Many may feel there is little reason to give thanks this Thanksgiving Holiday

For more than two years, our world is facing a period of distress, where many of us are also challenged by difficulties to do our work and to have contact with others.

Several church groups probably will have the same questions as we receive and have to give reasons for their members to continue in the faith. In many church communities, these days are normally of good cheer, lovely family time and time to thank God.

Several people now wonder if they can rejoice in God no matter their circumstances. For many, it is clear that they are not enjoying a glorious or nice time. Some have lost their job and income, and once more they are facing a new lockdown.

We may not forget it was not always a delightful time for people of God. Can you imagine it must have been when they were used as slaves in Egypt and on top of that they had to cope with several plagues. They, too, lived in a time when not so many wanted to worship the One True God.

Ramses II, like all the pharaohs, claimed to be divine. Because he did not want to let Israel go, Jehovah set the stage for a long struggle between this distrustful ruler with an outsize ego and a prophet with a new understanding of Jehovah and His Power.

The flow of the White Nile is fairly even throughout the year because of consistent equatorial rains. The Blue Nile, on the other hand, originating in the headwaters of the Ethiopian highlands at the time Moses was bargaining with Ramses, got very high and wild by excessively heavy summer rains in Ethiopia. That flow washed powdery, carmine-red soil from the slopes of the hills. Around the Lake Tana region the blood-red torrent picked up bright red algae (known as flagellates) and their bacteria. Since there were no dams at that time, the Nile flowed blood-red all the way to the Mediterranean. It probably reached the delta region in August. Thus, this rare natural event, it is held, set in motion a series of conditions that continued until the following March. Nature seemed to have lost its course, and people got bullied by plagues of the frogs, gnats and mosquitoes.

Further, there were times men of God, like Moses, David, Elijah, and Isaiah had no easy time. With ups and downs in their life, they tried to keep their faith and trusted God, praying to Him for His Help and comfort. Some, like David felt miserable at a certain time, but knew it was better to fall in the hands of God than in the hands of those who think they own the world.

“David said to Gad,

“I am in deep distress. Let me fall into the hands of the LORD, for his mercy is very great; but do not let me fall into the hands of men.”” (1Ch 21:13 NIV)

Yes it is even known that we as human beings can come in a time of inevitable distress.

“Yet man is born to trouble as surely as sparks fly upward.” (Job 5:7 NIV)

“”Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble.” (Job 14:1 NIV)

We should know that our life will not always as easy as we would love it to be. Even those who seem to be so strong shall have to face moments of weakness and of difficulties.

“All his days his work is pain and grief; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is meaningless.” (Ec 2:23 NIV)

“If you falter in times of trouble, how small is your strength!” (Pr 24:10 NIV)

“You have shown your people desperate times; you have given us wine that makes us stagger.” (Ps 60:3 NIV)

“The cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me; I was overcome by trouble and sorrow.” (Ps 116:3 NIV)

Today there are lots of people who came to blame God for what is happening to this world today. Job saw likewise but refused to blame God.

“In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.” (Job 1:22 NIV)

When looking at our present situations, we should think of all those people who are living under the open air, in hot but also very cold conditions, not having enough food, having babies crying of hunger and pain. How many in our world of plentiful think of those in the poor countries and of those who have to live in places where wars are already such a long time part of their life.
When they would think more about them, they would see how blessed they really are. What if we would consider this Corona plague as once again testing from God?

“2 “If only my anguish could be weighed and all my misery be placed on the scales! 3 It would surely outweigh the sand of the seas—no wonder my words have been impetuous.” (Job 6:2-3 NIV)

“For you, O God, tested us; you refined us like silver.” (Ps 66:10 NIV)

“All day long I have been plagued; I have been punished every morning.” (Ps 73:14 NIV)

An 18th-century Russian icon of the prophet Habakkuk, member of the tribe of Levi, (Iconostasis of Transfiguration Church, Kizhi monastery, Karelia, Russia)

Those men of God complained also at certain moments, but they also found time to thank God for all the good He also had done for them. In ancient times, the professional prophet of the Temple from the 7th century bce (probably between 605–597 bce) Habakkuk at a time when there did not come the necessary blossoms on the trees, no fruit on the vines and the produce of the olive failed, he and the people were in distress because the fields yielded no food.

