Thank You!

(This is an abridged version of the sermon preached at Epworth Chapel, Baltimore on 11/20/11)

"Praise the Lord! O give thanks to the Lord, for God is good, for God’s steadfast love endures forever. Who can utter the mighty doings of the Lord, or declare all God’s praise?" (Psalm 106:1-2)


It has been suggested that there is an infectious disease that is permeating our land. It is the disease of ingratitude. We live in an age where many people have forgotten how to say “thank you.” Ingratitude has overtaken us.

If you know like I know, there is a certain irony that can be found here, in that we are more blessed than we have ever been in the history of civilization. We are blessed with technological advances, and material things that our foreparents could have only dreamt about.

Many of us are blessed to have finer homes, and larger cars, and more expensive clothing than ever thought we should or could possess. Many of us are blessed to be more educated and to have better jobs, and some of us even have a few more dollars in the bank. We’re blessed.

But still many people today are infected with this disease of ingratitude. For some reason many people are ungrateful, and seem not to know how to say “thank you.”

I remember growing up, and being taught as one of the first lessons of life how to say “please” and “thank you.” It was engrained into our very being as young people that if you wanted somebody to do something for you… you’d first say “please.” And once somebody was kind enough to do something for you, however small or large it was, the appropriate response was to say “thank you.”

Now it seems that many people think that it is their right that somebody would do something for them. They have the audacity – the nerve – the unmitigated gall – to ask without saying “please,” and to receive without saying “thank you.” Ingratitude is in our midst.

In Psalm 106, we find the psalmist reminding those who would hear with these words, “O give thanks to the Lord for God is good; God’s steadfast love endures forever.

This is a word of reminder to the faithful. In order that their faith might be well-founded and properly grounded, in order that their hope and perspective might be sustained, the psalmist sent them a lesson in thanksgiving. In order to improve their aptitude for praise, and enhance their attitude of gratitude, the psalmist here offers words of instruction as to the conditions in which the believers of this day were to render their appreciation, and say “thank you” to the Lord.

In similar words of encouragement, the apostle Paul wrote to the church at Thessalonica and said, “In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God concerning you.” (1 Thess. 5:18)

What Paul was saying to the congregation is that the zenith of Christian conduct is to be able to say “thank you.” In everything give thanks, Paul says.

Here, in Thessalonians we find that the apostle Paul was en-route to Rome with a layover in Corinth when he wrote his first letter to the young church at Thessalonica. Paul was aware that the church there would have its ups and downs, its risings and fallings. It is apparent above all else, that the people in the midst of whatever they were going through, had forgotten how to say “Thank You” to the Lord.

And so Paul says that we are to give thanks in all things. Herein lays the real challenge of faith and life. If we are to follow Paul’s instruction, we will develop the capacity to give thanks for the good and the bad of life. We will be able to give thanks in ups as well as in downs, in the sunshine and the rain, in life and in death, in triumph and in trial.

The psalmist encourages us to give thanks - in other words, to say "Thank You!" If we affirm what the psalmist wrote, we can affirm that God is good. This speaks to the very nature of who God is. The Lord is good. This is the acknowledgement of the omni-benevolence of that Lord, that the Lord is God in all God’s ways.
• From the rising of the sun, to the going down of the same, God is good.
• In ups and downs, God is good.
• In joy and even in sadness, the Lord is good.
• In times of prosperity and even in times of need, the Lord is good.

O, give thanks to the Lord, for God is good. God’s steadfast love endures forever. Oh that people of faith will find a reason to be grateful in the days that are before us.

When I think of the goodness of Jesus
And all that he’s done for me
My soul cries out, Hallelujah,
I thank God for blessing me!