The Importance Of - And Danger Of - Trying To Be More Thankful

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Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (1 Thessalonians 5:18) 

I was reading a blog post this morning about the importance of giving thanks. One scripture after another, like the one above, commanding us to give thanks. But it also made me think - indirectly - about the danger of trying to be more thankful. 

Let me explain.

First, The Importance Of Giving Thanks 

We are told to give thanks for a few reasons, three of which I’ll mention here:

  • Thanksgiving fights against idolatry. Thankfulness -- when it is expressed directly to God or to other people while recognizing God as the ultimate giver behind those people - gives God the glory and the praise that He deserves. And since we are wired to worship something by design, thanksgiving fights to keep God as the object of that worship, the object of our affections. As the Psalmist put it, we “magnify him with thanksgiving” (Psalm 69:30). Thanksgiving makes him bigger in our hearts! 
  • Thankfulness fights against entitlement. Our entitled little hearts are always looking around, like metal detectors, to find something we don’t have that we think we should have, while simultaneously taking for granted that which we DO have.  Paul said this in Ephesianas 3: "Sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving (Ephesians 5:3–4). Thanksgiving, he says, is the opposite of lustful & covetousness hearts & mouths. 
  • Thanksgiving fuels our faith. When we take the time to recount and remember what God has done for us in the past -- the blessings he’s given us personally and, more importantly, the price He paid for us in his life, death and resurrection - then we are reminded that God is a faithful promise-keeper who will keep his future promises as well. And there are many future promises that He has for us, like the promise to complete the sanctifying work in us that He started when we first trusted in Him; or the promise to return and bring heaven down to Earth; or the promise of his very resurrection life flowing out of our mortal bodies. This is why, I believe, Paul said to combine our petitions with thanksgiving (Philippians 4:6). It helps to replace anxiety with faith. 

And it’s important to note - we are not to wait until we feel thankful to give thanks. No, when we choose to give thanks, we are reorienting our minds first to focus on what is true, what is noble, what is right, what is pure, what is lovely, what is admirable (Philippianas 4:8) -- and by doing that, by God’s grace, the feelings of our heart will follow. 

But waiting for our emotions to lead our minds is like waiting for a toddler to get a taste for vegetables before trying to give her green beans. We give her vegetables early and hope she will develop a taste for them eventually. 

 

So make it a goal - not just for tomorrow but for every day after - to take time in prayer to give thanks to God for what He has done - both in human history and also in your own personal life over the last few years, months, days or hours. 

 

Now The Danger of Trying to Be More Thankful

While being more thankful is a noble pursuit, how we go about it is tricky for a few reasons.

First of all, we humans stink at this thankfulness stuff. Sure, some of us are far more thankful than others, and those folks are much easier to be around, but I think by God’s standards, we all stink at this. We take far too much for granted, we whine far too much, we feel sorry for ourselves far too much, and we fret far too much. 

As a result, we can read the above section and then set out to give thanks more, but it's only a matter of time before we notice our minds wandering from “thank you, God, for the surprise bonus I got yesterday” to “I just don’t understand why my neighbor has to work on his truck so late at night -- we need to move!”

And because our hearts are not only entitled but also prone to religiosity, we can then feel like we are failing in our “Christian performance.” Deciding to be more thankful forces us, in other words, to come face to face with our own entitlement far more than we’d like to -- and that can give way to guilt and shame. 

I bet some of us reading this may have thought, “I wonder if people consider me a thankful person or if I’m one of those grumpy sour puss Eeor types, always having something negative to say….I wonder if that's why so-and-so hasn’t called to hang out lately. I wonder if that’s why I’m still single….Oh man, poor me!”

So let me suggest you take your heart for a detour when those feelings of guilt and shame settle in due to a lack of thankfulness. 

When you are made aware of how ungrateful you can be, how entitled you can be, how easily-anxious and easily-depressed you can be -- instead of trying harder or giving up, go to the cross of Jesus. 

You see, it is because of our entitled and idolatrous and wandering and doubting and forgetful and religious & guilt-ridden hearts that He died. He died for all our sin, including our sinful tendency to not be thankful for His sacrifice! 

So here’s a little thanksgiving hack, of sorts: when you can’t seem to wake your heart up out of its funk no matter how many thank-you lists you write in your journal or how many habits you implement around the dinner table - just confess it to Jesus and thank Him for paying for such brokenness.  Thank Him for loving you and dying for you even in the midst of your ungratefulness.  

SUMMARY 

This Thanksgiving, you have much to be thankful for. Obey God’s commands to give thanks. Take time out to praise Him. Make a list of all his many blessings. 

But if your emotions still don’t follow - if you just can’t stop your mind from wandering back to all the pain and unresolved trials you are facing -- then confess your weakness and praise Him for loving you, anyway. 

Put simply: Be thankful that God loves you even when you’re an ungrateful entitled brat.

Because He does. 

So so much.

And when that sinks in even more, thankfulness will replace the shame.  

14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom every family[a] in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being,17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ… (Ephesians 3:14-18).

 

Happy Thanksgiving, True Life!  



2 Comments

The Lord's prayer. Jesus says pray then in this way. You hear so many saying that we're not to recite this prayer, that it is a model of how we should pray. Ok. Wow. Do we fall way short in praying to our God. Way short. Father in heaven have mercy on us. The model pray then starts our all about God.

Our Father who is in heaven. We are to relate to Him as our father. In heaven. Jesus makes that clear; in heaven, to completely seperate our earthly Father, who at times fails us, who we have negative views about, to our Father in Heaven. Set apart! He then says hallowed be Your Name. Why "name". In short, the Jews referred to God as "the Name" . To holy to mention his name. Your "Name" implies all the names of God. Wow. Your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Again wow. There is so much there to be said. Given the space, we can see by this "model" of pray, that is set forth by Jesus, The son of man, The Son of God, when we pray, when we give thanks, when we have concerns, illness, no matter what, we should always before anything else, give honor to his Name, his Name is holy, so holy, that I have no clue how holy it truly is. Pray for for his kingdom to come, to come upon sinful earth, the way it is in His kingdom, pure, focused, intentional, all about Him. And only Him. So it seems the model of prayer Jesus gave us, we neglect. Maybe we don't even comprehend what He truly meant. I think that if we use Jesus' model of prayer as our standard, I think, rather I believe we would see a drastic change amongst God's church, that we would enjoy the favor of all the people. Meaning unbelievers. May the God of our Lord and Savior protect each one of His children, may He give us boldness to pray as Jesus taught, so that we can bring honor and glory to His Name. To Him. And only Him. Peace.
I THANK GOD for All HE has done for me and putting TrueLife in my life.

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