Reaching Out

Thankfulness
By Ro Lashua

This is the month when America celebrates the holiday of Thanksgiving Day. The holiday means different things to different people.

The Bible states that in the last days mankind will be unthankful. We see that today. We all have our stories where we have seen unthankfulness. Recently I was on my way to an office on the second floor in the elevator at work, when a fellow male coworker joined me. He motioned for me to enter the elevator ahead of him. He is a gentleman and proud of it. He began to share an experience recently when he opened the door for a young lady and her child at a local store. He was aghast when he received no thank you for his efforts. As he followed them through the doorway, he said, a thank you would be nice. She turned and just glared at him with an incredulous stare. Perhaps she had not been taught to say thank you in her home. How sad.

We should be thankful.

When people are rescued from fires and floods and physical harm it seems that being thankful is a bit easier. People can give thanks to rescue workers because of the physical rescue they have received.

We should be thankful.

How often do we think of the spiritual rescue that we have received from Jesus? He gave a lot for us. He came to this earth and lived a sinless life so He could qualify to pay for our sins. He could do this because He was sinless. He willingly died on that cross to pay for our sins. He did not have to do that.

We should be thankful.

It is because of Jesus’ sacrifice on that cross, that we can have salvation. Without Jesus’ sacrifice we have no hope for an eternity with God.

When we know Jesus as our Lord and Savior we have a lot to be thankful for. The relationship we have with Jesus fills us up with peace, joy, love, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, balance, self-control. These are the fruits of the Spirit and the attributes of God. When we are in Jesus and He is in us, we have awesome things to be thankful for. These are a lot more than mere physical blessings.

The physical blessings are nice but as we have seen in the last couple of years “natural disasters” can take everything we physically own away from us in minutes. However, if we have the spiritual blessings because of our faith in Jesus no one can take that from us. Then we can have thankfulness no matter the state or condition of our physical possessions.

“Things” are very temporary.

The spiritual cannot be burned or flooded out of our lives. We retain these as long as we retain our relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit. King David used to pray, “take not your Holy Spirit from me” because he knew the value of that guidance and contact with God.

We read in the Scriptures that we are to be thankful for all things. Think about that. Are we to be thankful for floods? Are we to be thankful for fires or storms?

Let’s look at that scripture:

Ephesians 5:18b-20 …but be filled with the Spirit, 19speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, 20giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, (KJV)

We are to thank God for all things. This might seem like a crazy thing to do, however let’s think about it.

How can we give thanks to God for the bad or difficult times?

The secret to this is to know, and know that you know, that God is in control of our life. If we know that, then we will realize that God could have stopped whatever happened, but He did not. Therefore there must be a reason.

Now, when I say that, most people will jump to the conclusion that I am referring to the fact that it is punishment for sins. We cause enough of those on our own. Perhaps God lets us experience some things to teach us a lesson but I do not believe God is sitting on His throne just waiting to GET US.

Remember Jesus did not come into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be save through Him (John 3:17).

One thing most of us do not realize is that God is not as concerned about our comfort as He is about our character. He wants us to learn lessons. He wants us to learn to TRUST and OBEY.

What does all this have to do with Thankfulness?

I will tie all this together.

When we are thankful for all things, this shows God two major points about us. First that we know He has everything under control, and He does. Secondly it shows faith on our part, and that we trust Him to work it out for our good in the end.
Romans 8:28 - And we know
that all things work together for good
to them that love God,
to them who are the called
according to his purpose.
Can we see that?

When we can thank God for all things, we are trusting and obeying God.

When my son was first sent to Operation Iraqi Freedom when the war first started, I prayed and lifted my son to God for total protection. He was over there with missiles streaming over his head and I could do nothing about it. I just kept praying. Before he left I lifted him up to God and said, Lord, he is in your hands. There is nothing I can do even if I was over there with him. However, Lord I know you can be there for him 24/7 and I know you will.

When David came back from his first deployment he had grown so much in faith I was amazed. He said, Mom, I was telling my buddies about the bible and I didn’t care what they thought. He said, we had some heavy discussions about the bible. I saw what God did for him through this trial. It was awesome.

For his second deployment I again lifted him up and said, Lord, he is in your hands. There is nothing I can do even if I was over there with him. However, Lord I know you can be there for him 24/7 and I know you will.

When David came back from this second deployment he had grown stronger in faith but also his wife had as well. They became a regular church attending family and they were committed to giving God the glory.

My son is scheduled for a third deployment next Spring. Again I will lift him up to the Lord and release him to God for total care while in the war zone. However, I also expect God to do some great things for my son and his family during and after this deployment.

It’s those times of adversity that we grow the most. It is during those times that God sees what we are made of.

Will we trust Him?

Anyone can “trust” and have “faith” if things are going well; actually that is not trust or faith if we see things going well. It is when things are going bad or seem to be that we must exercise our faith and trust God for the outcome.

That is the very time when we need to be thankful.

We can then give God thanks for ALL things.

I have learned through some very difficult times in a work environment, that God is in control, and He will not let His people be oppressed forever. He might leave us in difficult times to see how long it will take us to cry out to him, but He is still in control. He will let us experience some things to stretch us. He will let us experience some things to build our faith. Remember He is less concerned about our comfort than He is with our character.

Now when things “going wrong,” I try to get exited and say, OK Lord, what cool thing are you going to do now? There is a plan and I am now anxious for it to be revealed to me and also to those around me.

So let’s be encouraged when things seem to be going wrong. Let’s be thankful for all things and at all times.

Faithful and faith filled Christians are thankful people.

If we speak word of thankfulness, then the we will stir up the Spirit within us, and we will experience greater faith and joy.

Memory Verse:

Ephesians 5:20
Giving thanks always
for all things
to God the Father
in the name of
our Lord Jesus Christ
(KJV)