Top Level Thanksgiving Series

Leslie Weatherhead tells the story of the 5 year old boy use to listen to the radio even

though he could not understand anything but the children's programs. He observed that his

parents listened every day to what was called the news. He could make nothing of that. One

Sunday morning he went into his mother's bedroom where the radio had been turned low so

as not to disturb the baby. Assuming it was the news, he listened and heard a word he

recognized. The speaker kept using the word God. He took off down the stairs to the

kitchen where his grandmother was preparing a meal, and he said, "Granny, you had better

turn on the radio. It's the news, but today it's about God." If ever the world needed to hear

news about God, it is today. God news is good news, for God is good and the source of all

that leads to thanksgiving.

If we live in a world of diminishing gratitude, it is because we live in a world retreating

from God. Gamaliel Bradford expressed the minds of millions of modern materialists who

suspect that they have been short changed in their trading of God for gold. He wrote,

Of old our father's God was real,

Something they almost saw,

Which kept them to a stern ideal,

And scourged them into awe.

I sometimes wish that God were back

In this dark world and wide;

For though some virtues He might lack,

He had His pleasant side.

Had the poet taken some time to study the nature of God he would find that the only

reason God had an unpleasant side, and must be a God of judgment, is because of men like

himself who push God out onto the fringes of life, and put idols in the center. The modern

American is in danger of forgetting his heritage, and like the pagans of old, worshiping the

creature rather than the creator. Years ago a Chinese delegate to a summer conference in

America told of how an Indian, Chinese and American would react to seeing Niagara Falls

for the first time. The Indian would become deeply meditative, his mystic soul being stirred

to commune with the infinite spirit. The Chinese with his ingrained sense of family solidarity

would wish his family could be there to enjoy it with him. The American, however, would

begin immediately to figure out how much horsepower was going to waste per minute.

This is an exaggeration, but one based on the obvious fact that we as a people are

becoming so obsessed with the means of living that we are losing sight of the meaning of

living. G. K. Chesterton said that future generations will discover how miserable we were by

our daily reminder to each other that we ought to be happy. If we were a people basically

happy we would not need constant exhortations to be happy. The fact that every

Thanksgiving we sigh and say we really should be more grateful for all we have reveals how

ungrateful we are. This does not mean that most people do not appreciate having the good

things they have. It is just that it is hard to get excited about it. Turkey and all the

trimmings might turn you on temporarily, but it doesn't last. That is the problem with

materialism and thankfulness on the level of getting good things and pleasure.

Thanksgiving in the Bible is on the level where it has lasting meaning. In Psa. 118 the

author expresses thanks for many things, but notice how he begins and ends this song of

gratitude. He begins and ends with God. Only when God is the alpha and omega of our

thanks do we experience thanksgiving on the biblical level, which is the top level. We tend to

center our thanksgiving around our blessings rather than around the Blesser, and so we

loose much of the emotion and joy of a heart filled with lasting gratitude. We need to lift our

eyes to God and His goodness, and not glue them on the gifts. We must, with the Psalmist,

gaze on God's being first, and then on His blessings.

The fire of gratitude can only be kept burning bright by feeding it with the fuel that

comes directly from God's own nature. Those who rely on the fuel they can produce are

from their own nature soon become cold and ungrateful. Give thanks to God for He is good,

says the Psalmist. God is good; that is the basis for everlasting praise, and not the fact that

you have got everything you need and much beside. Start with God. "Give thanks and

praise to God above, For everlasting is His love, Praise Him ye saints, your Savior praise,

Forever good in all His ways." The first thing this great hymn of gratitude makes clear is-