Giving Thanks in 2020
By: Dan Seale
My mind was blank. Absolutely nothing good was coming to me. A friend had just asked , “What are you thankful for in 2020?” What immediately came to mind were the many frustrations and trials. How about you? What are you thankful for in 2020? Hopefully, you are not freezing like me. It took my beloved wife, Debbi, to remind me of some amazing things in 2020. One daughter graduated from college and was married. One daughter and her family moved into the area. Another moved to Tennessee and is involved in a good church and found a job with a great company. The mental dam was broken, and my mind began to recount many things big and small for which I was thankful.
Psalm 136 calls us to give thanks to the Lord because he is good, and his steadfast love endures forever. That word, steadfast (hesed), could be translated covenant love, loyal love. The fullness of God’s covenant loyal love is seen in the cross where Jesus, the loyal one was treated as a covenant breaker, taking our sin and judgment upon himself and that the unfaithful might be clothed in his righteousness. This covenant loyal love will never let us go. No matter what trials and hardships we face we know nothing will separate us from His love (Romans 8:28-30. 37-39).
But what about all the pain and hardship of 2020? How are we supposed to sort through our loss and grief associated with this year? God’s goodness may seem less apparent in hard times. James tells us to count it all joy when we face trials. Is James just trying to put lipstick on a pig and do some kind of positive thinking mumbo jumbo? Not at all. James is not inviting us to call evil good or to deny suffering. He commands to look beyond the circumstance to the possible result. His command to count it all joy is rooted in the reality that it is often through hardship and trial that our faith and character grow. The path to maturity is through challenging times.
Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect that you may be perfect (mature) and complete, lacking in nothing.
James 1:2-4
James is reminding us that growth often comes through trials and suffering. Peter, in a similar manner, tells us to rejoice in trials because they refine and test the genuineness of our faith (1 Peter 1:6-7). Though it feels counter-intuitive, 2020, a year of trials and suffering, may have given us many reasons to give thanks as our faith has been tried, tested, and refined. In these challenging times, we have had more occasion to turn to the Lord in the faith and repentance and trust.
Often trials and suffering cause us to question God’s love or care for us. It can feel as if God is against us or angry with us. Charles Spurgeon pastors our doubting hearts by painting a word picture of God as a gardener tenderly and with great care working on our lives through intentional but painful pruning so that we might blossom and flourish.
“There are times when, without any anger in his heart, but with designs of love toward them, God treats his children, outwardly, as if he were an enemy to them. See the gardener going up to that beautiful tree. He takes out a sharp knife, feels its edge to be sure that it is keen, and then he begins pruning it here, gashing it there, and making it to bleed in another place, as if he were going to cut it all to pieces. Yet all that is not because he has any anger against the tree, but, on the contrary, because he greatly values it, and wishes it to bring forth more fruit than it has ever done. Do not think that God's sharpest knife means death to his loved ones; it means more life, and richer, fuller life.”
Join me and take some time over the next few days to reflect on where has God been at work, lovingly, tenderly, wisely, pruning your life to produce more fruit for his glory and your good. Maybe even write out a thanksgiving psalm to Him.
Give thanks to the Lord for he is good and his steadfast (covenant love) endures forever.
Happy Thanksgiving!