Tag Archives: Thanks

Posted on

Thanks!

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the LORD say this! (Psalm 107:1-2)      

_______________________________

I like the way The Message version of the Bible renders the psalmist’s call to gratitude: “Oh, thank God—he’s so good! His love never runs out. All of you set free by God, tell the world!”

God is good—all the time!  That truly is the testimony of my life—and I have a feeling it is true of your life as well.  Certainly, I ought to be proclaiming God’s goodness to anyone who will listen—and even to those who won’t—much more than I do.  Add to that the fact that I am, on my best day, not so good, and on my worst day, frankly, pretty bad, only adds to the brilliance of God’s overwhelming goodness.

The New King James translation of the psalmist’s words are even more meaningful to me: “Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever.” Mercy—I can really relate to that.  Now don’t misunderstand what I’m saying:  I’ll take either enduring love or enduring mercy—I can’t live without either one.  Love and mercy are simply different facets of the same diamond we understand as the goodness of God.

But God’s mercy really speaks to me, and I’ll bet if you thought about, it, you would say the same.  Someone said that mercy is not getting what you deserve.  The truth is, you and I depend upon God’s mercy every single moment just to draw in the next breath, since the holy and righteous God has had every reason and right to annihilate us from the planet because of our sinfulness.  Jeremiah said it well in Lamentations 3:22-23,

Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

The entirety of Psalm 107 is simply giving one example after another of how God in his faithful love and enduring mercy has freed his people from what they deserve.  And at the end of each example, the psalmist expresses the call to gratitude:

Oh, thank God, he is so good!  He love never runs out!

I’ll bet you could write your own Psalm 107.  In fact, that might be a good assignment for you on this Thanksgiving Day.  And then, like the psalmist suggested, we should go tell the world.  Now that’s a pretty tall order, so how about starting with the people with whom you will enjoy the holiday meal today?  Write your psalm and share it with your spouse, your family, and your friends.

I am not sure how they will feel about it, but you will certainly feel pretty good.  That’s what heartfelt gratitude to God for his faithful love and enduring mercy does.

________________________

“We ought to give thanks for all fortune: if it is good, because it is good; if bad, because it works in us patience, humility, contempt of this world and the hope of our eternal country.” (C.S. Lewis)

Posted on

Thanks A Lot!

5×5×5 Bible Plan

Read: Luke 17
Meditation: Luke 17:15-17

And one of [the ten], when he saw that he was healed, returned, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan.”

Shift Your Focus… Every generation of parents ask a question of their children.  It’s more of a prompting than a question.  After receiving a gift or a favor, parents ask, “What do you say?”  Of course, the expected response is, “thank you.”

My parents would ask me, “What do you say to your grandmother for her Velveeta, Spam and lima bean casserole?” Now they didn’t really want my honest opinion here—they would have gone postal if I would have said, “Grammie, what in the name of heaven were you thinking?  You shouldn’t ever be allowed to prepare meals again!”  They didn’t really care what I thought, they simply wanted a response of gratitude to show my acknowledgement of Grammie’s kindness and effort.

Even if children don’t feel gratitude, parents want them to learn to offer thanks simply because it’s the right thing to do.  Why?  Because every human being lives with a debt of gratitude to someone for something.  Of course, parents hope their kids won’t just parrot words of gratitude; they hope that the exercise of gratitude now will one day produce authentically grateful people.

And that is exactly what our Heavenly Father hopes for each of us! That is why you can’t go very far into the Bible without a reference or an admonition to be thankful, as in this story Jesus tells.

The ability to express gratitude is one of the fundamental signs of a redeemed life and a growing spirituality. To give thanks is one of the highest callings we have and one of the most self-benefiting things we can do.  It keeps us from being self-absorbed. It produces an eternal perspective.  It reminds us of how truly blessed we really are. It creates a perspective that sees that all of life is a gift.

At the end of each day G. K. Chesterton would say, “Here ends another day, during which I have had eyes, ears, hands [to experience this] great world around me.  Tomorrow begins another day.  Why am I allowed two?” That’s why Ambrose, Bishop of Milan said, “No duty is more urgent than that of returning thanks.”  It keeps you focused on God’s goodness and not on yourself.

And perhaps best of all, gratitude opens the door for more.  The great preacher Andrew Murray said,  “To be thankful for what we have received…is the surest way to receive more.”

Why not practice a little gratitude today!  You’ll be grateful you did!

“Gratitude is not only the greatest of the virtues, but the parent of all others.” ~Cicero

Prayer… Lord, you have blessed me with good things far more than I can count and far more than I deserve.  Thank you.  I owe an eternal debt of gratitude that I will happily but never fully repay.