1) INTRODUCTION: Everyday should be a day of thanksgiving, on the Christian’s calendar. We are taught by command to be thankful: Eph. 5:20 – Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Col. 3:15 – “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.” Col. 4:2 – “Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving.” 1Thess. 5:18 – “In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” We must do the will of God to enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. 7:21) Thus gratitude is not optional. To be an ingrate, is to be disobedient; and to be disobedient is to be lost.
2) WE ARE TAUGHT BY EXAMPLES TO BE THANKFUL: (a) Jesus was thankful. Matt. 11:25 – “At that time Jesus declared I thank thee Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from wise and understanding and revealed them to babes.” Mark 8:6 “And He commanded the crowd to sit down on the ground; and he took the seven loaves, and having given thanks He broke them and gave them to His disciples to set before the people.” John 11:41 “So they took away the stone and Jesus lifted up His eyes and said Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.” He is our exemplar. (1Pet. 2:21-22). (b) David in Psalm 100:1-5. (c) Daniel in Dan. 6:10 “And he gave thanks before his God, as he always did. (d) Anna in Luke 2:38 “And coming up at that very hour she gave thanks to God and spoke of Him to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem”. (e) Paul in Phil. 1:3 “I thank my God upon every remembrance of you” and Phil. 4:6 “Do not be anxious for anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God”. All had thankful hearts. Yea, the Angelic host gives thanks. (f) Angel in Rev. 7:11-12 “And all the angels stood round about the throne and about the elders and the four beasts and fell before the throne on their faces, and worshipped God”. Vs. 12 “Saying, Amen; Blessing and glory, and wisdom and thanksgiving, and honour, and power and might, be unto our God forever and ever. Amen”
3) REMEMBER TO NEVER FORGET: Psa. 103:2 “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all His benefits.” Forget not all His benefits. Forgetfulness is an enemy of gratitude. Though Joseph befriended him, the butler forgot him (Gen. 40:23). Only one of the ten cleansed lepers remembered to not forget (Luke 17:11-19). How different were the of Jabesh-gilead who never forget Saul’s kindness (1Sam. 31:1-13). Blessing are those who give without remembering and those who can receive without forgetting.
4) DO NOT MAJOR ON YOUR TROUBLES: (i) Count your blessings, not bruises; Yet, how often do we major on our frustrations rather than our blessings. We even date matters from a given tragedy. “That happened the year tornado killed somebody”. Or “the year I had rheumatic fever”. If we are not careful while we talk the pathway of life we will never pluck a rose but will pluck many thorns and wear them in our hearts. Fanny Crosby did not major on her troubles even though blind wrote with numberless blessings in her heart the hymn “A Wonderful Saviour”. (ii) In fact, we should be grateful even for our troubles and so-called inconveniences; One little boy was thankful for his glasses, for they kept the boys from fighting him and the girls from kissing him. Matthew Henry wrote in his diary upon his house being robbed, “Let me be thankful first, because he never robbed me before. Second, they did not take my life. Third, because although he took all I possessed, it was not much and fourth, because it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed”. But, how can a Christian come to be thankful even for his troubles? He must firmly believe that “all things work together for good to them that love God” Rom. 8:28.
5) THINK HOW MUCH BETTER OFF YOU ARE THAN SO MANY: What would happen if we were reduced to the same level of many people in the world? More than one billion people in the world find themselves under the following situations or conditions: (i) No furniture except a few old blankets, kitchen table and one chair. (ii) No clothing except for the old dress or a shirt or blouse, one pair of shoe for the head of the family. (iii) No food except molded bread, salt and potatoes and a handful of onions. (iv) No water except a dirty stream five kilometer away. (v) The nearest clinic or hospital is twenty miles away and a midwife is in charge instead of a doctor. (vi) The head of the family has only two acres of land to cultivate to feed the family.
6) COUNT THE BLESSINGS YOU DO HAVE RATHER THAN CONCENTRATING ON WHAT YOU DO NOT HAVE: “And having food and raiment let us be therewith content” (1Tim. 6:8). “Be content with such things as ye have” (Heb. 13:5). Yet, so often we fail to remember the things with which we are so remarkably blessed. A mother and father gave a sizable gift to the church in memory of their son who was killed in world war2. When the gift was announced, a mother whispered to her husband. “Let’s give the same amount for our boy” The husband replied; “Our boy didn’t lose his life”. Whereupon the mother said, “That’s the point. Let’s give it as an expression of gratitude for sparing his life”. This mother has not lost sight of the fact of what she did have. How often we sing, but how seldom we practice “Count your many blessings, name them one by one and it will surprise you what the Lord hath done”. (a) We should try and count our spiritual blessings: (Eph. 1:3). There is God’s son, the incomparable church, the holy Bible, the exceeding great and precious promise, the sustaining hope of heaven, our conversion and on and on. (b) We should try and count our physical blessings: There are our families, our health, our food, shelter and clothing, our freedom, the beauty of the world, and on and on. (c) We will come to see that these blessings are in numerable.
