In E^er^thing Gr?e TKanks Reprinted from A n O ld Magazine. A Message Christians Everywhere A re Needing • BY HANNAH WHITALL SMITH, London Foundation Text: 1 Thess. 5:18.
who would not for the world omit an immediate note of thanks upon the re ception of any gift however trifling from a human friend, hut who have never given God real thanks for any one of the innumerable benefits He has been showering upon them all their lives long. And be not drunk with wine, wherein is ex cess; but be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.—Eph. 5:18-20. “Giving thanks always for all things;” not for a certain class of things only, not for instance for so called religious things only, but for all things, spiritual and temporal, things that look good and things that look bad, pleasant things and unpleasant things, for everything in short that God sends, or, what is the same thing, permits to come. “AH things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made that was made.” Therefore, however it may look on the surface, those who have eyes that can see below surfaces know that God is in everything, and behind everything, and that nothing can hap pen outside of His love and His care. For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving: for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.—II Tim. 4:4, 5. For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God.—II Cor. 4:15. The reason we do not give thanks in everything is partly because we do not really believe that every creature o i God is good and because instead of believing that “ all things are for our sakes,” we believe a great many things are entirely against us. God’s gifts look often so much like curses instead
Jn everything give thanks j for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
TERB are three things to emphasize in this passage. First, that we are to give thanks, second that we are to give thanks in every thing, and third, that this is God’s will concerning you.
I am afraid we do not always read this as it is written. We change the words “give thanks” into “be resigned,” and the words “everything,” into a “few things,” and leave out altogether the words “this is the will of God concern ing you.” Have we ever come face to face with the fact that it is absolutely God’s will that we should give thanks in everything? Have we ever even imagined that we could do it? I am afraid the greatest height to which many Christians have risen is to strive after being resigned to most things and patiently to endure them; but actually to give thanks, that seems like an im possibility, and they entirely overlook the fact that God has commanded it, and that therefore it must be possible. The result is that thanksgiving is al most an unknown exercise among Chris tians, and that, instead of giving thanks in everything, many of God’s children hardly give thanks in anything. I very much fear indeed that Christians as a body are a thankless set. It is consid ered in the world a very uncourteous thing for one man to receive benefits from another man and fail to thank him; and I cannot see why it is not just as uncourteous a thing not to thank God, And yet we find people
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