There are some Bible verses that can definitely strike you the wrong way. One of them is this: “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
Ouch! It sounds like spiritual masochism. Part of our problem is we tend to read it the wrong way, as if Paul meant to say, “Give thanks in all circumstances, for these circumstances are the will of God for you.”
That’s not what he’s saying. He’s telling us to give thanks in all circumstances, for it is always God’s will for us to give thanks. Many of our circumstances are definitely not God’s will. God does not send sickness, poverty, relationship breakdown or depression. All those things are the result of our inviting the enemy into our life and our world. Ever since then he has done his best to ruin both.
There are lots of things we can do when things go wrong. We can own up to anything we have done to cause our mess. We can pray and ask for prayer. We can search out practical help. We can seek counsel. Refusal to do these things often makes things far worse than they need be.
But the weapon most often overlooked is to give thanks. It is totally counterintuitive, yet it is of critical importance, as the verse indicates.
Why is this so? I think there are several reasons:
Giving thanks takes our focus off the problem, which is making us miserable, and onto God, who wants to comfort and strengthen us.
Giving thanks is a decision to refuse the urgings of our sinful nature to blame God for the situation. Blaming God is futile. He’s the answer, not the problem. Blaming God only ensures you’ll never find a way out of your predicament.
Giving thanks destroys the root of bitterness before it’s had a chance to grow up and possess us. Bitterness is the refusal to forgive. It removes us from the grace of God, and places us under the cruel tyranny of a self-destructive anger that can never be resolved.
Giving thanks reminds us that what the Lord has done for us is always greater than what the enemy, life or others have done to us.
I believe there’s a supernatural power released when we give thanks. Many years ago, a prison chaplain named Merlin Carrothers wrote a book called “The power of praise.” In it, he told the story of people who faced enormous adversities in life, who came to Christ, and who began to take hold of the verse quoted above to thank God in all circumstances. He told story after story of God’s miraculous intervention in their lives as a result.
The past cannot be changed, but its consequences do not have to possess us.
Psalm 149 says that the praises of God are a mighty weapon in our hands to bind the enemies that come against us. King Jehoshaphat saved the nation by sending an army of worshippers out to give thanks when the circumstances were the worst imaginable.
When life, people or the enemy come against you, you may feel powerless in the face of the onslaught, but you are not. What worked for Jehoshaphat will work for you.
Start giving thanks and see what the Lord will do.
And let me know what happens.