Thanks be to God

(I Chronicles 16:28-36; 2 Corinthians 9:6-15)

‘Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift.’ (2 Cor. 9:15)

We call this feast ‘the communion’. That points to a central reality of faith. At this table we meet in unity of heart and mind, that is, in communion, with God and with each other. That is our faith.

In some other traditions this feast is called the ‘Eucharist’. It comes from the Greek; in fact from the words of Jesus as the Last Supper. ‘And when he had given thanks, he broke it [the bread] …’ The word is eucharistia, thanksgiving. This too is central. Gratitude is a fundamental disposition of faith. To speak of ungrateful Christian life is like speaking of a one-legged Tarzan. You can say the words. But it doesn’t make living sense.

So what does it mean to be thankful? Well, in general it means to respond warm heartedly to someone for some good thing they have done for us. So thankfulness is a self-transcending emotion; it is directed to another. Not all feelings are like that. Happiness, for example, can be self-contained. I can feel happy in myself. But gratitude necessarily reaches beyond me. We are grateful to another.

Secondly, gratitude relates to a benefit received. We are grateful for something. When I came to work on Wednesday, I found 70 helium balloons jostling for space on the ceiling of my office to celebrate my birthday. After the initial shock, I was really thankful to Belinda for her imaginative gift and the motivation that lay behind it. Both the ‘to’ and the ‘for’ are of the essence of gratitude.

Our readings this morning show this same structure in relation to God. Chronicles says, ‘O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever. And Paul writes, ‘thanks be to God for his indescribable gift.’ There it is. The fingerprint of thanksgiving: the reference to a giver for a gift.

Unless both this ‘to’ and this ‘for’ are present in us, we cannot really be thankful. For example, we can be the recipients of a worthy gift, but not recognize it. And because we don’t recognize it, we are not thankful. I was given many great gifts by my parents as they raised me from a baby to a child to an adult. But it wasn’t until I actually had my baby, Catherine, in my arms, that I found out what it really means to feed, clothe, teach, protect, love, and guide a child. Only then did I drop to it what my parents actually did for me. And when I learned that lesson, I saw my parents in a new and deeper light. I discovered the gratitude they deserved all along, but I had not until now really given.

On the other hand, we can sometimes feel the emotion of thankfulness in our souls, but not really know ‘to whom’ it is rightly directed. I remember a dear friend who had her first baby rather late in life; indeed she had given up hope of ever being a mother. But then this darling child came along. Pam and I visited her in hospital. She was over the moon. ‘I feel so grateful!’ she said with shining eyes. ‘But I’m not sure who to be grateful to!’ We need both ‘to’ and ‘for’.

Well, enough of theory. What is Eucharistic thanks, the gratitude this table enacts? In your order of service you will find this sheet [Eucharistic prayer]. It is one of the prayers prayed at Anglican Communion services. Now be not alarmed! I am not sneaking Anglicanism into our worship! I’m using the prayer for 2 reasons. One: it is written down so we can follow it. And two: it is a prayer with historical depth. Its shape and content goes way back into the early centuries of the church. So this prayer is steeped with Christian experience of communion over centuries.

Basically it is a prayer of thanksgiving. Look at the second paragraph. ‘Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.’ With the response, ‘it is right to give our thanks and praise.’ To come to this table is to meet with a situation for which the first and central response is gratitude. And it is clear to whom: ‘give thanks to the Lord our God’. This is thanksgiving directed through and through to God.

But what of the for? What do we give thanks to God for? Three things according to this prayer.

1. For Being. In short, for creation. Paragraph 4-5: ‘We praise you that through your eternal Word you brought the universe into being and made us in your image. You have given us this earth to care for and delight in, and with its bounty your preserve our life.’ That is the first ‘for’. And it is big; the whole universe in its splendour, the earth and its wondrous bounty, ourselves and our complex lives. This great reality: We did not make it. We do not preserve it. This universe is God’s doing. If we like life; if we enjoy the earth; if we stand in awe before the night sky; if our spirit rises at the call of the magpie, and leaps to the sound of a stream running across its sloppy rocks; if we love our children and our friends. If any of this is true for us; then this table says gently to us, ‘be thankful to God for it all’.

