Thanks for Nothing!

We all have heard the expression “Thanks for nothing!” It isn’t really an offer of thanks at all. It is an angry declaration that the person speaking feels they have been treated wrongly, cheated, held out on.  This week the utility company came to my home and accused me of owing hundreds of dollars in unpaid bills dating back to four years before I moved into this house. It did not matter that I produced all the paperwork showing my innocence. They demanded money and I would not give it, so they cut my power line in two. I didn’t say anything to them, but for a while I sure wanted to say something like “Thanks for nothing. Have a nice day.” In my drippiest sarcastic tone. 

Sometimes, we look at our lives and there is so much stuff to deal with, so many problems we can’t solve. We feel like the squirrel in the movie “Over the Hedge” who runs to one end of the hedge and back and declares “It never ends!” Then he runs to the other end of the hedge and back and says, “It never ends that way too!” We feel helpless. Helplessness is not a feeling we like to experience, so then we become angry. 

We want God to fix it. Make it better. We are his children and when He doesn’t meet our expectations of what a Father should do, we act like, well, children. Children who are angry and ungrateful and say “thanks for nothing.” 

What if “nothing” IS a gift? What if we had to trust Him for everything? What if instead of taking our problems away He walked with us through them? What would we learn from that? How would it transform us? 

If He gives me “nothing,” can I in sincerity say “Thank you, Father, for nothing?” trusting that in His love and wisdom He has given me something worth more than it appears to be?

In church yesterday we sang a Keith Green song, “There is a Redeemer.” The first part goes like this:

There is a redeemer, 
Jesus, God's own Son,
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah, 
Holy One,
Jesus my redeemer, 
Name above all names,
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah,
Oh, for sinners slain.
Thank you oh my Father, 
For giving us Your Son,
And leaving Your Spirit, 
'Til the work on Earth is done.

"In everything give thanks, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 1 Thessalonians 5:18

We can give thanks to Him IN everything, because He has given us his Son, and that IS EVERYTHING. 

Happy Thanksgiving!