be more optimistic,
have more social connections
just be happier than people around you?
Would you like to be less depressed,
envious,
greedy,
or prone to addictions?
How about having more money,
sleep more soundly,
exercise more regularly,
and have a greater resistance to viral infections?
Would you like your children and teens to be less materialistic,
get better grades,
set higher goals,
complain of fewer headaches and stomach aches,
and feel more satisfied with their family, friends and schools?
I know this all this sounds too good to be true doesn’t it? But a decade long study published last year in the Wall Street Journal said that all of this is reflected in people’s lives when their lives are characterized by one thing - gratitude. A lifestyle of giving thanks leads to better attitudes, better health, better relationships and just a better life which is why God tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:18 to give thanks in all circumstances. God commands us to give thanks because God knows that a lifestyle of thanks-giving is physically, emotionally, mentally and relationally good for us.
So how do we cultivate a deep spirit of thanksgiving? How do we order our lives so that gratitude flows from us in all circumstances? Well, we don’t develop this spirit of thanksgiving by eating turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce one day a year. That may be how we celebrate Thanksgiving but it is not how we cultivate a life of giving thanks. We cultivate a grateful heart and a thankful spirit by following the principles we see in the actions of the one leper who returned to Jesus. Luke 17 is the only place this story is told and it is a familiar one, Jesus heals 10 lepers but only one of them returns to say thank you. Jesus response to the leper is, your faith has made you well.
As I was reflecting on those words it struck me that all 10 lepers had faith in Jesus. All of them looked to Jesus for healing, all of them followed Jesus’ command to go and show themselves to the priest and all of them are healed, and so they all had faith in Jesus, so what is this faith that Jesus is talking about here. Maybe the faith Jesus sees and mentions here isn’t a belief in him, but a spirit of thanks giving. What set this man apart from the other lepers is that he was grateful for what was happening in his life and so he returned to Jesus to say thank you and it is that gratitude which Jesus sees here, and it is that grateful heart that brings a wholeness to this man’s life that the other 9 didn’t experience. But this wholeness in life doesn’t come from Jesus. Jesus doesn’t offer this man some kind of bonus healing because he returned to say thank you, what Jesus is saying is that because this man has a spirit of gratitude that guides his life – he is going to experience more wholeness and health than the other nine. So Jesus was saying here what a decade long study in 2000 years later has proved – those who are grateful will experience more wholeness and happiness in life. So what can we learn from this man about how to cultivate a spirit of thanksgiving.
The first things we see in this leper is that along with the other nine, he cried out to God in his need. Lepers were a pretty helpless group of people. They did not have the ability to make themselves clean. If a skin disease didn’t clear up quickly, then it was most likely going to be considered leprosy which meant that the person had to be cut off from the larger community so that the disease would not spread. That these 10 lepers were all together tells us that they had probably tried everything to get better and nothing had worked. So here they are cut off from the larger community, unable to get themselves clean or healthy on their own and so in desperation cry out to Jesus who they believe can help them. Not only had these lepers heard about Jesus power to heal but they heard that he was willing to heal the poor and outcast. While no one else would help them, they had faith that Jesus would so they humble themselves and cry out to Jesus.
Having a thankful heart and grateful spirit requires an element of humility. Giving thanks calls us to have a basic understanding that what we have and what we need in life isn’t always going to be found in ourselves so we need to look to God and others for help. I think the Pilgrims in that first thanksgiving had that same spirit. They knew they needed help if they were going to survive in this new land and so they humbled themselves before God but also reached out and took help from the natives who were here. It was the Native Americans who taught the Pilgrims how to use the resources of this land to help them grow crops and find food which enabled them to survive that first year.
So gratitude requires humility. Before we give thanks we have to acknowledge our own needs, but humility and crying out in times of need is not easy. Too often we see humility or acknowledging our need as a sign of weakness but in reality it is the first step toward giving thanks which is the key to a healthier life. So to really give thanks we need to ask ourselves what need we have today that God can meet? What power of God do we need to experience in our lives? If it is a need for healing or forgiveness or peace – God wants to help. If it is a need for physical support or inspiration or encouragement – God’s people want to help. The question is whether or not we will cry out to God and ask for help. Are we willing to stop trusting in ourselves to provide all that we need and start looking to God and others? Are we willing to stop thinking that we can do it all on our own and start asking people around us for help? We need to see this kind of humility not as weakness but as the pathway to giving thanks and experiencing wholeness and power in life.
So the lepers cry out to Jesus because they have exhausted every other option. There is nothing else they can do to help themselves so they turn to Jesus and Jesus tells them to go and show themselves to the priest who is the only one who can declare them clean. Now all 10 lepers have faith in Jesus power to heal so they all begin to make their way to the priest and as they go they are made clean, but it says that the one who returned to Jesus saw that he was healed. Now obviously all 10 saw that they were being healed, they could see their skin turning healthy and as they went they celebrated this healing but while the other 9 just kept going the one who had a grateful spirit stopped. He stopped the direction he was going, he stopped what he was doing and he took the time to really take note of what was going on in his life. He not only noticed that his skin was healing but he thought about why it was happening and who was responsible for it. He stopped and thought about what God was doing in his life and that is the second key to a thankful spirit.
