We give thanks to you, O God;
we give thanks, for your name is near.
We recount your wondrous deeds (Ps. 75:1).
What do we celebrate on the day of Thanksgiving? Whether it be the Canadian or American holiday, the experience has been much the same for both nations in recent history: the masses do not know what to ultimately be thankful for, or to whom. Perhaps it is a matter of being thankful for our health, our wealth, our family, our liberties, but to whom do we express our thanks? Historically, since 1621, Thanksgiving was a celebration of the harvest and other blessings of the past year, modelled after that first feast shared by the English colonists (Pilgrims) of Plymouth and the Wampanoag people. But how does that translate to our modern world today? In this secular world, there may be no one to thank but ourselves, but that would be tantamount to a monkey expressing thanks to himself for the bananas that grow on the trees. Did the monkey plant the trees? Did the monkey produce the bananas? Did the monkey bring such a thing into existence? Does the monkey exist in and of itself? I state all this because I want to make something clear: What we have is not our own, not even the air we breathe is our own. All that we have, we have because of God, for He is the Creator of heaven and earth. Irregardless as to what one’s religious beliefs might be, as to what worldview one might hold, we cannot escape the fact that we live and breathe in God’s world, and it is because of that fact that we cannot help but presuppose Him in our living and thinking. And while this fallen world really has no root motive for celebrating thanksgiving, one that makes sense anyways from a fallen worldview perspective, we who are a part of God’s covenant community have a biblical motive that is right and true.
We give thanks to God because God is near. He is not a God that is distant. He is not a God that is far off. He is not a God made of human hands. He is not a God concocted from our imagination. He is not a God that turns a deaf ear to those who call to Him. He is not a God that turns a blind eye to the afflicted and the persecuted. He is not a God that demands a certain amount of good works in order to extend the hand of fellowship. He is a God who, out of an abundance of grace, made a way for us wretched sinners, through His Son’s redemptive sacrifice, not only to be made right again, but to reconcile us into fellowship with Him.
We give thanks to God for what He accomplished on the cross, for as the apostle Paul wrote “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). We give thanks because all who call to Him find Him to be near. He is a God who humbled Himself in order to rescue us from our depravity. He is a God who invites us into eternal life-filled fellowship. He is a God who we can pray to, and trust with certainty, not only that He hears us, but that He is intimately involved with every aspect of our lives. In times of prosperity, He is there. In times of poverty, He is there. In times of health, He is there. In times of sickness, He is there. We thank God because this fellowship He invites us into is not dependent on our performance, for if that were the case we would have been quickly disqualified, but rather, it is wholly dependent on His grace, and it is a fellowship that can only be enjoyed when we abide in Him. As John Newton, the former slave trader and famous hymn writer wrote:
Amazing grace! How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found;
Was blind, but now I see.[1]
Oh the nearness of God! The priests of Baal may have shouted and pleaded in vain for their god to hear them and to rain down fire from heaven, all to show the nation of Israel that Baal was the true god (1 Kings 18:20-29). We are not like the priests of Baal. We are not like the priests of pagan Greece. We are not like the pagans of antiquity, or as the unbelievers and skeptics of our age. But we, like Elijah, call upon the true God who sent fire down upon the altar, consuming everything as an absolute declaration that He is the true God, the near God, the ever-present God (1 Kings 18:30-40).
This is the God we worship, this is the God we abide in, a God whose feats are not like mortal man’s, but whose feats can only be attributed to the one true God, for his feats are marvelously divine. Who can compare with the wondrous deeds of God? Who created the world from ex nihilo (Genesis 1:1)? Who parted the Red Sea (Exodus 14)? Who fed a whole people with mana from heaven (Exodus 16)? Who caused time to stand still (Joshua 10:1-15)? Who caused the sun to turn back but for a moment (2 Kings 20:8-11)? Who raised (not merely resuscitated) the dead (2 Kings 4:18-37; Matthew 9:18-26; John 11:1-44)? Most importantly, most marvelously, most miraculously, who has provided the means for man to be forgiven, redeemed and renewed (Matthew 26:28; John 3:16; Revelation 21:5)? Our God, the God of Scripture, the God of Christian theism, there is no other, and no one comes close.
As the Psalmist writes, “We give thanks to you, O God; we give thanks, for your name is near” (Ps. 75:1). And what nearness that is, it is a nearness that, if embraced, will result in the experience of God’s most wondrous deed, for as Charles Spurgeon had put it: “Nearness to God brings likeness to God. The more you see God the more of God will be seen in you.”[2]
May we express our thankfulness unto the Lord for all that we have, and for His nearness that makes all that we have pleasing and enjoyable, for without His nearness all would be vanity (Eccl. 1:2-11). And may we not only express our thanks on the day of Thanksgiving, as if that day were to be more important than any other day, but every waking moment of every passing day. “We give thanks to you, O God…”
[1] “Amazing Grace”, Hymnary.org. Accessed September 28, 2021, http://www.hymnary.org/text/amazing_grace_how_sweet_the_sound/.
[2] Charles Spurgeon, The Complete Works of C.H. Spurgeon, Vol. 29: Sermons 1698-1756 (Delmarva Publications, 2015), No. 1725, Part III.