(from the sermon, The Sweet Grace of Thankfulness)
Should I really thank God for everything?
Ephesians 5:20, Romans 7:24-25
As Christians, we want to thank God for everything. Do we thank God, though, as much as we should? What should we thank God for? Well, what does the scripture say? In Ephesians 5:20, it says, “Always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” So, we should thank God for everything. Well, when should we thank God? Ephesians just told us always, but there’s another verse as well. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says, “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” We should thank God for everything all the time. You may struggle with that. You might wonder, “Should I really thank God for everything?”
Many years ago, I came across an account about a Dutch Christian, Corrie Ten Boom, who was arrested by the Nazis along with her sister Betsie and her father for harboring Jewish fugitives during World War II. Upon discovery, they were arrested and sent to the Ravensbrück Concentration Camp, one of the worst concentration camps in all of Germany. It was a devastating trial in their lives, and they struggled.
Corrie and Betsie were in the woman’s compound. That area was so infested with lice and fleas that as soon as anyone walked into the structure, they would be swarmed and bitten. It was absolutely disgusting. It was a rough place, a place of physical torture and a place of death as they well knew.
Every day they would labor long hours for nothing. Occasionally care packages would come, and the women would fight like wild beasts to get whatever was inside that. It was a brutal life and very, very difficult. Betsie constantly urged Corrie to give thanks to God, to be thankful to God for everything. Corrie, depressed under the miserable circumstances, wrestled with this. Understandably, she was struggling with her attitude and replied, “One thing I will never thank God for are the fleas.” Betsie said, “Corrie, you should even thank God for the fleas. Even for the fleas.”
At the same time, they had somehow smuggled a Bible into the women’s dormitory. These courageous sisters risked their lives to hold nightly Bible studies, knowing they would be executed if they were found possessing and studying a Bible. At first, they were very timid and secretive about it. But the longer it went on, they noticed that they were never bothered by the guards. As a matter of fact, the guards never came into the women’s area at all.
the fleas gave them an opportunity to minister in the name of Jesus Christ in one of the darkest places on the face of the Earth, maybe in all history, a Nazi concentration camp.
One day Betsie came with great excitement to Corrie and said, “I want you to know I’ve finally discovered the reason why the guards never come in here. The reason is, and I overheard the guard saying, it’s the fleas, Corrie. They don’t want to get bitten with the fleas, so thank God for the fleas.” And from then on, she did. She thanked God for the fleas because the fleas gave them an opportunity to minister in the name of Jesus Christ in one of the darkest places on the face of the Earth, maybe in all history, a Nazi concentration camp. And it was the fleas that God used to carve out a place of peace where they could do that ministry.
So, we too should be thanking God for everything. And if we should thank God for fleas, how much more for those things that are counted by everyone to be blessings? We Christians should be, above all people, the most thankful. Knowing how desperate we were apart from Jesus and combining that with how lavishly we’ve been provided for in Jesus, we have all the grounds for thankfulness we’ll ever need.
What did we receive, brothers and sisters? Our cleansing, our spiritual healing came when a person named Jesus Christ stood in our place and took our lashing, our condemnation, our sentence of judgments, our ridicule, our spittings, our crown of thorns, our nails and took our death on himself. Jesus died in our place. He suffered under the wrath of God. He shed his blood and died for us, that we might have forgiveness of sins. As Romans 7:24-25 says, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”
We received full forgiveness of all our sins, past, present, and future. We are welcomed by Almighty God. We have a place waiting for us in the new heaven, the new earth where we will sit at table with Jesus Christ. We have been given all this and a thousand other spiritual blessings.
Are you trusting in him today? Do you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior? If you have never trusted in Christ, you are in great danger. You may not know it, but the scripture testifies that you are in great danger. Jesus’ sufferings picture that so we may have a sense of what we deserve for our sin. We deserve hell, and Jesus came that we might not have to suffer, that there would be no condemnation for those who are in him. Jesus died for you. Call on the name of the Lord, and you will be saved. Trust in him, and your sins will be forgiven. Thanks be to God!