Boxing Day sales have become an expected, if unfortunate, part of our sadly shriveled western culture. I hadn't realized that Thanksgiving has succumbed, too. (No criticism meant of Dave Warlick--he's just the messenger.)
Contrast this from David Guretzki, who explores the fatal choice in Eden as "an act of ingratitude!":
I think of how small children (and maybe us more often than we want to
admit!) can have dozens of toys to choose from, but only want the one that
they do not have or have been kept from playing with. It is hard to imagine
that truly thankful persons would be tempted to covet that which has been
withheld from them. It is only when we are no longer thankful for that which
we already have that our ingratitude leads us to disobey God by coveting
that which we do not have. And it is then, perhaps, that we are most tempted
to get what we want in ways that we know can only be displeasing to God.
Perhaps on this Thanksgiving weekend, we need to be reminded that being
thankful is not just something good to do alongside all the other good
things we should do. Rather, being thankful might be the very essence of
what it means to live Christianly in a world where "getting more" is what we
are told life is all about. As Paul says in Colossians 2:6-7, "So then, just
as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and
built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and
overflowing with thankfulness." In Christ, we have all that we need. The
question is, Are we thankful for what we have received in him?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment