Thanks to the Giver

Mayflower Landing by. Antonio Gisbert

Overlooked and Undervalued

It’s Thanksgiving week in America and by this point, half of us have mentally moved on to Christmas. It’s easy to do, Christmas has more festive colors, flashier decorations, better music, and a much jollier mascot. If the holidays had a better PR team from the beginning, we would’ve realized that the chubby smiling guy with presents was much more suited to inspire thankfulness than the dry tasting bird with a baggy neck. I dislike the favor shown to Christmas and in this post, I want to do my small part to put the brakes on the out-of-control Christmas train. I hope that by the end of this brief excursion you will agree with me that we prematurely skip over the giving of thanks to get to the receiving of gifts.

The Christian Holiday

           Though Christmas gets all the attention in the culture as being the Christian holiday, I believe Thanksgiving is every bit as much a religious holiday. It doesn’t have Christ in the name, but without Him, it couldn’t exist. Admittedly, Thanksgiving is celebrated by almost everyone in our culture, including non-Christians. Countless unbelievers gather with their family and are no doubt thankful for many things, including their loved ones. Yet, lurking below the surface, like a dog waiting on a kid to drop some turkey, is the question: “Giving thanks to who?” This superficial similarity is made all the more convincing because Non-Christians will do much the same things as Christians during the holiday. Parents from both groups will do things like ask their kids what they are thankful for and gather around as Dad tells the story of the Pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving. I’m sure there will be many videos online where kids answer questions of this sort in extremely cute and funny ways. Often, we will see the children of Christian parents and kids that never hear Jesus’ name give very similar answers to these types of questions. But I wonder what those children would say if asked who they are giving thanks to. It’s funny, and sad, that we can so easily overlook assumptions that are built into a name. Thanksgiving assumes that we are giving thanks to someone. The originators of this holiday certainly understood this. 

Generations of American schoolchildren have been taught about the Pilgrims and their struggles to survive in the newly settled wilderness of America. What most aren’t taught anymore is the intense and passionate religious devotion of these Pilgrims. They left England specifically because they knew it was so important to worship and give thanks to God rightly. Thanksgiving in Pilgrim and Puritan society left no doubt who they were thanking. A firm reliance and trust in the sovereignty of God enabled them to give thanks to their Creator, even when the cold, unwelcoming, and unknown wilderness surrounded them. Let us commit to telling the whole story this year. A story that tells of the generous aid the American natives gave to the strange Pilgrims, the resulting feast and celebration that forged a friendship. But let us also remember the part where they gave thanks to the God that sustained them by sending those natives to sustain His people. Let us also tell of the humble trust those Pilgrims placed in their Lord, so that even if they did go without those same heartfelt prayers of thanks would still be given to the One that gave them everything.

Idol Slayer

           Idols get a lot of focus in modern Christian lingo. We hear about the idol of self, the idol of money, the idol of fame, and many others. And rightly so. All of those are wicked sins that dishonor the Lord and shame those bearing His name. Through this post, I want to try and put another tool in your idol destroying toolkit. It’s one that might not seem very useful at first. Kind of like when a young couple buys their first home and the young homeowner receives a set of tools from his wise and experienced old man. It will seem like a strange gift, but his dad knows that in the very near future it’ll come in handy. As any husband knows, that pretty young bride will very soon start finding countless uses for it. This metaphorical tool is the Christian practice of thanksgiving. 

Among the idols that are present in our culture, selfishness, pride, vanity and greed are all near the top of the list. I’m sure we as a society aren’t as unique as we think we are and surely these sins have been widespread in past ages. Nevertheless, I think it’s fair to say that our society has taken an additional step down this road of wickedness. Now we not only tolerating these vices, we actively promote them. Christians often want a way to fight back against the never-ending onslaught of secular culture. It often seems to be unstoppable as it infiltrates our churches and homes. We want something to pick up and swing that will knock that dead and decaying zombie that is American society back a few steps. With this mindset, as you look around for something heavy and big to swing, you may be disappointed to be handed the practice of thanksgiving. It doesn’t seem like it on the surface, but the Christian practice of giving thanks to God is as powerful an idol slayer as there is. 

Thanking Him first and foremost for who He is, but also for all He has done and given to us will crush the self-focus and greed that consumes the unbelieving world. In 1 Timothy 4:4-5 Paul says “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.” Here we see the reality of living as followers of Christ in a corrupted world. Things of this world are not bad in and of themselves, we make them bad when we divorce them from the Maker. If we value the gift but neglect the giver we have turned a blessing into an idol. The practice of thanksgiving is a powerful idol slayer because it reorients us away from valuing the gift for its own sake, and back onto the great Giver Himself. When we continually draw our attention to the Lord that gave us all the blessings of this life it becomes exceedingly difficult to think we deserve more or that we are better than those with less. By giving thanks we are forced to humbly realize that we are no more deserving than others, just more blessed by the Giver.

Never Ending Thankfulness

           Christians are not only called to be generous and kind people, but we are also told to be thankful people. It is a bit odd to modern ears to hear that thankfulness can be a requirement, but the Lord expects His people to acknowledge the generosity that has been shown to them. In Philippians 4:6 Paul instructs his readers to do what might seem strange at first glance. He tells them “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be known to God.” It doesn’t seem odd to us that Paul anticipates some anxiety being present, and therefore as a corrective to this he instructs them to ask God for what they need. The seemingly strange part is that he tells them to pray and make requests “with thanksgiving”. We generally don’t ask for things with thanksgiving. Normally the giving of thanks is reserved until we know whether or not our request will be granted. But Paul tells us to give thanks in our asking. Even the petitioning of God should be filled with thanks. One thing I think this reveals is that our thanks to God should not depend on His answer. Even if every prayerful petition we send up receives a “no”, we should never run short of thankfulness. If He never gives us another thing, He has already given us more than we deserve. A million times more. As His beloved Son hung on that tree and bore the wrath that should have been directed at you and me, God was then earning a never-ending stream of thanksgiving from all those that would ever come to trust in the work of that sinless One.

Christians, never let our thankfulness be tied to any condition in our life. Let our bank account be empty, our loved ones sick, our days long, and our bodies ache. But never let us stop that heartfelt, humble, and passionate thankfulness for our Savior who has given us everything and deserves more than we can ever give.