A thankful spirit requires us to stop and recognize what God is doing in our lives and how God’s power and grace is helping us and moving us forward. Again, I think this is what the Pilgrims did that first thanksgiving. They stopped in the midst of a busy season to recognize what God had done during the past year and what God was doing in their lives at that moment. Think about what a busy time it was for the Pilgrims. While the harvest may have been over – they were still preparing for the winter and to take a couple of days out of their preparations to acknowledge all that God was doing is significant. Sometimes we tell ourselves that we are too busy to stop and reflect or too busy to stop and take note of all that God is doing in our lives but gratitude requires us to take this time.
I know that this coming week is usually a busy one for all of us. We have family visiting or maybe we are travelling to visit family. We have meals to plan, Christmas shopping to begin, football to watch and hunting trips to get ready for – it’s a busy time and it’s all good and fun things that we want to be busy with – but in the midst of it all can we take some time to stop and take note of what God is doing in our lives? What has God done in our lives this past year? How have we seen God’s power and how have we experienced God’s provision? What blessings has God provided for us and what blessings do we see as part of our lives today? We will never be able to give thanks if we don’t take the time to notice all the things that God is doing for which we need to give thanks.
And let’s not just look back and give thanks – let’s also look forward. I don’t think this one leper was looking back on his old life when he came to Jesus; he was looking to all the open doors and opportunities that this healing was going to bring him. He knew that this healing would help reunite him with his family. He knew this healing would open the door for him to literally be able to feel the touch and embrace of his loved ones. He would be able to connect to society once again, worship in the temple and eat at the table with his friends. So many open doors were in front of him and he was grateful for them all. Too many times at our Thanksgiving tables we only look back when we think about giving thanks and while that is a good thing to do, I would challenge us to also look forward. What is the open door and new opportunity for which we are thankful for today? How is God leading us into the future? What is God’s plan for us because God does have a plan for us – Jeremiah 29:11-13. God has a plan for our future and God wants to share that plan with us and we will hear about that plan when we stop and begin to take note of all God is doing in our lives.
So we cultivate a lifestyle of giving thanks by crying out to God in humility and stopping long enough to notice how God is meeting those needs and leading us into the future, but there is one more step in a lifestyle of gratitude that we see in this one leper and that is to physically give thanks. The leper stopped in his tracks, turned on his heels, returned to Jesus and fell face down on the ground in front of him to say thank you. These are not casual words of gratitude here, these are physical and intentional acts of giving thanks to God and we need to find intentional and physical acts of giving thanks that we can make part of our lives as well.
What physical way of thanking God can we embrace this week? Maybe it is taking a physical posture in times of worship, praise and prayer. Maybe when we pray we need to simply open our hands to God as a sign of humility or as a way of saying that we know that what we need in life will come from God. Maybe it will mean kneeling in prayer each morning or evening, or lifting our arms to God because we know that we need God to take us by the hand and lead us. Maybe the physical act is to literally count our blessings and write them out so that we can see all God is doing in our lives. I have seen a number of people on fb recently place in their status every day this month a list of things they are thankful for. Each day they are simply taking time to take note of what God has done and is doing in their lives and they are physically giving thanks.
Another intentional act might be to write out a prayer of thanksgiving to use in our family meal. My Grandfather did that and I am blessed to have those prayers, all written before I was born. These prayers were shared at the table with my family and they reflect the intentional sitting down and counting of God’s blessings. What a gift it might be to your Grandchildren if you wrote out a prayer of thanksgiving and began a tradition of passing those prayers on to your family. Another intentional act might be to read some of the psalms of thanksgiving and I have listed 7 of them in the next steps so we can read one everyday this week. Maybe we need to read it out loud as a prayer so we can hear with our own ears some of the things we need to be thankful for. We train and condition our hearts and develop a deep attitude of thanksgiving by intentionally and at times physically giving thanks to God. All of these intentional acts will shape our attitudes and cultivate the lifestyle of gratitude that we want to embrace.
I hope that this week won’t just be a time of visiting with family, eating food, shopping with the crowds or getting ready for camp, I hope this week we will work to cultivate a lifestyle of giving thanks that will carry us through the rest of this year and into the next. Giving thanks every day will change us, it will bring us more of the life we want to live and more of the life God has to offer.
Next Steps:
Cry out to God. Identify a need in your heart, life, or relationships that needs God’s grace and power. Name it to God this week.
Stop and take notice. Take time out of this busy week to stop and look at your life. Make note of all that God is doing. Make a list of the past and current blessings but also open doors and new opportunities God is giving you.
Thank God. Find intentional and physical ways to thank God.
• Write a prayer of thanks (and use on Thanksgiving).
• Prayer walk your house and thank God for something or someone in each room.
• Take a posture of giving thanks during a time of prayer or thanksgiving: kneel, open your hands to God, bow your head, raise your arms.
• Read a Psalm of Thanksgiving (perhaps out loud) every day this week: Psalm 65, 95, 100, 103, 105, 108, 116
