Week one of our Faith Study at Bethany focused on the first section of Diana Butler Bass’ book Grateful: The Transformative Power of Giving Thanks.
Summarizing that first section here are some gems to consider:
Two Bible texts that immediately come to mind…
Psalm 100
Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth.
Worship the Lord with gladness;
come into his presence with singing.
Know that the Lord is God.
It is he that made us, and we are his;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
and his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him, bless his name.
For the Lord is good;
his steadfast love endures forever,
and his faithfulness to all generations.
1 Thessalonians 5:18
Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
Recollection of a Table Grace at Thanksgiving where every person was put on the spot, asked to name something s/he was thankful for. The silence was deafening. People struggle to name something they are thankful for, amidst all of the struggles and stress of life people don’t always know what they are thankful for. They feel guilty about it because they should know so they name something vague, something others expect, rather than an authentic response from the heart. We need to learn the language of gratitude if we are going to use the language of gratitude.
Butler Bass believes that we can still, eventually, get to a place of private gratitude. With time and reflection most of us can and do prize gratitude, experience gratitude, appreciate gratitude, and strongly feel gratitude when something happens to me. At the same time she feels that as a society, in community, see look around and see what others have and feel dissatisfaction, why do they have that when I don’t, after all I deserve it too.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer says of gratitude: “In normal life one is not at all aware that we always receive infinitely more than we give, and that gratitude is what enriches life. One easily overestimates the importance of one’s own acts and deeds, compared with what we become only through other people.”
Duty-based gratitude is emotionally empty and causes resentment. It is easy to suspect that benefits are given to exert control by, or forge loyalty to, an unscrupulous benefactor. Obligatory gratitude rarely has a heart.
Gifts exist before benefactors, the universe is a gift, life is a gift, air, light, soil, and water are gifts. Everything we need is here, with us, we freely respond to these gifts by choosing a life of mutual care.
Grace—gifts given without being earned and with no expectation of return—is, as the old hymn says, amazing. Because you can neither earn nor pay back the gift, your heart fills with gratitude.
Matthew 5:45 so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. The gifts come to all, regardless of moral orientation or past deeds and successes.
Luke 14 One time when Jesus went for a Sabbath meal with one of the top leaders, all the guests had their eyes on him, watching his every move…Jesus turned to the host and said, “The next time you put on a dinner, don’t just invite your friends and family and rich neighbours, the kind of people who will return the favour. Invite some people who never get invited out, the misfits from the wrong side of the tracks. You’ll be—and experience—a blessing. They won’t be able to return the favour, but the favour will be returned—oh, how it will be returned! If one is invited to the Table without merit or status, only because the host wishes to make a free gift then the guest can feel nothing but pure gratitude.
Of course cannot be thankful for everything, every experience. Telling victims to be grateful for trauma, violence, or abuse only wounds those who have suffered and empowers the perpetrators…Gratitude cannot and should never be forced or faked, and it never appropriate to cover up or deny abuse or excuse injustice.
“Life is the first gift,” said poet Marge Piercy, “love is the second, and understanding the third.” Gratitude is not about stuff.