Teaching Children to Be Humbly Grateful
by Carolyn Sherrod The Thanksgiving and Christmas season is upon us and we are reminded of our need to teach our children the virtue of gratitude. A few years ago, at a Thanksgiving celebration, our church’s children’s choir sang a song about gratitude. Using a play on words, the title itself spoke a clear message, “Are You Humbly Grateful, or Grumbly Hateful?” The lyrics of the chorus asked: Are you humbly grateful, or grumbly hateful? What’s your attitude? Do you grumble and groan or let it be known you’re grateful for all God’s done for you? Which one are you? Which one are you? Let’s face it! We all have known both adults and children who fit into either of these categories. Perhaps you resonate with the question, “which one are you?” We all would want to be known as being humbly grateful, and that we are raising our children to be humbly grateful. But instead, another kind of pandemic is currently sweeping our culture - a lack of thankfulness, a sense of entitlement, and an unhe