November 25, 2024

Giving Thanks

Given the many mentions of thankfulness in scripture, it’s clearly right—necessary even—to pause and be thankful daily to the one true God. Whether we also make a special day of it is a personal choice.

By PAUL ZILMER

Read Time: 3 minutes

As I write this, we’re about a week away from celebrating Thanksgiving Day in the US, where I live. Last month, Canada had their Thanksgiving Day. Doing some looking around, I was a little surprised to find that quite a few countries have something similar. A number of them have a formally designated day, and others just have a cultural tradition of pausing to be thankful. In all of them, the day (or three days in China, or four days in India, or a week in Israel) is held at harvest time.

Of course not all of these are held to give thanks to the God of the Bible. Some involve thanking some other god or gods, and many are entirely or mostly secular. In the US, originally it was to thank the Christian God, but it’s now is in the “mostly secular” category.

Arguably, giving thanks ought to be something we do every day. We have much to be thankful for, but in particular we have good reason to give thanks for the food we eat. Jesus did (Matthew 15:36). In particular he gave thanks for the bread and wine at what is called the “Last Supper” (Luke 22:17-19). Through the apostles commanded us to do likewise (1 Corinthians 11:23-26). In other places there is mention of giving thanks for our food (Acts 27:35, Romans 14:6, 1 Corinthians 10:30, 1 Timothy 4:3-4), so the custom among believers of giving thanks at meal times is well founded

Even more important, and more frequent in the New Testament, is giving thanks to God for the salvation He has provided in His Son. You can make use of your favorite Bible study tool to find these numerous passages—it’s a most worthwhile exercise

Back to the idea of a Thanksgiving Day. How should we, as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, treat the formal or informal day(s) of thanksgiving around us? We truly should give thanks every day—for daily food and much more, as we’ve seen. Beyond this, I believe there’s nothing wrong with having a special day set aside for more intensive thankfulness. Depending on what’s happening around us:

If the day is ostensibly to give thanks to the God of heaven, it’s an opportunity for us to talk about that God and honor Him as the source of all life and the provider of our salvation. Others might be more open to such a conversation at this time.
If the day is meant to honor another god, we can (gently) express our conviction that the God of the Bible is the one we truly owe thanks to.
If it’s mostly secular for those around us, we can let them know that for us it’s true thanksgiving to a living God.
If it is dangerous for us to express faith in the God we worship, we can still set aside a day of special prayers of thanks, even if only in our hearts.

Given the many mentions of thankfulness in scripture, it’s clearly right—necessary even—to pause and be thankful daily to the one true God. Whether we also make a special day of it is a personal choice:

One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. (Romans 14:5-6)

Every day, and perhaps on a special day also, let us join the angels:

“Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” (Revelation 7:11-12)

Love, Paul

Giving Thanks

Given the many mentions of thankfulness in scripture, it’s clearly right—necessary even—to pause and be thankful daily to the one true God. Whether we also make a special day of it is a personal choice.

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