I know we sometimes we forget it, of course we do. We just get up in the morning and live the events that come at us moment by moment. The busyness of life crowds out our sense of wonder. We lose sight of the for … for this great gift. Or, if we do sense the joy and wonder of the world, we don’t quite take that step of ‘to whom’ these feelings are properly addressed. This table reminds us gently: ‘You (O God) have given us this earth to care for and delight in …’

2. The second thing is renewal of being; the prayer calls it reconciliation. Paras 6 – 8. ‘We thank you that you bound yourself to the human race with the promise of a gracious covenant … [that is the OT covenant with Israel]’ Then, ‘above all, we give you thanks for your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ: born as one of us, he lived our common life and offered his life to you in perfect obedience and trust … delivered us from sin, brought us new life, and reconciled us to you and to one another.’ In other words, thanks be to God for God’s gift of new life, reconciling us when we are estranged and at enmity.

We don’t need to be told how badly our world needs healing, peacemaking, kindness; needs the kind of love that holds in times of crisis and makes new in situations of violence. Sometimes it all looks so messed up that we feel close to despair. There seems little to be thankful for. And we can overlook the signs of new life, of work for peace, of acts of kindness and love that are going on all around us, every day.

Again, this table reminds us gently that the reconciling work of the Holy Spirit is always present in the world. God in Christ reconciles the world to Godself. Yes, in history it is fragmentary; yes, in history it is broken. But here at this table of Christ we are reminded that it is nonetheless real and its reality is the very basis of the world. Peace not war is God’s life. Love not hatred is God’s way. ‘We give you thanks for your Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ …’ Yes indeed.

And then the prayer goes on to tell of the founding of this feast. Para 10: ‘Holy God, we thank you for these gifts of your creation, this bread and wine, and we pray that we who eat and drink them in obedience to our Saviour Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, may be partakers of his body and blood, and may be made one with him and each other in peace and love.’ And, over the page, it relates the story of Jesus’ first sharing this feast with his friends. ‘Take eat … Drink from this all of you … in remembrance of me.’ This table intends to create in us remembrance of the acts of God in creation and reconciliation and so bring us to a place of true gratitude: to God for God’s gifts of love.

3. So we learn thankfulness to God for being and for new being. And finally comes the gift of hope. Para 14: ‘ As we eat and drink … renew us by your Spirit that we may be united in the body of your Son and serve you as a royal priesthood in the joy of your eternal kingdom.’ This is the vision of ultimate redemption. The love of God in creating the universe, in reconciling our broken lives, in calling us into the church, the ‘royal priesthood’ as it is called here, leads finally into God’s eternal kingdom in which there are no more violence, tears, and brokenness. Death shall die in the outworking of the resurrection of Jesus.

Again, I know it’s hard at times to see that clearly: when we feel the power of death near to us; when children around the world cannot live because of war and famine and greed; when the earth itself grows sick and sad with pollution, it is hard to feel hope for an eternal life of mercy and peace.

And yet in the midst of uncertainty and doubt this table says to us gently: yes, there is such hope; and yes, it is offered to us; and yes, it is God who is its giver. And therefore it is right to be grateful. So we eat and drink this feast, for ‘the joy of [God’s] eternal kingdom.’

This is the table of communion; this is the table of eucharist. Thanks be to God the creator of the universe, to God the reconciler of enemies, to God the redeemer in eternal life. And thanks be to God for our being called into life; for our renewal in situations of brokenness; for our undying hope in Christ. Wondrous gifts from the heart of a gracious God. Yes and yes again: ‘It is right to give our thanks and praise.’

I wrote in the bulletin this morning that thanksgiving means giving thanks. And giving thanks means action not just words. We are called, says this prayer, ‘to serve God in love and peace’. Of course, that is who God is and what God does. We are called to be reconciled to God and to each other. Of course, that is who God is and what God does. We are called to serve as a ‘royal priesthood’, that is, as mediators of God in the world. Of course, that is who God is and what God does. And that is the God we remember and celebrate here.

And so we are grateful to God for all God is and does. And that means to share with love the good things which we have been given in God’s grace; including all the things written on these boards. The love of God can be made more real in our world, in Australia and in Bangladesh, if we act as thankful recipients of the grace God gives us in Christ.

‘O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever’, so says the OT. ‘Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift,’ so says the New. And so say all of us.

Graeme Garrett

Canberra Baptist Church

Seventh Sunday after Easter

5 June 2011