Thanksgiving is more than eating mashed potatoes with gravy, watching football, and taking a wonderful turkey-induced nap. Thanksgiving is an essential concept in Scripture. And although it is good to set aside a Thursday each November to cultivate a heart of thanksgiving, the Scriptures have more to say about giving thanks than one day a year can handle.
First, We Were Lost by Forgetting Thanksgiving
A misplaced spirit of Thanksgiving contributed to the first sin. Perhaps if Satan had tempted Eve on Thanksgiving Day, she would not have fallen for his trickery. Satan of course hasn’t been grateful for a long time. He wanted more; more power, more glory. Ultimately, in his essence, Satan is an ingrate. And he sinks his venom into the heart of Eden. Satan’s sin becomes the first sin of humanity: the sin of ingratitude. Adam and Eve are simply ungrateful for what God had given. That became the catalyst of their sin of eating the forbidden fruit.
Our fall was, and has always been, that we are not satisfied in God and what He gives. We seem to always be hungering for something more, something other than what we have. So, Satan the master ingrate, spawns this unthankfulness in Eve, who passes it along to Adam, and then to the rest of us. Thus, we are unthankful people, often even after our salvation.
Second, We Were Redeemed By Thanksgiving
God himself, in the person of his Son, Jesus Christ, entered into our thankless world, lived in flawless appreciation of His Father, and died in our behalf, for our sin, including our sin of ingratitude. It is Jesus, who has manifested the perfect life of thankfulness.
Third, Thanksgiving Is About the Complete Godhead.
We see the Trinity in our call to give thanks. The typical pattern of thanksgiving in the New Testament is that God the Father is the object of thanksgiving, God the Son is the person through whom thanksgiving flows, and God the Holy Spirit is the source and contact point of thanksgiving.
“And whatever ye do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.”
Colossians 3:16–17
The very presence of thanksgiving points to the work of the Holy Spirit as the source of thanksgiving. Thanksgiving flows to God the Father, through God the Son, from God the Spirit.
Fourth, Thanksgiving Replaces Sin
Just as the Apostle Paul admonishes Christians to put away sin from their lives, he also commands them to put thanksgiving in its place.
“Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient (out of place), but rather giving of thanks.”
Ephesians 5:4
Paul knows that we either go through life with sinful, thankless hearts which leads to foolish talk and crude jokes, or we act with thankful hearts and thereby please God with our words.
The key to unlocking a heart of gratitude and overcoming bitterness and ugliness and disrespect and violence is a strong belief in God, the Creator and Sustainer and Provider and Hope-giver. If we do not believe we are deeply indebted to God for all we have or hope to have, then the very spring of gratitude has gone dry.
Fifth, Thanksgiving Sanctifies Creation
How should Christians think about God’s marvelous creation? Paul says that it should be received with a heart full of thanksgiving:
“For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving. For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.”
I Timothy 4:4
Paul teaches that creation is good and should be received with thanksgiving because it is made holy through the word of God and prayer. It almost seems as if the Scripture is implying that the differing taste of food is a reminder of the diverse goodness of God. And when we taste food, it is a communication of God’s goodness, so we thank Him for the food and for the lesson in being grateful.
Sixth, Thanksgiving Brings us Close to God
Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote that if the stars came out only once a year, everybody would stay up all night just to behold them. We have seen the stars so often that we don’t bother to look at them anymore. We have become accustomed to our blessings. And sometimes, we altogether forget that we have them.
During the Thanksgiving season, we often recall the story of ten lepers, nine Jews, and one Samaritan. The story tells us that they asked Jesus for mercy and He tells them to “go” and as they do, all ten are healed. However, only one, the Samaritan, returned to say “thank you”to the Lord. Ninety percent of those treated with love, compassion, and grace were never heard from again. So, Jesus voices the question, where are the nine?
If that were to happen today, we might answer Jesus by saying it is because they come from a culture of entitlement. They think they deserved good health all along. They believed that finally they were getting what they were entitled to. Furthermore, even though Jesus helped them, that’s what He should have done—it was His job. Actually, He should have come and done it sooner. Such is the culture of entitlement.
However, entitlement culture misses the real blessing of this story. In telling this story, Luke says, all the lepers “kept their distance.” That’s what they were supposed to do. Lepers lived near the cities so they could beg, but by law they were required to stay at a distance so as not to infect others. But something changed for number ten when he was healed. He came right up to Jesus with his praise and thanks. He lay at the feet of Jesus. What gave him that right? Was it his healing? Sure, that was part of it, but there was more.
It was healing plus gratitude. That’s what brought this leper closer to Jesus. That’s what brought him back. That’s what brought him to his knees. Gratitude is what brought him closer to God. This is just like our salvation allows us to come to the feet of Jesus, but it is our gratitude that will actually bring us there.
Without gratitude we not only lose the full taste of our food, and the full blessing of our healing, we also lose the full taste of our relationship with God.
Dr. Worthington has been in the ministry over forty years and serves as President of Pathway Ministries.