Teague Bible Church

SHORT-TERM THANKFULNESS
“Eat all your food! You should be thankful you have so much! There are kids starving around the world tonight and you are being picky about what I put on your plate!”
The above represents a good attempt by parents to get their kids to appreciate things. Nothing is worse than a thankless child! It is such an irritating thing to endure. Yet, even if the kid, “Gets it,” it seems they, and we, only stay thankful for just a little while before they, or we, are back into the negative territory of complaining about something that is not right around us.
When someone has gone out of their way to do something nice for us we usual express thankfulness to that person. I wonder why thankfulness does not last in us; to become a settled condition in us?
The Scripture calls thankfulness a “sacrifice” in several texts. Talk about an understatement! It hurts, at first, to be thankful. But it is exercising true faith, because you are called to be thankful, before you feel it. Then after a while you “feel” the blessing of a continued thankful life.
We had a kid in the youth group who got the idea of wanting to be thankful at all times. She realizing this was 100% the will of God for all of us. ( I Thessalonians 5:18- “in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”)
Her mom was so negative that the daughter would say to her, on occasion,
” Mom now that you stated a problem, tell me three things you are thankful for.” Mom simply blew that off as trivial. Good kid; poor mom.
So thankfulness by default, which means being thankful only because somebody else has it worst, is not the heart of thankfulness. The person who is only thankful in that setting, is also the person who can be really negative a moment later as they also compare themselves continually to the person who has it better than them. Even when there are thankful by default, they have a condescending attitude toward those less fortunate. What a mess; what a short-term view of thankfulness.
Thankfulness is like the heat given off by the light of the sun. If you stand in the sun (Son), you will warm up. It is the idea of knowing God’s heart and sharing His life which is in you by being a believer. Not so much trying to be thankful, by gritting your teeth to get it done, but rather being in the presence of God. Go where His heart stays.
I was in Colorado once and was engaged in a conversation about thankfulness with a friend. As we looked across the Continental Divide at Wolf Creek Pass, I ask why we seem to be so pathetic at giving thanks, at all times. He had two responses.
First, we are always looking for an excuse for our failures. If you have a lot to be thankful for, then someone outside of you might wonder why you are not happier. So being hypercritical makes you look smart, and covers up your self-absorbed life. Ouch!
Secondly, he told me to look around and breath in this mountain air. I did. Then he said, “You just have to live here to have this. Where do you live again?” I told him, but he really wanted to know where my heart lived. A few visits to the mountains is nice, but not a big help, long-term.
There is a real Godly thankfulness that transforms our lives, but we have to live there; short visits rarely help. Even unbelievers are good at being thankful by default. Believers must exhibit the real thankfulness. It starts as a sacrifice, it moves to joy, and is noticed by all who should say of us, “He must live in a wonderful place! I want to be like that!” JWP