Grateful for God

For what are you thankful? We’ll likely hear and consider this question multiple times over the next week, and it will spark many answers from within:

• Health
• Family
• Friends
• Home
• Food
• Work/Career
• Money/Wealth
• Freedom/Safety
• Education
• Nature
• Memories
• Possessions

And then these answers spark another question. Do we give these answers because we know in our mind, logically, that we should be thankful for these things, much like a child at school gives the correct answers on a pop quiz?

Or do we give these answers because we deeply believe and feel within our heart that we not only must be thankful for these things, but we truly are thankful for them? In other words, do we actually say we are thankful for these things because we immediately, spontaneously, deeply, personally, passionately feel immense gratitude and praise for them. Are we like the 1 out of 10 lepers who returned to Christ?

And as they went, they were cleansed. One of them, when he saw that he was healed, returned with a loud voice glorifying God, and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan. Jesus said, "Were not the ten cleansed? Where are the nine? Were there not any found to return and give glory to God except this foreigner?" (Luke 17:14-18)

This kind of genuine, deeply-felt gratitude – rather than the technical, intellectual kind – only comes from a person who honestly and humbly recognizes that they are entitled to nothing, deserve nothing, and indeed deserve nothing more or less than God’s judgment. To them, all that God does for them is undeserved grace, and for this reason they are deeply humbled and grateful for all of God’s many blessings towards them. To this person, gratitude is real, not academic.

But this sort of genuine gratitude for God’s blessings raises yet one more fascinating question, which is this – why are we so fascinated with giving thanks for all of God’s blessings when we should, in fact, be most thankful of all for God himself?

“God’s giving deserves our thanksgiving,” one person has said. Another has said, “Thanksgiving is the vibration of the soul’s heartstrings under the soft touch of God’s benevolence.” But why do we focus so much on the “giving” of God and the “benevolence” of God? Should we not be most fascinated with and grateful for God himself?

As we walk through another season of thanksgiving, let’s be sure that we are genuinely humbled and grateful for God’s many undeserved blessings towards us. Let our awareness of his benefits and blessings outshine our fixation on our challenges and difficulties (which are themselves, perhaps, blessings in disguise).

But most of all, let us be increasingly and more intentionally focused upon and grateful for the giver of all blessings, God himself. Let us meditate upon his attributes, his actions throughout history, his faithfulness to us today, and his promises for the future.

The climax and punchline of these lyrics from Matt Papa’s excellent song, “O Give Thanks,” elevates this point very well:

O give thanks to the Father
Spring of life, Lord of love
The bountiful, fount of all provision!
Come rejoice in His goodness
Count each blessing that comes
From heav'n to earth, now from earth to heaven

O give thanks unto Jesus
Sing of His saving love
The Bread of Life, broken for redemption
How He carried the cross to
Make us daughters and sons
Exalted now, the King of our salvation

O give thanks to the Spirit
Fire of joy, bond of love
O Breath of God, help our hearts remember
Purge our pride with Your kindness
Plant this song deep in us
For all the gifts, greater is the Giver!

So, as we walk through this Thanksgiving week, may we cultivate within our hearts a gratitude that transcends our thankfulness for all of God’s blessings, a gratitude that’s rooted in and resulting from a deeper, greater fascination with God himself. Let us be thankful, most of all, for him.