Thanksgiving is today, so it is an appropriate time to look back and reflect on all the things we should be thankful for.

I was reminded of these things watching, then editing a recent webinar from Dr. Anthony Esolen, entitled To Read a Painting, to Enter Another World. While watching, I was reminded of how blessed I was to have gotten an education like this growing up. Dr. Esolen’s walked the audience through four paintings in carefully interpreted explanations of iconography, techniques, the painters used to achieve, vibrant, scintillating colors, and the ways that we could identify an artwork. It was created just by the artist’s use of colors. Dr. Esolen gave a wonderful webinar, and it reminded me of art classes I got to attend while I was in high school and college.

Such an education is a journey filled with many twists and turns and unexpected parties (to use Tolkien’s words). Like Tintoretto’s “Annunciation,” the wider world may be full of debris—broken pieces of wood and ruined stones—but occasionally moments of great beauty burst in.
Likewise with the first Thanksgiving. The Pilgrims were sojourning in a cold, rocky unforgiving wilderness and yet, there were those moments when profound clarity burst through like the angel Gabriel visiting Mary. Like how the Pilgrims found fields already sowed and planted, thus giving them food supplies when they would otherwise run out. A Native American named Squanto who spoke English and could teach them how to survive the bitter New England winter. Or the foresight to compile a founding charter, the Mayflower Compact, which would serve as the first governing document in the United States.

As I examine my own life, I see those moments of beauty and clarity when God burst through and directed my attention to the better things, the sublime things, that inspire the soul and bring joy to life.

I hope that on Thanksgiving, such moments may happen to you as you gather with family and friends and celebrate the things that really matter.