Happy Thanksgiving! What a wonderful holiday—lots of delicious food eaten with people you love, celebrating the amazing story of the pilgrims and indians and the gift of our great nation, and doing it all with a deliberate and intentional focus on thankfulness. Not to mention, none of the pressure and craziness of shopping for gifts and desperately trying to create the perfect Pinterest Christmas! What’s not to love!
But seriously, gratitude should not, must not be just a once a year holiday we celebrate or a short-lived activity we engage in for a few weeks every November. As Cicero said many centuries ago, “Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.” And I really think nothing has a more transformative impact on our attitude, our witness, our contentment, and indeed our lives, than being thankful people. And as believers, that means first and foremost thankfulness to Almighty God both for who He is and what He’s done, as well as thankfulness to Him for His many blessings in our lives. And also consistently expressing thankfulness to the people He has so graciously put in our lives.
As believers we have the joyful, amazing privilege of daily going to the throne of the Lord of the universe and giving Him thanks and praise. G.K.Chesterton once wrote that “The worst moment for any atheist is when he is really thankful and has no one to thank.” And that’s the point behind singer Andrew Peterson’s wonderful song called, “Don’t you want to thank someone?” He sings about dark, long nights…and then the beauty of the morning sun burns thru the mist or when, after a hard, bleak winter, “spring arrives and warms you like a mother’s kiss”—“Don’t you want to thank someone? Don’t you want thank someone for this?”
I couldn’t help but think of Coach Jim Valvano after NC State won the national championship in basketball years ago. Immediately after the winning shot, Valvano starts running around with his arms outstretched. He’s overcome with joy and wonder and excitedly, almost desperately looking for someone to hug. Yes! That’s what overwhelming thankfulness will do for you—you want, you must find someone to thank and with whom to share it!
Try being grumpy and irritable when you’re thankful—you can’t do it! Gratitude displaces fretting and complaining like nothing else! One more G.K. Chesterton quote that’s always been one of my favorites. He declared, “I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled with wonder.” Read that again—“gratitude is happiness doubled with wonder.” (That’s Valvano!) Don’t you love that!
Over and over again, God’s Word commands us to be thankful! Read thru the Psalms—you’ll see it time and again, “Give thanks to the Lord,” “Enter His gates with thanksgiving,” “Surely the righteous shall give thanks to your name.” And Paul’s epistles, oh my, constant, overflowing thanksgiving! “I give thanks to my God for you,” “I do not cease to give thanks for you,” “We ought always to give thanks to God,” and on and on!
Here’s the thing—have you ever wondered what God’s will is for you in your life? Well, I can tell you what God’s Word makes crystal clear on that subject, and it’s in I Thess.5:16-18 “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” God’s will for you is to give thanks in all circumstances. How well are we doing that?
Jon Bloom writes that the repeated commands in Scripture to give thanks “are not the exhortations of a vain deity. They are the loving prescription of the Great Physician; they are the loving reminders of our caring Father. Just like a parent helps a child to cultivate thankfulness through frequent reminders, God intends his frequent reminders for us to give thanks to him to help us experience the profoundly healthy and deep joy of seeing grace and feeling grateful. And like all of God’s greatest blessings, He has made our thankfulness something that gives Him glory and gives us joy! He gets the glory of being the grace-Giver, and we get the joy of being grace-receivers and the gratitude-feelers.” That’s a win-win!
Giving thanks is a habit that must be cultivated like any other—the more you do it, the more habitual and second nature it becomes. And the more habitual, the more you will find your mindset and attitude being joyously transformed. Mary Mohler, in her wonderful book, Growing in Gratitude, reminds us when we make thankfulness an intentional mindset, it becomes like an overflowing fountain that continuously spills over and splashes joy and thankfulness to all around us. “If others happen jostle us,” she writes, “we spill gratitude.”
So how do we do it? We simply start choosing to obey God’s simple, health-giving command to “give thanks in all circumstances.” Maybe you all already keep a gratitude journal, but if not, (or of like yours truly, you’ve let that habit slip away!) how about if we commit (or recommit) to doing that starting today? Here’s one suggestion: get a notebook and every evening before going to bed, write down 3 things for which you’re thankful. Make the first item on your list everyday something about Almighty God, His character, or His works for which you’re particularly thankful. And then write at least 2 things for which you’re grateful that day—whether it’s a lovely sunrise or your child coming home from college or the hug of a friend. And then here’s the kicker—let’s try to keep this up past Thanksgiving and all the way into the new year and beyond!
God has been so extravagantly good to us—even in the hardest, darkest times of our lives—for He is always with us, behind us, before us, beside us, in us, and for us. Let’s start counting His blessings, His gifts—big and small—and in the process, not only will He be glorified, but we’ll be strengthened and encouraged as we remember and recite His relentless goodness.
To God be the glory.
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