How Can I Ever Thank You?

Luke 12:32

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I was a twenty-three-year-old young man living in a brand new state. I didn’t know anybody there. I didn’t have any friends there. No family or even an extended family. And Thanksgiving came around. I didn’t know what I was going to do. And then a couple from church actually invited me into their home to be a guest with their family and their friends and their loved ones. And maybe not surprisingly they left none of the food portion of the day on the twenty-three-year-old bachelor.

I was a guest in their home and everything was provided. There are two different kinds of turkey. There were potatoes to feed a multitude. There were pies and all kinds of other good vegetables. There was a feast at hand and there was great company to boot.

I recall at the end of the day saying something that perhaps you’ve said multiple times after you’ve been in the situation as somebody’s guest. “I don’t know how I’m ever going to thank you.” I don’t know what I could say or what gesture I could give you that would show you the pleasure or return the pleasure to you that you have that you have given me. I don’t know how I could possibly thank you.

And the response was probably one you’ve given at various times too. “The pleasure was all mine.” That is to say the pleasure that I need or that I would ever want was simply to have you as my guest receiving these things that I’m giving to you.

In the next few days and weeks. We take time as a nation to celebrate Thanksgiving and as we do especially as Christians we think about all of the many things that are provided to us from the gracious hand of our Lord. They are the things that apply for our body and our life, the clothing that we wear, the family that we enjoy, but not only that the gift of his Son. And as we pause and think about such things we might find ourselves saying the exact same thing to the Lord. “How can I ever thank you?”

How could I ever thank you for all of the gifts that you give me and the pleasures that I receive simply from your gifts. Jesus tells us about where his Father’s pleasure is. One of the maybe the simplest ways that we could ever thank him that we might look right past. Jesus says of his Father.

Your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. (Luke 12:32)

This is what pleases our Heavenly Father to give gifts to supply us all that we need for this body and life not so that he can get something in return or get repaid equal gift for equal gifts but simply to be the one who graciously and mercifully opens his hands and supplies to us all that we need. It is our Father’s pleasure to give us the kingdom. Amen.