How important is gratitude to God?

The Apostle Paul commands us, “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thessalonians 5:18).

Gratitude is thus central to our becoming what God intends us to be. But we easily fall into ingratitude, focusing on what God has not given us as opposed to what He has.

Consider these seven categories of items, from the past and in the present, for which we should express thankfulness to God:

1) Salvation, in all its parts

We were by nature children of wrath, but God being rich in mercy made us alive in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 2:3-5). That salvation is completely undeserved; it is all a gift, all by His grace (Ephesians 2:6-9). In Christ Jesus we have complete forgiveness through His sacrifice on the cross, and thus have access directly to God the Father. He adopts us into His intimate family and has His Holy Spirit dwell in us. He transforms us more and more into the likeness of Jesus.

2) Obvious Other Gifts

God sometimes grants us pleasures, joys that are clearly unexpected gifts from Him. Here’s one from my life:

I was a competitive distance runner for almost 25 years. As a 37-year old In 1993, I ran a small town Thanksgiving Day 5k in Massachusetts that I should have won. But I limped home third, showing no guts and little speed. I was disgusted with myself.

The next day I got up before sunrise to run a five-mile loop. Looking at the thermometer, I almost got back into bed – it was 7 degrees, the coldest morning so far. I forced myself out of the house, just planning to go through the motions.

And then God gave me the gift. After a mile or two, I found myself running with tremendous freedom, with smooth form, with considerable speed, soaking in the beauty of the sunrise over the mountains.

All that I loved about running was encapsulated in that effort.

Then God gave me another gift – I wrote about that run. Unbeknownst to me, eight months later I would suffer a knee injury that would prevent me from ever running like that again. But our Lord prompted me to write in part in order that I would have that reminder for the rest of my life of His gift of running.

I wrote, “I am most thankful not for the years of races, not for the hard training, not for any speed I may have, but for this Thanksgiving Friday run.” (You can read my write-up here.)

What obvious gifts are you thankful for?

3) Clear Answers to Prayer

God involves us in accomplishing His purposes via prayer in part so that we will give thanks to Him when He answers: “You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many” (2 Corinthians 1:11).

So remember what you pray for – and give thanks when He answers!

4) What We are Tempted to Think We Produced or Obtained Ourselves

Let me just list several examples to prompt your reflection:

• Spouses
• Children
• Jobs
• Income: “It is [God] who gives you the power to get wealth” (Deuteronomy 8:18)
• Homes
• Health and Fitness
• Skills and Abilities
• Education
• Christian virtues: faith, obedience, perseverance, even the desire to follow Him (Psalm 119:36)

5) What We are Tempted to Think We Deserve

Again, here are some possible examples:

• Life – He created us
• Breath – He sustains us
• Sleep – “He gives to his beloved sleep” (Psalm 127:2)
• Daily provision – food, health care, peace
• A functioning government – While it is easy to see flaws in our government, very few people in the history of the world have lived under a better government than ours.

We recognize all the items in these first five categories as good. The problem is that we often don’t acknowledge them as from God, and so we fail to give Him thanks.

The last two categories are different:

6) Gifts that We Easily Overlook

We are tempted not to notice these gifts – instead, we often complain when we don’t encounter them. Examples:

• An efficient customer service agent
• A courteous driver
• Electricity when it doesn’t go out
• Police who do their jobs effectively and professionally
• The church members who aren’t up front – who prepare the Lord’s Supper, who put up signs, who clean the church, and do so many other tasks

What do you benefit from that you overlook? Thank God – as well as the people involved.

7) Always and for Everything by Faith in God’s Future Grace

The seventh category brings us to Paul’s statement that we should give thanks “in all circumstances,” or, as the Apostle says in Ephesians 5:20, “always and for everything.” That implies that we should thank God for trials and difficulties – even for the results of sin.

So we should rightly thank God for:

• Tragedies
• Deaths
• Disappointments
• “Negative” answers to prayer – when the sick are not healed, when the door to a job or a ministry or marriage is not opened, when a relationship is not reconciled, when a war is not

How do we give thanks for these?

We do not thank God for the sin, the sorrow, the pain, the suffering. But we do thank Him that He is working out His purposes even through such hardships.

Remember what our Lord says in Luke 11:11-12: “What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?”

A good father doesn’t refuse to give his child something good, and never gives his child something harmful. But when a good father’s two-year old asks for a cookie he may well give him an orange. We – spiritual two-year olds that we are – often struggle to see how what God gives us serves His purposes. But if we are in Christ, whatever He gives us is for our good and His glory.

Sometimes we get a glimpse of how God is at work, as Paul did 2 Corinthians 1:8-9:

We were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.

Paul discerns one way God worked through that difficult trial – He highlighted Paul’s dependence on Him. God undoubtedly was accomplishing millions of other objectives simultaneously; as the Apostle says elsewhere, “How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways” (Romans 11:33). Though Paul doesn’t see those millions of accomplishments, he is able to thank God for this one good result of his trial – for this one way this difficulty was an egg and not a scorpion.

So when in the midst of trials and difficulties, look for ways that God may be at work. Ask Him to show you a glimpse of what he is accomplishing.

However, even when we pray for such glimpses, oftentimes we fail to discern any good that results from the evil we experience. How do we thank God “always and for everything” then?

Thank God that He promises that:

• He is at work – even when we can’t see how
• He has not given us a scorpion
• He is sustaining our faith in the midst of the trial
• He provides in His Word and in church history accounts of others in similarly terrible circumstances – and those worked for the good of His people and the glory of His Name.

I encourage you to cultivate a thankful heart by considering these seven categories. Identify and thank God for one example from each, whether recent or from your past. Thank Him for:

• One aspect of salvation
• One obvious gift
• One clear answer to prayer
• One good you are tempted to think you earned or produced
• One good you are tempted to think you deserve
• One gift you easily overlook
• One difficulty that considered by itself is not good

You may want to do the entire exercise in one sitting. Alternately, perhaps it would be more beneficial to pick one category a day over the course of a week. In either case, then share these thanksgivings with someone else. Ask him or her to do the same.

Continue to remind yourself that any good, any pleasure, any delight, all health, all wisdom, all knowledge, any growth, any improvement, any Christlikeness comes from God – and they are ours only because of Jesus.  Apart from Him, either the entire human race is destroyed under God’s wrath, or we live in a Genesis 6:5 world: “Every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time” (NIV).

So cultivate a thankful heart. Give thanks always and for everything. Express that thanks to God and to one another.

And so fulfill the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

[This devotion is based on part of the March 27 sermon, “Give Thanks in All Circumstances.” You can listen to that sermon via this link.]