Watching and listening to people this time of year intrigues me. In the celebration of Thanksgiving, we set aside time to thank our Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer, our Abba Father for all that He has blessed us with. Sadly, we have turned this amazing opportunity to pause and corporately thank Him into a glutenous feast with a cardboard turkey centerpiece. If you are a crafty-Martha-Stewart-type, perhaps your centerpiece is a cornucopia handcrafted out of fresh picked willow branches, but nevertheless, we often miss the point.

Even in our attempts to make the holiday more meaningful, it often seems to ring hollow. Go around the table and say what you are thankful for – “my family,” “my job,” “this house,” whatever. Not that it’s bad to be thankful for these things, but are we truly thankful people? What about the little things? What about the painful things? Are we thankful for those?

…And if we were genuinely thankful people, how different would “black Friday” be?

I ventured out to JoAnn fabrics and Kohls last year on Black Friday – only the second time I remember ever doing that. I was almost 7 months pregnant and had AG with me, who was at that time 19 months old. Cranky older women were grabbing shopping carts before I could get to them so that they didn’t have to carry their purses and the 20 bolts of fabric they snatched up before someone else saw them. Apparently, it didn’t even matter what kind of fabric it was. They would hold onto it like birds of prey and circle the cutting table for recently set-aside options that they might like better. (Who knew that 60 year old quilters could be so mean?)

I came home that day exhausted and frustrated and feeling invisible. I had to laugh to myself as I thought, “And a very Merry Christmas to you, too.”

I love 2 Corinthians chapter 9 – Paul was writing to the Corinthian church and was reminding them of the pledge they had made to support and help their needy brothers and sisters in Christ in Jerusalem. In verse 5, he says he was sending some other brothers to “finish the arrangements for the generous gift you had promised. Then it will be ready as a generous gift, not as one grudgingly given.” John MacArthur notes, “[grudgingly is] more clearly translated ‘covetousness’ or ‘greed,’ it denotes a grasping to get more and keep it at the expense of others. This attitude emphasizes selfishness and pride, which can have a detrimental effect on giving, and is natural for unbelievers, but should not be for professed believers.”

Is that convicting to you? It is to me. “A grasping to get more and keep it at the expense of others.” Remember what it means to give thanks. Nothing we have is ours – it is entrusted to us by God. If we truly believe that He owns it all, how would that change the way we live? I surely do not think that we can have a genuine, humble heart of gratitude on one day and then go out the next day and brawl over a bolt of fabric like animals. Notice how Paul describes the impact of the Corinthians’ choosing to give sacrificially:

This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift! (9:12-14)

If we are followers of Jesus Christ, our genuine hearts of gratitude will motivate us to act. To give, to serve, to love – as a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving to our Jehovah Jireh, the God who provides. To recognize that our gifts back to Him pale in comparison with his “indescribable gift” in Jesus Christ.

This year, I want to think of Thanksgiving and Christmas as going hand in hand. May I be truly thankful, not just for material blessings or the people in my life, although I really am deeply thankful for them. May I realize that we serve a great and gracious God who has given something indescribable to us – a personal relationship with the Almighty One. That humble scene of the babe lying in the manger led to the cross – and the ability for mere fallen mortals to enter the throne room of heaven and call the Creator of the universe, “Abba” – “Daddy.” This is no light thing to be taken for granted. It should rock our lives.

Thanksgiving cannot be about the turkey. Christmas cannot be about the presents. Oh, Father, forgive us for marginalizing you in our lives! It is easy to point to our culture and say, “evil!,” while entertaining the same vanity in our own lives. Because you have given us everything, we humbly thank you. May it not be just words on our lips – may it change the way we live. And may we not forget to give You the highest gift we can this Christmas – everything we are, everything we have. How do you wish to use us, Father? May we do it cheerfully as an expression of thanks.