7) CONSIDER HOW DETESTABLE OR ABOMINABLE OR HATEFUL IN GRATITUDE REALLY IS: “Neither were thankful” (Rom. 1:21) is one of the many sins characteristic of the Gentile world too, in describing the perilous times of the last days, Paul says men will be unthankful (2Tim. 3:1-5). Shakespeare said in “As you like it” “Blow, blow thou winter wind, thou are not so unkind as man’s ingratitude.”
8) EXPRESS YOUR GRATITUDE: (a) Express your gratitude verbally: We are instructed to “give” thanks, not “feel” or “think” thanks (1Thess. 5:18, Eph. 5:20). “O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good …Let the redeemed of the Lord say so” (Psa. 107:1-2). Weary and burdened with the care of the day, the preacher’s little girl came into his study room, climbed up into his lap, and said, “Daddy, I did not come to ask for a thing; I just came to tell you I love you.” The statement so warmed the heart of the preacher that his weariness was soon forgotten. In like manner God is a father and He desires and longs for His children to express their love and gratitude. (b) Express your gratitude by your life as well as by your lips: Thanks saying is not necessarily thanks giving, but thanks living is. In response to David’s question “What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits toward me?” (Psa. 116:12), let us resolved that we will give unto God our love, our time, our talents, our money, our lives, yea our all.
9) DO NOT TAKE THE THINGS OF LIFE FOR GRANTED: We are so thankless because we are so thoughtless. Think and thanks come from the same root word. And in our thinking, it is so easy to let ordinary blessings of life to be forgotten and unappreciated. For example, if the sun did not rise one morning, we would all become hysterically frantic, but what about the many days, yea day after day that the sun does rise? Do we daily stop to think that such takes place by the grace of God; and then pause and thank Him.
10) AVOID OVER EMPHASIZING THE LUXURIES OF LIFE: We must come to understand that “a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth” (Luke 12:15). (a) We must be thankful for the simple necessities. (b) We must be thankful and put emphasis on, the spiritual things (Eph. 1:3). And aged Christian was called upon by the tax collector to determine the amount of taxes that should be paid. When asked what property he had; the aged Christian stated “I am a very healthy man.” Whereupon the tax collector asked him to list his possessions. The aged man said (i) I have remission of my sins (Acts 2:38). (ii) I have a mansion in heaven (John 14:2). (iii) I have peace that passeth understanding (Phil. 4:7). (iv) I have joy unspeakable (1Pet. 1:8). (v) I have a divine love that never faileth (1Cor. 13:8). (vi) I have a faithful, pious wife (Prov. 31:10). (vii) I have devoted children (Exo. 20:12). (viii) I have true, loyal friends (Prov. 18:24). (ix) I have songs in the night (Psa. 42:8). (x) I have a crown of life (James 1:12). (xi) I have a savior, Jesus Christ, who supplies all my needs freely (Phil. 4:19). Closing the book, the tax collector said “you are truly a wealthy man, but do you know that I’m not able to tax you on any of this?” He then added, “you have possessions that give 100% profit.”
11) DO AWAY WITH MURMURING AND COMPLAINING: Instead of remaining continually grateful for their deliverance from Egypt, how soon did Israel start to murmur and complain (Exo. 15:24, 17:3; Num. 14:2). Let us avoid duplicating this spirit (1Cor. 10:10). Though he was in prison at that time, Paul stilled penned, “Giving thanks always” (Eph. 5:20) and “do all things without murmuring and disputing” (Phi. 2:14). In the city of happiness, complaining avenue and thanksgiving lane are miles apart, so that you cannot live on both streets at the same time. Some people who should be humbly grateful only become grumbly hateful. Into which group do you fall.
12) REALIZE THAT YOU ARE A RECIPIENT AND NEVER FORGET THE GIVER IN THE GIFT: (a) All that we have , we received of God (James 1:7) Paul was so deeply conscious of this (1Cor. 15:10; Rom. 1:5) whereas the rich farmer failed to realize the same (Luke 12:16-21). (b) Now, let us never forget the giver in the gift. A child who has been pampered by an uncle, bring biscuit each day he visited, on a day the uncle forgets the biscuit, the child cried bitterly. Why? The child is more interested in the gift than in the giver. It is possible for us to have the same attitude toward God. When God healed our sick loved one in answer to our prayers and we forget to give Him thanks, had we not forgot the giver in the gift? Were we not guilty in being interested in the blessings to the neglect of the blesser? Accordingly, let us never separate God from his gifts.
CONCLUSION: George Herbert prayer, “Our Father, thou has given us so much. Do please, give us one more thing …A grateful heart”. Written By Dr. S. P. Ekanem.
