Gratitude
This time of year we tend to spend some time thinking about gratitude, what it means to be grateful, and what we are grateful for. (Pardon the dangling participle.)
I was taught manners as a child. Part of those manners was to say, “thank you” when someone did something for you. A stranger opening a door, a server filling up the water glass, or a cashier at the grocery store handing me my change. These were the type of interactions that required a “thank you” according to my parents. And so to this day, “thank you” comes out of my mouth frequently, especially to strangers. But is that gratitude or polite regard for others?
I have to confess that I am a pretty ungrateful person. I have always functioned with the attitude that if someone is supposed to do something, say take out the trash, that thanks is not required and should not be expected. In Luke 17, Jesus tells a strange parable about a slave who has worked in the fields all day and comes in to prepare dinner for the master. Verses 9-10 read, “Do you thank the slave for doing what was commanded? So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, ‘We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!” So doing what you are supposed to do should not garner you special consideration or thanks.
And then I am humbled.
“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” – 1 Thessalonians 5:18
Giving thanks in all circumstances? Believe me there are circumstances that I am not grateful for! Maybe, just maybe, I am looking at this whole gratitude thing the wrong way.
Is my problem that I want to be thanked? And if I’m not thanked, I resent it? My lack of gratitude might stem from the reality of thankless jobs that fill life, that no one even takes notice of, that I’m busting my butt to get done and no one seems to care … unless it suddenly doesn’t happen? And is my problem that I am as guilty of not recognizing all that is done around me and for me?
That brings me back to the beginning. When I say “thank you” to someone who has done a small kindness (opening a door) or simply their job (the cashier at the grocery store handing me my change), am I in that moment recognizing one of those thankless jobs that are done around me and for me? And in that moment am I acknowledging the humanity of that person who is so frequently invisible?
More than all that, I think my biggest problem with gratitude is that it’s not about me being the recipient of gratitude. Instead, gratitude is an attitude toward all of life in the good times and in the bad. Gratitude is seeing the people and things around me that make my life full and sometimes simply easier.
Even after 58 years of life, I have so much to learn. I still think I am a pretty ungrateful person. But thanks be to God, I’m working on it.
Blessings,
Pastor Peg