also challenges us to reconsider how we give thanks—and, even more importantly, why we give thanks.