Psalm 92:1-2 It is good to give thanks to the Lord, and to sing praises to Thy name, O Most High; to declare Thy lovingkindess in the morning, and Thy faithfulness by night. I don’t give thanks nearly as often as I should. There are so many things that I have to be thankful for: my family, a place to live, cars that drive, a job, being healthy and relatively strong, imagination, beauty, a Bible to read and a community to talk with, music and the ability to worship, electricity and technology, laughter (especially my children’s), the ability to buy food, living in America, days off, clean water, my cell phone (Sometimes), joy, words, forgiveness, grace …YHWH. It is good! And I’m thankful I can sing praises! He is reliable and faithful, no matter where I’ve been. Thank you YHWH!
Psalm 50:13-14 “…What I want instead is your true thanks to God; I want you to fulfill your vows to the Most High. Trust me in your times of trouble, and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory.” In this Psalm God is telling His faithful ones that He doesn’t need their sacrifices because He already owns all the resources of the universe and beyond. What He really wants is different – their thanks, the fulfillment of their vows, and their trust in times of trouble. I’d imagine those are the same things He wants from us. I was listening to the radio yesterday (Z88.3) and one of the DJs told a story of this woman she’d talked to who didn’t have anything to give her child for Christmas and didn’t really have any way to celebrate Christmas at all. The DJ was making the point that Christmas isn’t really about the gifts and presents and lights, but it’s about Jesus and what He’s done for us. What hit me though, was that I am so blessed! I don’t have a lot of money and most months I’m really happy to squeak by without running the accounts to zero. But God provided enough to buy gifts for my children and for my husband and me. He has been SO faithful about making sure we have what we need (not what we want, but always what we need) and then a little extra. That story really made me realize how much He blesses us. Trusting God in times of trouble sounds like it would be easy, but it’s easy for my first thing to do is try to fix it myself. Of course, that usually makes a bigger mess… But trust is hard for everyone, I think. So often when we trust people or things our trust is broken. I see this in politics a ton, but also in day-to-day life (someone says they’ll do something but they forget about it). We trust big companies to make products that help us but find out later they make them specifically to break down after a certain amount of time so that we’ll all have to go buy more stuff… The list goes on. So trust is hard. But God wants us to trust Him. In fact, He promises to rescue us if we trust Him! That’s a pretty nice deal! But, I suspect that we have to completely trust Him, without holding on to that last bit of rope. We have to completely open our hands and trust that He’s got us. That’s kind of scary for most people, I think. Ultimately, we can tithe all we want and we can give God things all we’d like, but what God wants is our thanks, or honesty, and our trust. That’s not too much to ask, is it?
Zechariah 7:9-10 This is what the LORD Almighty says: Judge fairly and honestly, and show mercy and kindness to one another. Do not oppress widows, orphans, foreigners, and poor people. And do not make evil plans to harm each other. You’d think that these guidelines would be common sense, that people would do this naturally. However, maybe it’s because of the sin in our world that we no longer naturally judge fairly and honestly, are merciful and kind, and take care of others. I suppose if you look at the news it’s even more obvious that these laws are broken all the time… But then you hear stories that bring a smile to your face. This morning on the news (while I was waiting for my computer to wake up – it’s worse than I am!) I heard a story about a law firm here in Orlando that is giving away 1000 turkeys for Thanksgiving! I thought that was awesome! There were some men lined up at 4am to get a turkey for their family because they didn’t have the money to buy one otherwise. In a time when the message seems to be all about plenty and getting more and more and more I am challenged to remember just how blessed I am. Have times been easy? No! But God has so faithfully provided us with everything we need, and a little extra to do some things for Christmas. No matter how many packs of diapers we’ve needed or how much food the little ones were packing away, He’s always put the money there to cover it. We are healthy (mostly) and have good doctors to get us well if we need it. We have a place to live that is comfortable. We have family that loves us. We have a church we love. We are truly blessed. There is still honestly and goodness and kindness in the world. No, it’s not everywhere, but little things like the generosity of this law firm remind me of how much we’ve been given and that there are people who want to do good for others. So, as we start out this holiday season (or continue in it, depending on your perspective), I want to remember to give a little more away – even if it’s just a kind word or deed. I think that makes God smile. And that’s a great thing!