“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” 1 Thess. 5:18
November 26, 2025
Of all people, Christians should not be ingrates. No, ingrate is not a bird. It is an ungrateful person. To be such runs counter to what it means to have experienced the grace of God in Christ. The grateful heart is to the Christian life what breathing is to the body. It is the natural and necessary characteristic of one who has experienced the forgiveness of God. “In everything” tells us that we should find causes for thanksgiving in what God has done for us. It means that we are not dependent upon gratifying circumstances to overflow with gratefulness. The gift of redemption in Christ is to flow in thankfulness to God that even in evil times and circumstances our hope remains and God continues His work in our lives. How do I respond to adversity? We are not told to be thankful for everything. I am not to be thankful for cancer, but for the sufficiency of God who gives us joyful hopefulness whatever bridge God asks me to cross over into the presence of Christ. We praise God for being God; it is not praising Him for evil. We are to be thankful that God is bigger than the bad things that happen to us. He will work out His purposes. He loves me. We are to be thankful that God supplies us with what we need to serve Him, for my responsibilities, my family, my friends, my church. The last thing we should be is an ingrate. That is a spiritual disease, one of the worst.
H
“The Christian faith is a religion of gratitude: our good works flow from the salvation God has already wrought or worked within us (Phil. 2:12).” Introduction to Biblical Ethics, McQuilkin and Copan