Community Church Sermons

Year A

November 20, 2011

Pentecost 23

Thanks - Giving

Matthew 25:31-46

Rev. Martin C. Singley, III

Senior Pastor

LISTEN IN!

How would you like to be healthier? Be more resilient for facing life’s crises? Develop better cognitive skills? Be able to undo the effects of stress in your life and become less anxious? How would you like to live longer, laugh louder, and be younger than your years would ever suggest?

Or, put another way, how would you like to be unhealthier, less able to face crises, have diminishing cognitive abilities, have more stress, die earlier without much laughter, and come across to others as being an old goat?

Psychological studies clearly demonstrate that you can achieve either of these states of being by simply practicing – or not practicing – the art of…gratitude.

People who are thankful, these studies show – who practice the art of gratitude - achieve a better quality of life than those who do not. Experts refer to this as “the power of thank-you.”

Today is Thanksgiving Sunday! Next Thursday we will celebrate our wonderful American Thanksgiving holiday! This is a special season set aside to help us recapture and learn once again to practice this amazing therapeutic power of gratitude.

And we so desperately need it!

Have you noticed lately that the headlines are full of all that’s wrong with the world? From Occupy Wall St. to the scandal at Penn State we are bombarded day in and day out with commentary about how messed up life is. Even here in our own little corner of the world, conversations abound about our personal aches and pains, and complaints about this and that. I’m not saying that some of us are chronic complainers. I’m saying that most of us are chronic complainers.

And it’s not that these things that are wrong in the world are unimportant, or should be ignored. By no means! There are plenty of things around us that are not right and need to be fixed. But complaining is not the way to solve them. All complaining does is to fill us up with stress and – even worse – to cause others to disrespect and not listen to us. You know this is true, don’t you? We have a saying in our family that goes like this: “No one likes a whiner.” And along with that, we like to say, “Would you like some cheese with that whine?” Complainers lose the respect of others.

So in a world like this with its many challenges, and in families like ours with all their deficiencies, and in lives like ours with lots of blemishes and frustrations, what can we do to strengthen our ability to live successfully and meet the challenges we face?

The Bible says it in two words: give thanks.

In 1621, when the Pilgrim people at Plimouth Plantation gathered with the Wampanoag tribe to celebrate the first Thanksgiving, it was not out of an abundance of good news. Things were tough. Half the people who had arrived on the Mayflower had died that first winter. The harvest that next fall was pretty scarce. As a second winter approached, there was much to be anxious about.

So they gave thanks.

Do you know why?

I find it very meaningful that every year on this Sunday we celebrate two special days. One, of course, is Thanksgiving. The other is Christ the King Sunday. Today is the last Sunday of the liturgical year. The year began 12 months ago on the first Sunday in Advent. We walked together through the time of waiting for Christ’s birth, and then we celebrated his coming among us at Christmas. Twelve days later, we rejoiced in the season of Epiphany when the arrival of the magi from the east revealed that the whole world is included in God’s gift of love. Then we walked with Jesus through his three-year ministry, and during the season of Lent we followed him to the cross. But then came Easter, with shouts of, “He is risen!” Then we learned together about how WE are to live as Christians – first waiting for the power of the Spirit to come upon us at Pentecost – and then spending week after week learning how to obey Jesus’ only commands: to love God, and to love neighbor. And through all these times and seasons, life has happened to us. Sorrows have come, along with joy. There have been good times and bad times, times of plenty and times of want. And finally we have come to this day, Christ the King Sunday. A whole year has come and gone – and God is still on the throne! Our lives are surrounded by his promises. He is our shepherd and we are the sheep of his flock. His blessings fall freely upon us day after day. Through life - and even death – God keeps our lives and gives us the victory through our Lord, Jesus Christ.

And so the Pilgrim people gave thanks. And the power of gratitude gave them the strength to go on! Thanks-giving reminded them that God is still on the throne and will be faithful through all the changing seasons of life!

So what does gratitude look like?

Sometimes we lose our ability to give thanks or offer gratitude because we have been taught to “count our blessings.” Counting blessings is a good thing, but it is not really thanks-giving.

