COVID-19. Death. Quarantine. FEAR, Anxiety and separation. Business closures and jobs lost. Stark needs for food and financial aid mark
our communities in a fashion much like a scarlet letter did in previous ages. Not a shame from sin but a shame from being proud Americans who can take care of themselves being driven to humility in seeking assistance just to get by day to day. Now we add to it the drastic polarization of ideals in the political sphere, a contested election and hateful rhetoric from both sides. 2020 has shaped up to be quite the disappointment. Not much to be thankful for these days…
2020, a year like none other. Or is it?
This is not the first time we in America have faced difficulties. This is not the first time we have faced a polarized political election. I honestly cannot remember a time in my lifetime when there wasn’t polarized presidential elections, though not with so much hostility and incivility. This is not the first time that we have had trials. For some of us we are old enough to remember a few of those trials that shaped a culture. 9/11 changed the way the world looked at security and many chose to accept the loss of personal freedoms for the greater good of all peoples. Many did not, but it happened anyway. In 2008 when the real estate bubble popped there were people loosing jobs and homes and the landscape was changed yet again.
Is this the first year there was a global pandemic? The first time schools were closed, businesses shut down, Churches abandoned? Nope. The Spanish flu outbreak in 1918 is still considered the most deadly pandemic in modern history. It lasted until 1920. 2020’s pandemic is on the 100 year heels of the Spanish flu.
Many today have been greatly impacted by this Corona Virus. Many have lost loved ones and friends, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, grandparents and extended family. If you have been shielded from the loss and pain this season has brought on many you have been one of the lucky ones. I have lost family members and I have lost friends. People have lost jobs or quit jobs because of fear or pragmatic precautions. Today, people are missing meeting together with family to avoid the risk of exposure and potential loss on a greater level. So much for Thanksgiving, ehh?
But what if I told you Thanksgiving is not about a holiday filled with plump juicy turkeys, ham, stuffing and all the rest of the trimmings? What if I told you thanksgiving was not about all the great good things in your life? What if I told you that thanksgiving is best celebrated in adversity, for rarely are we truly grateful when we have it all together. Rather it is when we don’t that we can really see the true meaning of Thanksgiving. Gratitude is easy, and even oft overlooked when life is easy. Being grateful in the midst of trial, now that’s something that is born in the heart, recognizing the finite nature of a man and the infinite sovereignty of God who is a Father that tenderly loves us through it all.
There are 33 references to thanksgiving in the Bible. There are countless other passages that give us great reason to be thankful, without ever mentioning being thankful. Understanding those passages brings hope in the midst of adversity. They show us how to live in a state of gratitude. They help us understand Paul’s writing to the church at Thessalonica to be thankful at all times. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 “in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” This is the state Paul is in when he writes to the church at Philippi the famously out of context quoted verse in Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” While missing the full picture portrayed in the previous verses: “Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content: I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Looking just a few verses further back kind of tee’s up this thought of Paul’s how to be content in abasement or in abundance: Philippians 4:6 “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”
Gratitude gently guides our hearts towards contentment in whatever we face. Gratitude sees God in His omniscient Love for us through Christ that allows us to have confidence that “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written:
“For Your sake we are killed all day long;
We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”
Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:35-39.
Today, in the midst of all the various adversities we now face, I am grateful for the Love of Christ and a Daddy who sees and knows and has never abandoned in the midst of trial. I am grateful He is for me, He is faithful to me and He is ever-present in my time of need (Psalm 46).
Happy Thanksgiving, I pray today you find a little to be thankful for no matter where you are in the midst of the current trials we face as a
nation, or that you face individually. I pray that our gratitude is not based on outcomes but based on God’s faithfulness through the storms and through the calm.
I am thankful for you today.