Give Thanks - He is Worthy
(also posted at the website of Bow Valley Christian Church)
Thanksgiving season is a time when we examine the gifts we have been given and remind ourselves that we are not "self-made." Douglas Wilson writes,
The issue of thanksgiving is really central to the whole debate about the existence of God. On the one hand, if there is no God, there is no need to thank anyone. We are here as the result of a long chain of impersonal processes, grinding their way down to our brief moment in time. If there is a God, then every breath, every moment, every sight and sound, is a sheer unadulterated gift. And, as our mothers taught us, when someone gives you presents like this, the only appropriate response is to thank them.[1]
A God who exists and created the universe is a worthy recipient for our thanksgiving. To whom does the atheist turn to give thanks? If there is no God, there is no thanksgiving. Oh sure, you could thank your forefathers and foremothers for outrunning the predators so that they survived long enough to reproduce and ultimately brought you into this world. But that would be hollow thanks. When we give thanks, there is always someone to whom it is given and the receiver must be worthy of our thanks.
I am glad to know the God who deserves our thanks. He is the one who has given us the gifts we have in this life. It is to Him that we respond.
Rev. 4:11 'You are worthy, O Lord our God,to receive glory and honor and power.For you created everything,and it is for your pleasure that they exist and were created.'
[1](Wilson and Hitchens 2009) Introduction to the book Is Christianity Good For the World: A Debate, Christopher Hitchens and Douglas Wilson
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