Be Thankful in All Things

When Winston Churchill went through school, he did not do well. The headmaster of his school told Churchill that he was too dumb to amount to anything and the headmaster predicted that Churchill would be a failure in his life. After Churchill became prime minister of England, he was asked to go back to his old school and give the graduation address. He went and when it was time for his address he stood up to the podium. There was an enormous swell of excitement among the pupils and the faculty and the guests that such a great man of history, a great learned and educated man, a man known for his ability to speak was about to address them. Anticipation filled the room as they looked forward to Churchill’s words that would tell them how to go forward in their lives. What a great irony from his days as a student at the school. Mr Churchill got up, leaned over the podium, looked out and around the audience, meeting the eyes of many there and said, “Never, never, give up.” Then he sat down. That was his entire message; four words. And in truth, if he had said more, those four words might not have had the power they had; wouldn’t have been quite as memorable. But what a powerful message - Never. never give up. He was living proof. How easy would it have been for him to give up when he heard those words from his headmaster that he was going to be a failure. Those words were so much more powerful because he applied them to his own life. Never, never give up.
God also presents us with four words. Four words recorded in the book of 1 Thessalonians by the Apostle Paul and four words that we need to write on our hearts; four words we need to apply to our own life; four words that will bring us to the trust, the communion and the relationship we need to have with Jesus Christ. Here are the four words: In everything give thanks.
Think about it. In everything give thanks. Now if we as followers of Christ truly believe that what we find in the Bible is truly God’s word for us - then we are to hear this statement not just as a platitude or a nice thought but as a command from God. Just like the other commandments - not stealing or lying or killing - here is another commandment given to us through the writings of the Apostle Paul. God is saying - Thou Shalt give thanks for everything.
Now, we know that giving thanks is a good thing to do. We probably don’t verbalize it enough, but we know we are to give thanks. It is pretty easy to be thankful for food and shelter and family and all our ‘stuff’. But what about the hard times, the events that shake up your world, that throw you into a place of sadness and confusion, happenings where you see your world crashing around you. What about those times when you prayed and prayed and God didn’t answer the way you wanted; things didn’t turn out the way you thought they should. What then? Just what is this everything business. In everything give thanks?
But that is what God tells us - thanking God in everything is the whole key to our relationship with Him. If we can understand how to give thanks in everything then we can better understand who God is and how much God truly cares for us. Understanding how to give thanks in everything is one of the great spiritual truths of the Bible - it is an essential part of our living our lives as God desires we live as his followers. Give thanks in everything - in loss, in illness, in depression, in grief, in failure and in happiness and success and health and peace and all the good things. Good and bad alike - give thanks in everything.
But how difficult is that? You wonder how you can possibly thank God for something that turns your life upside down. But we are called to be a people of faith and when something happens that totally throws us for a loop, that is precisely when we are called to give thanks on faith alone ..... obedient, trusting, faith in God no matter what.
That’s why we read that passage today from Genesis concerning Joseph. Lets remember what happened to him....... Joseph is the favorite child of his father Jacob and as a result Joseph gets all the attention and all the presents and his other brothers are stuck with all the work to do. The brothers become jealous and one day when the brothers are out in the fields working, Joseph delivers their lunch and they decide they had had enough of their baby brother and so they beat him, threw him in a pit and then eventually sold him into slavery. Joseph ends up in Egypt in the home of Potipher as his house servant and things are going pretty good when Potipher’s wife seduces Joseph and Joseph rejects her so she lies to her husband and said that Joseph had approached her. Joseph was forthwith thrown into prison where he was literally forgotten. So he spends a long period of time in prison - remember he is in prison even though he truly is innocent. Finally through a set of circumstances only God could arrange, Joseph is let out of prison and ends up being 2nd in command of all of Egypt. There is a famine and because of Joseph’s actions Egypt has stored food so people are traveling from other countries to buy food from Egypt - including Joseph’s brothers. They come before Joseph and of course do not recognize who he is. In a million years they would have never thought that Joseph would be in this position. But, Joseph recognizes them. When he tells them who he is, they are terrified. Makes sense - Joseph is in a powerful position. He has an opportunity to get back at them for what they did to him - he can refuse them food, he could arrest them, he could kill them, he could sell them into slavery like they did him. Joseph, however, looks at them and says, “You all may have meant evil for me, but God used it for good. Because of what you did, God was able to use me to feed people during this awful famine. Not only do I forgive you, but I am thankful that I am now in this position to be able to help so many.” Joseph was beaten, kidnapped, sold, lied about, imprisoned, forgotten - but he was thankful because it meant he was able to help others. Give thanks in everything.
So I ask you to think about this during this time when we are emphasizing Stewardship. Stewardship is a concept in scripture that goes all the way back to Genesis - to the beginning when Adam and Eve are charged with taking care of the garden - they were to be good stewards of what God had given them. Each of the Old Testament figures we are familiar with were charged with some type of Stewardship - Moses and Esther and Daniel and Nehemiah and Isaiah were are told by God to be good stewards of what God had given them and to use what God had given them to further God’s work. Wasn’t always money - often it was God’s people they were to care for. Stewardship in the biblical sense runs the gamut from caring for the natural world to caring for possessions to caring for people and to caring for money. In fact the word Stewardship actually comes from the same word that we translate as economy - our system of money. And in all of these different pictures scripture gives us of stewardship - of whatever form the stewardship takes - God is always reminding that stewardship is an act of thanksgiving for whatever we have been given.
The thing is however, sometimes things work out even when we don’t thank God for what has happened. The story we read from Luke today tells us that. There are 10 lepers who ask Jesus to heal them. He heals all 10. They go back to their homes rejoicing - and one, one, comes back and falls at Jesus’ feet and thanks him. One said thank you. But the other nine were still healed. Jesus didn’t take it back just because they didn’t say Thank You. So you still get what you want sometimes, even if you don’t say thank you.
It is pretty confusing…..
We all pretty good at thanking God for our blessings - even if it is just a quick ‘Thank You Jesus!‘ But can we really take God up on his command to thank him for our afflictions, because that is what this passage is telling us to do. We are to give thanks whether we are in the valley or on the mountaintop.
Stewardship reminds us that regardless of whether we are in a good place or a questionable place, whether we have received what we wanted or we are disappointed that we haven’t acquired what we thought we should, God still asks us to thank him - not through words alone, but through our actions; through our commitment to him and to his church; through our tithes and our offerings; through our pledges of money and time and talents. That is how we truly thank God - not just lip service, but the actual returning of a part of all that God has given us.
God realizes that the giving of our money and our time and our talents takes a special kind of commitment; a special kind of faith; an enormous amount of trust. It means believing the passage from Romans - “In all things God works good for those who love him.” Those are tough words to hear when your life is in disarray; when you feel like you are Joseph in the bottom of a pit; but you know, there isn’t much left if we can’t depend upon the words of God. These are words of great promise, of great hope; words from a God who loves you more than you can ever realize.
There is a great peace that comes within you when you can take these words and apply to them to yourself and to your giving. When you can live a life of gratitude; when you can give thanks in everything and you can return to God a portion of what he has given to you.

Amen.