When I worked in an urban after-school ministry with many children of poverty, we once took a group of children to spend a day at the county zoo. Spring was just beginning, and the day started out extremely cold. Every boy and girl was expected to wear a hat and mittens. As the day wore on and the sun became brighter, things warmed up. By lunchtime the kids wanted to take off their hats and mittens. I noticed one of the girls remove her very nice, new-looking hat and mittens and toss them into a trash can. I immediately asked her why, and her reply was, “I don’t want to carry those. My mom got them free, and she will get me another pair free, too.”
You and I have been given so much more than a free hat and free mittens. But are we just as ungrateful?
Although we deserve only punishment for our sins, God saw fit to send his only Son to the cross of Calvary for us. Through his death and resurrection, we will live eternally in heaven some day. God has given us his beautiful Word so that we can know him better as our dear Father in heaven. God sent his Holy Spirit into our hearts, and through his Word the Holy Spirit created faith and nurtures that faith. God truly is the gift-giver of all time! And he doesn’t stop there . . .
Every day, God provides us with earthly blessings in abundance. We have homes with heat in the winter and a/c in the summer. Most of us drive cars. Our children go to schools, and many have amazing teachers and therapists who are emotionally invested in their learning and growth. The list of blessings goes on and on and on and on.
While God blesses us so greatly, we are still living in a world marred by sin. Often our blessings are shadowed by hardships and difficulty. Even in the midst of the hard times, our God gives us so much to thank him for. Psalm 30:4-5 says, “Sing to the LORD, you saints of his; praise his holy name. . . . Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” Similarly, Psalm 126:6 observes, “He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy.” You see, even in the midst of great hardships and pain, the cause of our inner joy still burns within our hearts. Our faith in Jesus and our hope of heaven give us joy that defies our circumstances. We know joy will come in the morning, and that knowledge carries us through.
So how can we thank a God who abundantly blesses us and has given us his own Son as the ultimate sacrifice? How do we thank a God who gives us earthly blessings with such abundance that we cannot even count them all? The Bible has a lot to say about thanking the Lord:
Psalm 100:4: Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
Psalm 105:1: Give thanks to the LORD, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done.
Psalm 106:1: Praise the LORD. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.
Isaiah 12:4: In that day you will say: “Give thanks to the LORD, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done, and proclaim that his name is exalted.”
What does thankfulness look like in our lives? Out of thanks, many people offer prayers and worship to the Lord. Many offer acts of service to other people. Many offer special monetary gifts to missions of their choice, their church, or someone in need.
In Old Testament times, the Israelites had clear guidelines for bringing offerings to the Lord. The Lord had specified what could be brought, how it should be brought, and how it would be sacrificed to him. These offerings were a picture of the Sacrifice that was to come. Since every law was fulfilled in Christ, we don’t have specific rules about our sacrifices.
We recall the Bible story about the first children in the world, Cain and Abel. When they became workers, they each brought God an abundant thank offering, but God found Cain’s to be unacceptable. It wasn’t unacceptable because of its content, but because of the heart of its giver. Cain did not give out of the overflow of his heart, and so his offering was unacceptable. When we think of the blessings we have been given so abundantly and spend time in God’s Word, our thank offerings will begin to overflow out of the love in our hearts. Colossians 2:6-7 says, “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.”
When we live “overflowing with thankfulness,” others take notice. (Writing that made me laugh because, who are we kidding?! Our children have special needs - others take notice of us anyway!) As they take notice, it is our joy – our defiant joy in the face of difficulty - and our focus on God’s grace that they will note. The Holy Spirit will use us to bring the news of Jesus to these people. When we live this way, our lives become a thank offering to God. Every day becomes Thanksgiving Day.
So this Thanksgiving holiday, maybe while we are thanking God for good food and enjoying our families and friends, we can share our inner joy, our relationship with Jesus, and our hope of heaven with others. We don’t need to use words. As they watch us overflowing with thankfulness (maybe even in the midst of difficulty), they will see. When our lives overflow with Christ like this, they are an offering of thankfulness to God – an acceptable, from-the-heart offering. May our offering this Thanksgiving be an overflowing life!
I recently read a devotion* entitled "Sippy Cup Trust" in which a mom talks about how her little son became panicked whenever he dropped his sippy cup and could not get it by himself. He would begin to yell and cry until she gave it back to him. If she took a few minutes to give it to him or had to do something else first, his panicked yelling and crying would become louder and louder. She would reassure him that she would get the cup in a minute, but he would begin to flail his arms and legs into a tantrum. She often found herself thinking, "Doesn't he know I see it fall? Doesn't he hear me when I say that I will get it? Why can't he trust that I will do what I say?" Over time she realized that this struggle with her son paralleled the struggle that she was often having with God - not remembering that He sees all, not trusting that He will handle things better than she could, not trusting that He will keep the promises that He has given to her (and all of us) in Scripture.
A huge parenting struggle in our home has been that I have been wrestling (only figuratively of course) with my 5 year old for control in our relationship. She has her own ideas and is trying very hard to assert them. While we value her ideas and intelligence, Scripture makes it clear that in a Christian home, CHILDREN MUST OBEY THEIR PARENTS. I have spent a lot of time talking about God-pleasing obedience being 1) immediate, 2) with a happy heart, and 3) thorough. Simple compliance doesn't do the trick. It is my responsibility to teach her that she needs to be in the habit of obeying those whom God has put in authority.
