We all know how to give thanks when we’ve overcome something. That kind of gratitude comes naturally. Just watch an athlete get interviewed right after winning a championship, or listen to an actor’s speech after winning an Oscar. They don’t struggle to thank people because it’s easy to be thankful when we win.
There’s a deeper truth about thanksgiving, though, that Paul wrote about while he was sitting in prison.
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:4-7 NIV, emphasis mine)
Paul’s words highlight a power that is accessed only by being thankful while we are overcoming. Sitting under house arrest (it’s fair to say that’s not how anyone would define winning) and being unsure if he’d be released or killed, Paul wrote about always rejoicing and always being thankful.
Always.
That’s one weighty word, but what it highlights is that followers of Jesus always have something to give thanks for, even if the only thing is the fact that they are “in the Lord.”
Notice what happens when we do this. God’s peace — a peace that is far beyond our ability to comprehend — will encamp around our hearts and minds like a military guard that would prevent invasions from the outside as well as fleeing by the inhabitants of that city.
Stated another way, giving thanks when it feels like we’re under attack keeps us safe and stops us from running away. Thanksgiving actually enables us to stand in the difficult places and seasons until we overcome.
Viktor Frankl, a World War 2 concentration camp survivor, saw gratitude as a choice that could not be taken from him, no matter how horrific the holocaust became for him.
“The last of human freedoms [is] the ability to choose one’s attitude, especially an attitude of gratitude in a given set of circumstances, especially in difficult circumstances.”
Today, many of us will gather around a table with fewer friends and family than this time last year, and we will feel the grief, the loneliness, and the pain of those losses. I pray that we make the same choice that Frankl did, and Paul did, and that just like them, we, too, will overcome with thanksgiving.
