Think to thank God daily
“It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to thy name. O most High; to declare thy steadfast love in the morning, and thy faithfuless by night ...” (Psalm 92)
In many of the services of the Orthodox Church, this verse from the 92nd Psalm is said just before the dismissal.
Just before we leave the place of worship to go our separate ways and face our separate problems, we are reminded that “it is good to give thanks to the Lord.”
Whatever uplift we may have gotten in public worship will quickly evaporate if we fail to engage is some kind of private thanksgiving: “... to declare God’s steadfast love in the morning, and His faithfulness by night.”
On Thursday, our nation will observe a Day of Thanksgiving.
For most citizenry it is an observance and little more. That is to say, a thing observed rather than felt, a looking on rather than an involvement in.
But if our hearts have been touched at all by the bounty of God, then Thanksgiving is continuous. It never ends.
But the question can well be asked whether a man can be moved to adore God before he has learned to thank Him.
Even the pagan Cicero claimed that “a thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue, but the parent of all other virtues.”
The first offspring of thanking is thinking. The two do come from a common root, you know.
A thank is a thought. A good thought is a good thank.
A man was asked what he was most thankful for. He thought a moment, then he answered, “I thank God for God!”
That’s really getting to the center of things.
We pause long enough to analyze the feelings of gratitude we experience, and we find that they proceed ultimately to the source of grace.
We give grace for the sense of His nearness and watchfulness, His “steadfast love in the morning, and His faithfulness by night.”
It’s amazing how the perspective of things changes when we think through to the first cause, as the theologians say.
We realize that God is at work in His world; things are not just happening; His will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven; and our world, shabby and shaky as it appears, can redeem itself through God’s grace and one day will.
Thinking then is the first product of thanking.
It lead the Psalmist David to some very profound questions.
As his heart overflows in songs of praise, suddenly he is struck with a question, “What shall I render to the Lord for all His bounty to me?”
David looked about him suddenly, and he thought: “How much I have! How blessed I am! But these things have not come to me out of any self-sufficiency, but out of God’s graciousness. They are mine, but I must owe something in return for all this. What am I able to give?”
And a few verses later, in the 116th Psalm, he finds an answer to this question of questions: “I will offer thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving.”
As thinking is a basic by-product of thanking, so is appreciation.
I don’t mean the word in the sense we commonly use it. I mean it as the opposite of depreciate.
Appreciation is the process of adding to the value of a thing. A kindness that goes unacknowledged seems only half as valuable as one for which thanks are sincerely returned.
So a gift for which the giver is thanked is an appreciated gift, that is, its value has been enhanced in the thanking.
We add magically to the intrinsic worth of everything we see and touch when we thank God for it.
There is a skill to it, and that skill is the special gift of a thankful heart.
And now one final offspring of thanking.
The relationship suggests itself in the word thanksgiving.
When we learn to think, and learn to appreciate, we also learn to give. It is the inevitable corollary of true and deeply felt gratitude.
The Psalmist David had to find some concrete way to make his thanksgiving to God real and meaningful. He did it by going before his people and inspiring them with his own feelings.
We need to find some tangible way to pronounce our thanksgivings, and that is what makes a thankful spirit one of the most dynamic forces in the world.
This explains in part the immense power of the early Church.
Paul placed much emphasis on giving.
He understood the deep spirit of giving and he taught the people to understand it.
To the Corinthians he wrote: “... for as a piece of willing service this is not only a contribution towards the needs of God’s people: more than that, it overflows in a flood of thanksgiving to God.” (2 Corinthians 9:12)
Paul knew very well that the practical net result would mean little without the intangible spiritual dividends.
The Rev. Daniel Rohan is pastor of St. Mark Orthodox Church in Liberty.