“17 Though the fig-tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, (Hab 3:17 NIV)

Even when the flock was cut off from the fold, and there was no herd in the stalls, he knew from Who all the good things came forward. Overlooking what was going on, he recognised it all was not so bad as to what others had to endure. Therefore, he was willing to rejoice in the Most High and was willing to exult in the God of his salvation.

18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Saviour. (Hab 3:18 NIV)

Also in this period of a pandemia we should look up to the Elohim Hashem Jehovah, the Most Powerful God, Who is our strength and can make our feet light and swift  like the feet of a deer, so that we can tread upon the heights.

Habakuk sang and played cheerful music to the leader with stringed instruments.

19 The Sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to go on the heights. For the director of music. On my stringed instruments.” (Hab 3:19 NIV)

Habakkuk had wrestled with his God, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah, and struggled with the realisation that this Unique and Only One God was going to use the godless Chaldeans to judge his people Judah for their rebellion. Habakkuk’s struggle was ultimately one of wrestling with God.

Today some people also have that feeling, but they should know it has no use to battle with God. One is better to battle with the world, and go in against all that keep claiming one has not to be vaccinated or one has not to protect oneself against the Coronavirus.

What we need more than anything in life today is renewed vision of God and to see things from God’s eye’s point of view. We should accept that He has given man the possibilities to battle this virus, so we should trust those scientists and be thankful that they can be instruments in the hands of God. Likewise, we should be thankful that all the medic staff can be an instrument in the hands of God. Out of respect to them and to the Divine Creator, we should protect ourselves and others, avoiding getting infected.

In the past, more than one man, prophet, king or judge, appointed by God trembled. More than once, those men of God knew for Whom to look and Whom to trust. Even when it took longer than they had hoped, they were willing to wait and to be patient. They found the power to wait on the Highest.

The prophet Isaiah knew what God had already done for His people and what He was still going to do. He also did not have it always easy, but he relied on God.

This Thanksgiving Day let us pray to our God and express our thankfulness for being with us in these difficult times.

“You have been a refuge for the poor, a refuge for the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat. For the breath of the ruthless is like a storm driving against a wall” (Isa 25:4 NIV)

Giving thanks to God helps us do just that.

 

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Preceding

Facing our existence every day

Many opportunities given by God

Time to be strengthened, thankful and to be prepared

Are you doing Thanksgiving

Altitude begins with an attitude of gratitude

The Gift of Giving

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Additional reading

1. What is life? (Our World) = What is life? (Some View on the World)
2. The time of year we remember our many blessings
3. 2016 Thanksgiving and politics (Our world) = 2016 Thanksgiving and politics (Some View on the World)
4. Give your worries to God (Our World) = Give your worries to God (Some View on the World)
5. Life in gratitude opens glory of God (Our world) = Life in gratitude opens glory of God (Some View on the World)
6. Beginning of a festival of lights
7. Hanukkahgiving or Thanksgivvukah
8. Thanksgivukkah and Advent
9. Coming to Thanksgiving day 2020
10. Good time to sort out your friends and contacts
11. Left in the dark or being in the dark seeing light
12. Making sure to be ready and to belong to the escaped ones
13. Fragments from the Book of Job #2: chapters 12-20
14. Fragments from the Book of Job #4: chapters 27-31
15. Ability (part 6) Thought about the ability of God’s Provision Bringing Glory (Our World) =
16. Ability (part 6) Thought about the ability of God’s Provision Bringing Glory
17. The chosen ones to fear or not to fear (Our World) = The chosen ones to fear or not to fear (Some View on the world)
18. Signs of the Last Days
19. In Coronatime thinking about death
20. Today’s thought “When in need of encouragement” (May 18)
21. Today’s Thought “Leaving you an example” (June 12)
22. Today’s thought “Rooted and built up in him” (November 14)
23. Today’s thought “The grace of God … training us” (November 27)
24. Today’s thought “Crying to God” (August 04)
25. If your difficulties are longstanding, try kneeling (Our World) = If your difficulties are longstanding, try kneeling (Some View on the World)
26. God my fence, my hope for the future (Our World) = God my fence, my hope for the future (Some View on the World)
27. Prayers for Rulers
28. Thanks for our fathers
29. Let them thank the Lord for …
30. Thanking God by thinking of people (Our World) = Thanking God by thinking of people
31. Give thanks to יהוה! For He is good, For His kindness is everlasting
32. Bring praise to the Creator
33. Praise and give thanks to God the Most Highest
34. Always rejoicing Praying constantly Giving thanks for everything
35. Praise Jehovah, ​You people

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