Thanksgiving: Protection from Discontentment
Thanksgiving opens the doors of our hearts to the presence of God. It heightens our awareness of His work in our lives and to all he’s given us. It awakens us to the grace He’s poured out. It reminds us of what He’s provided and done on our behalf. It makes us aware of His goodness. “God inhabits, dwells or is enthroned upon the praises of His people”( Ps 22:3). God says, "in my presence is fullness of joy"(Ps 16:11 ). Jesus said what he came to give us was abundant life, but the enemy came to steal. The enemy is after our joy and if he can keep us from giving thanks, then he can cloud our perspective to make us feel sorry for ourselves, leading us to a place of self pity and discontent. Ingratitude first appeared in the Garden of Eden when there was discontentment with all that God had given them because of the one tree he said they could not have. It is a part of the human condition, the falleness of man, to focus on what we do not have, instead of giving thanks for what we do.
So what do you do when your heart aches for something you don’t have? You most definitely take it to God in prayer. You are honest with him about what’s on your heart, just like you would be with one of your friends. He’s your dad, He wants to know your heart’s desire. The word tells us to pray about anything & everything, listen to the role of thanksgiving.
"Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."
Our prayers & our petitions are mixed with thanksgiving. If we keep all our prayers focused on what we want God to do, then we often grow discontent and loose perspective of all He’s already done. Thanksgiving protects us from being discontent. I was rereading the story of Daniel this week and picked up the detail that when it spoke of his habit of prayer it worded it this way, “Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before.” When Daniel was a teenager, he was taken as a slave by a pagan nation that had destroyed his city and separated him from his family to a foreign wretched land and still 3x a day he gave thanks.
“Pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1Thes 5:17-18)
Giving thanks in all circumstances gives us a triumphing spirit. I know there are seasons of life and trials that a message like this, a verse like this are hard to hear. They almost make us angry. There are situations where we feel completely out of control. We don’t know what to do to make the trial go away. Thanksgiving can be our action plan. We can always come back to it and it lifts our spirits and gives us strength. As I was studying thanksgiving, I kept seeing giving thanks to God in conjunction with the phrase “His love endures forever”. Check out psalms 136 where there are 26 phrases of thanksgiving. The phrase “his love endures forever” is repeated after each one. To give thanks in every situation, we have to know his love will outlast our trial. No matter what we are facing God’s love for us is enduring and stronger then that momentary trial.
The following are two trials from my life one I applied “giving thanks in all circumstances” and one I did not. That choice had a profound effect on me emotionally in each one.
When I was in the heart of chemo for cancer, a cancer that I had asked God for 10 years to keep far from me after watching how painful my mother’s battle was, I still remember being thankful. During my battle I was not thankful for the cancer, but I was thankful in it for God’s presence that was always comforting me, giving me strength, getting me through. God says He will never forsake us, and he never did. If I felt weak and had a, “where are you, God?” moment then I would call out to Him and He always met me. I would go in my room and shut the door so not to freak out my young children and have my little cry session. I would open my Bible to the Psalms and turn it into prayer because I didn’t feel like I had the strength to even word my own prayer. His spirit would meet me there. Give me perspective of the eternal, the lasting, the love of God and my hope and my strength would be renewed. I could give thanks in it for the financial provision, for the love, help and encouragement of family and friends. For practical things like a great wig, a family trip, my kids first experience to see the beach, for an apple and flax seed muffin recipe I loved, for a 600 ft pink apartment we got to stay in for free during radiation treatment in St. Louis for 6 weeks.
Fast forward to a trial I walked through 2 years before this. I had just gone through the “Believing God” study by Beth Moore with a group of ladies. We were all believing God for some big things. One of my dearest friend's husband had left her & instead of the change of heart & reconciliation we prayed for, she was served divorce papers. Our pastor’s wife, who was fighting breast cancer, lost her battle. My dear friend, who was pregnant with twins, lost one of them. My husband had a job as an insurance agent at the time and things had been tense between he and his older female boss. I was believing God for the relationship to improve and for him to have favor in his work, instead he was fired. I quickly found out I was pregnant with our 3rd surprise baby, but I kept it secret because how humbling is it to tell people in the same breath I am pregnant, again & my husband lost his job? I was not thankful. I was mad. I was envious of how it seemed to be working out for other people. Things seemed to be getting worse instead of better; we found out our financial investor was a fraud and we lost the $20, 000 dollars we had invested. He had stolen it, bought big houses & yachts all from those that had entrusted him with their money. My thoughts turned dark. I thought God was mean and uncaring. I felt like He was always picking on me. “Remember me God, I am the girl who had the absent father & the mom that died? I think I have been through quite enough. Why are you giving everyone else the blessings? Don’t you care for me?”
My self-pity and complaining hit an all time high. Not just about the big things, the little things too. I remember complaining that I couldn’t just go out & buy my baby girl any cute little dress or bow I wanted. I remember complaining about the direction my house faced & how hot the sun made my home. I remember complaining about the color of my car. All of this self-pity and complaining during this time sent me into a very dark depression. Outside of my women’s Bible study that was on winter break, I was not submerging myself in truth or Christian fellowship. I was at a very low place spiritually.
Was this trial worse in comparison to my battle with cancer 2 years later? Definitely not, but the difference was my response to it. In this one I felt sorry for myself, I viewed everything as never working out for me, I was angry and envious. In my cancer battle I obviously had hard days, but my reaction was still one of believing God loved me, seeing his love and provision in the midst of pain. Being thankful made all the difference in my outlook.
Gratitude is like a rope hanging in our miry pit, dug by our own negative outlook and self-pity. We can use gratitude like the rope to climb out of our pit. The rope of gratitude can be a slow and steady choice to find things in life on a daily basis that we are thankful for.
"He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God." (Psalms 40:2-3
Outside of the pit our tune changes. A new song of praise instead of complaint comes from our mouths.
2016/11/18 at 5:41 pm