Since 2020, pandemic fears have caused the destruction of many small businesses, greatly increased death globally from mandated experimental medical treatments, the sharpest political divisions in the country since the Civil War more than 160 years ago, rioting and looting in numerous major cities, social isolation from loved ones, and the increasing threat of nuclear warfare.

These things have caused the rise in delayed medical diagnoses that have resulted in severe injury and death, increased depression, and suicide. Being thankful in the face of these things can seem to be an impossible task. It would be far easier to fall into despair and hopelessness, as many have.

In 605 BC, King Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem and captured it. Among the captives he took with him back to Babylon was Daniel, part of the nobility of the Kingdom of Judah. Daniel was a young man when he was taken captive to Babylon. It is not hard to imagine the anguish he must have felt when he saw his home surrounded by foreign invaders, and eventually destroyed by them. Think of the mass violence and death he witnessed, and the separation from family and his homeland to what may have seemed to him an uncertain fate. He probably felt the abject hopeless feeling that God had abandoned him and his people.

Yet even in this situation, Daniel's life was characterized by faithfulness to God. This included being thankful to God in even the most dire of circumstances, which helped him to endure adversity and persevere (Daniel 2:23, 6:10).