Remembering the Gift – and the Giver

He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? (Romans 8:32)

            Thanksgiving ought to be a time when you and I gather around the table with loved ones and thank the Lord for the countless blessings He graciously bestows on us.

          If we’re honest, though, Thanksgiving usually is a time when you and I gather around the table wishing we had more – or, on the other extreme, waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop on our celebration.

          Perhaps this year you’ll be missing a loved one, or it’s been a tough year financially or with your health, or events simply haven’t unfolded as you had wished. It might seem like Thanksgiving is hardly an occasion on which you can be thankful. If you went through the rituals, you think to yourself, you’d just be putting on a show.

          Or on the other hand, you might gather around a bounteous table with all your loved ones in tow and with your health intact. But if the truth be known, you actually are waiting for the other shoe to drop: What if a loved one isn’t here next year? What if your own health fails? What if you fell into financial difficulty in the year to come?

          This Thanksgiving, if you find yourself in either – or both – of those camps, you’d be wise to spend time digesting Romans 8. That’s because very often, you and I have a flawed sense of priorities, and we have a flawed view of God.

          In Romans 8, St. Paul sets you and me straight on both counts – for the good of our souls.

          There is nothing inherently sinful about turkey or about family or about health. In fact, each of them is a good gift from the hand of God. Yet when you and I make food and family and health our life’s goal, we have sinned against the Lord and set ourselves up for great sadness.

          To be sure, the Gospel of Jesus Christ doesn’t call you and me to be callous toward the things of earth as though we were stoics. In fact, St. Paul grapples with the fallenness of the world in the first section of Romans 8; he even declares that the entire creation groans in travail and in pain because of the consequences of Adam and Eve’s sin. Cancer and death are not natural, and they cause us tremendous grief as they remind us of the curse God rightly placed on this fallen world. The Lord cares about your pain, and He doesn’t expect you to pretend as though illness, need and loss don’t hurt you.

          He simply wants you to prioritize properly and thus to remember what really matters: Jesus Christ is your righteousness. In him, you are reconciled to the God who made you. In him, you have hope of everlasting life and can be a “super-conqueror” in this present life, despite its pains.

          It’s interesting that Paul in Romans 8 doesn’t say that Christians will be free of persecution, nakedness, peril, sword or death because we believe in Jesus. These things might, and even will, come your way in some form at some time.

          Just remember: Thanksgiving ultimately isn’t about who’s at the table or what’s for dinner. It’s about the surpassing victory God has given you in His Son.

          Paul also challenges your sense of God’s character. You and I tend to want to paint Him as fickle when life takes a difficult turn. Paul, though, proves that God is always good and giving.

          In Romans 8:32, Paul allays your fears about the future by reminding you of the extent of God’s love for you. God the Father didn’t simply talk about love as some abstract concept; He spared not His own Son for your salvation. He gave up His perfect, precious Son so that you and I – miserable offenders and prideful ingrates that we are – might be freed from sin and guilt.

          Your salvation, then, came at the highest cost of all: the humiliation of the Son. If you ever needed proof of the extent of God’s love for you, there it is. And that’s why, Paul contends, you and I can rest assured that He will freely – not begrudgingly or fickly – give you and me everything we need as we live this side of glory. (Now, Paul doesn’t promise the Lord will give you everything you want; the promise is far greater: everything you need to be a super-conqueror in Christ).

          I have a cousin who lives in the Panhandle who usually comes to our family reunions. When she comes, this cousin always brings fresh-boiled shrimp from Panama City.

          You can imagine how my spirits drop when my cousin doesn’t make it to the reunion – or when she (gasp!) brings something besides shrimp!

          In the same way, you and I tend to hold our breath this time of year, wishing that things turn out as we’d desired, devastated if they don’t.

          So what’s the secret to a happy Thanksgiving in a fallen world where loved ones can’t come and the table isn’t always overflowing?

          The answer is remembering the best blessing of all, new and full life in Christ, and remembering that the One who gave you this blessing has proven – time and again – that He always will give you everything you need until He welcomes you to His great feast in heaven.