As I thought about this family struggle in relation to the sippy cup devotion, it dawned on me that I was like the mom in the devotion. The struggle that I was having with my daughter was a picture of my current relationship with God! I have been wrestling with Him just as my daughter has with me! Knowing that God demands obedience from His children hasn't stopped my heart and mind from questioning and rebelling these past months. Sophia isn't being obedient to me in a God-pleasing way and I am not being obedient to my Heavenly Father the way that He wants me to. My brain knows that God sees all, that His word promises that His plan for my life is being carried out, and that I can trust him absolutely. But that same mind and my hurting heart are in rebellion.
I spend my time trying to teach my precious child about obedience, but how do I – God’s precious child – learn to be more immediately, cheerfully and thoroughly obedient to my Lord? First, I look at who I am. I am a sinner and because of that I cannot obey God. My natural, sinful will is to disobey. Yet through saving faith in Jesus, I have been washed clean. The Holy Spirit is dwelling in my heart. In thankfulness for Jesus’ saving death and with his Holy Spirit dwelling in my heart, I arise daily with the desire to obey my Heavenly Father. As I read God’s Word and spend time in prayer I come to know my God better. I understand WHO my God is and what His good and perfect will is. My will begins to be more and more in line with the will of God.
If I try to think of good examples of Christian obedience, the apostles are some of the Bible folks who come to mind. In Matthew 4 we are told that when Jesus said, “Come follow me” the disciples “at once … left their nets and followed him.” THAT is God-pleasing obedience. They didn’t hem and haw. They didn’t check their accounts to see if they could afford it. They didn’t even go home and consult their families. They obeyed IMMEDIATELY! That is an amazing example of God-pleasing obedience!
David, too, is an example of obedience. Can that be? Can an adulterer, murderer, and liar be a great example of obedience. YES! Although David was definitely all of those sinful things, through faith in God he was also obedient. David repeatedly had the opportunity to harm or kill his assailant, King Saul, but he did not out of obedience to God. David’s obedience shows that he placed his full trust in God. Even in the desert David sang to the Lord, “I love you, Oh Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge.” (Psalm 18:1-3) Knowing that David, full of sin that was plain to see, was also a “man after God’s heart” and at many times in his life was very obedient to the Lord helps me to see that I can be obedient as well.
David yearned for the Lord. He talked to the Lord. The disciples spent their days and nights with Jesus – listening and learning. THIS is how I can become more obedient to my Lord. Did David and the disciples have moments of doubt that led to disobedience? They certainly did. God shares some of these moments of weakness with us in Scripture. He doesn’t share them with us just so that we can wipe our brows with a big “WHEW, they were sinful too!” of relief, but to help us see that God works in, through, and despite our mistakes. Does our disobedience and lack of trust make things harder in earthly life? Often it does. If you look at the lives of Bible believers, you will see that is the case for them too. David sure made his life harder when he had an affair with Bathsheba and then fixed it up with murder. Jonah ran from God and God saved him from drowning. Spending a few days in a fish’s belly can’t have been easy though. Maybe immediate obedience would have been easier?
Ever since she began afternoon kindergarten, Sophia is exhausted in the evenings and finds many reasons to be upset. One night as we were sitting down to a dinner of salmon and brussel sprouts (both of which Sophia actually loves) she came to the table crying and yelling that she wanted to eat a sandwich for dinner and WOULD NOT eat anything else. My patient husband filled her plate with the food that was being offered and got her to be quiet, pray, and eat. By the third or fourth bite, the crying seemed to be a faint memory (to her!) and with a big smile on her face she said, "Papi, I love salmon." How much easier, for Sophia and all of us, wouldn't it have been if she could have been obedient from the beginning. If my daughter's thoughts had been obedient, her behavior would have looked completely different. God-pleasing behavior is a reflection of God-pleasing thought.
So where does that leave me- the mom of a child with special needs who often feels that life is just not what I want? In thankfulness to my Lord and out of love for Him I want my thoughts to be obedient to him. And yet, I want my son to walk and talk. I want to have a larger family. I want typical sibling relationships for my daughter and I want my son to live a long, healthy life that includes things like marriage and children. I want an earthly life for my family that looks different than than what I have been given. This whole “special needs lifestyle” of adaptive equipment and medical interventions makes me want to run away like Jonah.
I look around me and it seems that most of the families we know get exactly what I want. They don’t even have to try. They have healthy baby after healthy baby. Their lives aren’t revolving around adaptive equipment, hospitals, and therapies. How do I bend my will to God’s in this most difficult thing? How do I trust my God who has allowed things into my life and my child’s that I am not particularly excited about? Knowing that He promises to work through them definitely helps, but just knowing doesn’t take the rebellion out of my heart.
The good news for me is that just like Sophia has a patient father who works her through her disobedience, I have a heavenly Father who describes himself as a shepherd who rejoices when one sheep re-enters the fold. This Shepherd loves me enough to work with me, through my bouts of disobedience. He forgives me when I wrestle with him and refuse to accept his will for my life. He offers closeness with himself to me in the pages of Scripture. Through the words of Scripture He comforts my wounded and rebellious heart. As He is doing this, his Holy Spirit is residing in my heart, making my will resemble the Lord’s – more and more everyday.
So to rid myself of my rebellion toward God’s will I can confess my disobediences to him and then immerse myself in getting to know His will better. I can bathe in the Psalms, drink the Gospels, and surround myself with His promises. The Bible tells us that His Word never comes back empty. That applies to outreach and nurture. When our hearts are nurtured in God’s Word, His Word will work on them.
So today let us pray, as the parents of children with special needs, that whatever is causing our hearts to rebel against our God will be soothed with God’s Word. May we look to Him to ease us out of our disobedience. May he inhabit our hearts and make them His dwelling place. Our actions will show this indwelling and our hearts will become obedient.
*The Heart of a Mother
Compilation by Wayne Holmes
Bethany House Publishers, 2003
Sippy Cup Trust by Tamara Rice
