Being Thankful; Always
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
As part of Paul's doxology to the Thessalonian Church, he encourages them with many imperatives; admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, don’t repay evil for evil, rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances. Why? Because this is the will of God the Father(1 Thess. 5:18). In the wake of Thanksgiving 2020 you may be considering your thankfulness and gratitude in a new light. You may have lost a job and started a new one, even in another field. You may have experienced death and sickness like you have not before. Either way 2020 has made me thankful in new ways. But, I want to share that as believers we ought to be thankful, always.
The churches in Thessalonica were experiencing harsh and real persecution and were in much need of encouragement and exhortation. Paul offers this, but in the middle of Paul’s imperatives for what the church should do as Christins, Paul admonishes the church to be thankful. Why is it that Paul thought it important to be thankful in the middle of being persecuted? An honest person would justifiably ask Paul, what is it that I can be thankful for? This may be you this year. You may question the need to be thankful to God in the middle of a financially burdensome year where you may have lost a job, a loved one, taken a pay cut, had to sell your home, not able to pay rent or mortgage, and may have stepped into sin. I’d ask you to consider that you ought to be thankful for the same reason the Thessalonians were admonished to be thankful. That is because as Paul puts it in 1 Thessalonians 5:5, “For you are children of light, children of the day”.
As believers we can be thankful for the shed blood of Christ that bought your salvation, is sustaining your salvation, and will bring your salvation to completion (Phillipians 1:6). Brother, sister, YOU. HAVE. HOPE! We have hope that this is simply a year, a moment in time, you can also be assured the Lord disciplines and chastens those He loves (Heb. 12:6), that this present suffering does not compare to the glory that will be revealed later (Rom. 8:18). We have this as our hope from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! So take heart, my friend and endure whatever comes your way knowing that the Lord is sanctifying his children to be glorified at a later time.
Being thankful is not a holiday and woe are we to relegate it as such. Let us not follow the cycle of the world to simply celebrate when given time off and told to by a world that panders to our Lord. Let us be thankful always for the salvation in which we do not deserve. Let us not forget that if the race were ran by us our reward would be death, hell, and eternal torment. Yet, we stand justified, being sanctified, to be glorified by the only name in which we can be saved. Let us remember our salvation comes from the Lord. Allow it to draw near to you and your soul that you are wretched and in need of a savior. In doing so, let us not grow weary of giving thanks that Christ, though while you were still loving your sin, came and rescued you from that desire and gave you a heart for His will. In this, Christ has grafted you into eternal life through His blood. It is this gospel that grants thankfulness. So Church, brother, sister, let us be thankful, always.