Here is what thanks-giving looks like:

A week or so ago, an email came through our church web site. It meant a lot to me. This is what it said:

“Please pass this on. I am an American Baptist pastor in Iowa who has followed the sermons of this church for some years now. Yesterday was the first anniversary of my mother's death and I want to say how very touched I was by the sermon on heaven and life and the illustration about Pastor Singley's mother.”

And then it simply said, “Thank you.”

That email made my day!

Thanks-giving is not something you feel. It is something you do – gratitude you express to someone else for something you received from them.

Deborah Norville has a book titled, Thank You Power. It is a wonderful book that has helped many people learn the power of “Thank you!” After it was published, she was invited back to speak at an event in her hometown of Dalton, Georgia. She describes her speech this way: “I talked about scout leaders, my fourth grade teacher, the Jaycees who sponsored the Junior Miss pageant that pointed me toward the TV path. I talked about what it was like growing up in a town where everyone knew who your daddy was... and consequently one behaved as a result. I reminded the audience that my hometown was a place where we celebrated other's achievements and figuratively hugged one another during the disappointments. I tried to publicly thank individuals who, all these years later, I still recognize as having a positive impact on making me the person I have become.” She went on to mention her dad and all three of her sisters, the lady who helped run the family office, the mother of her first boyfriend, her dear friend from high school, the man who headed the Jaycee's Junior Miss competition, the man who pointed the spotlight during the show, her scout leader's husband, the lady she used to babysit for, her high school pal's dad, and her backyard neighbor growing up. They were all there, and she used the opportunity to say, “Thank you!” to each one.

Thanks-giving is not something you feel. It is something you DO.

And it begins with saying “Thank you!” to God.

So many people find it difficult to pray. They have a hard time knowing what to say. So let me help you out with this and encourage you to pray like this: at the end of each day, make a list of the gifts God gave you that day. Waking up to another day of life. Air to breathe. Beauty to see. The love of family. Friends. Good food to eat. Sinking that fifth putt.

There is nothing in this world that you or anyone else owns. The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it! So see what kind of list you can come up with of all the good things God sent your way that day. And simply pray, “Thank you, God.” The prayer of thanksgiving is a simple, but powerful prayer.

And while thanks-giving begins with saying “Thank you!” to God, it continues with expressing, “Thank you!” to people who have enriched your life.

Write a thank-you letter to that third-grade teacher of yours who made a difference in your life. Send a letter to the editor of your hometown paper expressing gratitude for how that community shaped your growing up. Call your mother – and/or father - and simply say, “Thanks.” Send a text to your grandkids and tell them what they mean to you. Telephone and thank that person who long ago gave you a chance to get into your career. Come up after the service today and hug a choir member for the beautiful music they give you each Sunday.

There are millions of ways to say, “Thank you.” But they all start with practicing gratitude. Each day, take time to think back over your life. Let your mind take you back to childhood – to school and college – to military service – to church – to neighborhoods – to…wherever your mind takes you, and REMEMBER. Remember the people and circumstances that brought blessing to your life. Give thanks to God for those people and moments. And then figure out how to say, “Thank you!” directly to them.

And one more way to say “Thank you!”

Our Gospel lesson tells of the day the Christ the King comes and judges the world. To some, the King says “Come and enter the beautiful life God has prepared for you – for I was hungry and you gave me something to eat - I was thirsty and you gave me drink – I was a stranger and you befriended me – I was naked and you clothed me, sick and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.”

All the people are amazed by these words. “When, Lord, did we ever see you in any of these situations?”

And Christ – the King – says, “Whenever you did it to the least of these, my brothers and sisters, you did it unto me.”

The ultimate expression of thanks-giving – is giving. How we share our blessings with others is the standard by which our lives are judged. And so I want to say to all of you who have helped provide Thanksgiving turkeys for our neighbors in need – and to each one here today who shares the blessings of their life with others through Good Samaritan and Good Shepherd, through scholarships and the Child Advocacy Center, through Habitat for Humanity and the Good Neighbors Shoppe, and all of the other ways our church family reaches out to bless others…

…thank you.

May this Thanksgiving Season remind us all of the power of “Thank you!”

And may Christ the King be glorified with every cup of cold water offered to those who are thirsty.

Happy Thanksgiving!