It’s Thanksgiving again, 2024! It’s always here before we know it, and happening again, along with a long, warm fall and colder temperatures just in time for Thanksgiving week. We expect a usual crowd at our outdoor gathering but are never sure who or how many!

Looking back at the past year, we see the bounty of the gifts of time and material goods and how God has provided for us through our neighbors and friends near and far. Here’s a partial list of the abundance, knowing it is not possible to capture it all…

• A small construction crew came out for a week of nearly non-stop labor to put an addition onto one of our houses and make our 12X12 cabin ready for year-round living.
• Doctor friends have spent hours on the phone advising us. Therapists have offered their services for free or reduced fees. Lawyers have given their time to help us navigate the immigration system and occasionally say, “You know, I’m just going to take this case on myself!”
• Our neighbor, Nevin, lovingly and quietly does SO MUCH maintenance work when he comes out to volunteer. And Melora cheerfully graces our office each week to offer her bookkeeping skills.
• The Athens Area Diaper Bank has kept children of the families that we host in diapers all year—THANK YOU! 
• And CHILDREN—we have lots! They’re wonderful, they’re growing and learning. Diane came to help organize a summer VBS program for the kids, the Bruderhof led an outdoor festival and the Hawaii group led crafts galore.
• People far and wide have given clothes, furniture, car seats and toys and at just the right time.  
• The Athens Area Food Bank supplies us with countless pounds of food each year. Small local farms have shared their bounty. And then there is the occasional deer that a neighbor might bring by to fill our freezer. All this, together with our Jubilee grown produce, eggs and milk get our daily grocery costs down to under $1.00 a day per person.
• Off-property volunteers have formed Care Circles to offer countless hours of friendship and practical support to residents who moved on to other cities or states.
• Visiting friends and neighbors have brought us special music, sermons and personal stories to add to our times of worship.
• And, as they have for decades, the Trappist monks at the Monastery of the Holy Spirit have welcomed us twice this year for a 24-hour silent retreat, offering much needed refreshment.

We’ve received so, SO MANY gifts from all around us, locally and as far away as Hawaii and Korea. And with it comes encouragement and assurance that we are all God’s Beloved Children.