Giving thanks

Happy Thanksgiving.

If you're in the United States, I want you to know that October is the correct time to celebrate Thanksgiving, and that celebrating such an event in the throes of November when all the Christmas decorations are out in the store is the wrong thing to do.  Maybe not morally wrong, but wrong nonetheless.

Now, on to giving thanks, because this is one of the things that we are horrendous at.  Part of the deal is that our baseline happiness is something that is subject to all sorts of problems.  I'll explain.

You mentally adjust very rapidly to a new baseline happiness.  Your baseline happiness doesn't change much, though you think it might.  You think it might vascilate, and that vascilation might be cumulative.  It isn't.  And this is the problem with a consumer culture, is that it holds happiness, permanent happiness, right out of reach.  That doesn't mean that you can't buy or afford things that are promised to give you happiness, of course you can.  It's right there, and you buy it every day.  Every day, you exchange money, and by extension hours of your life, on something

There was a time when this wasn't out of date

that is promised to bring you happiness, and every day, your baseline happiness resets and adjusts to this new level.  You think to yourself 'if only I had this new item, if only I had the iphone 6 instead of this crummy ipone 4, If only I had the 2015 Honda Fit instead of the 2009,' and so on.  And this happiness is right out of reach, because the goalposts keep on moving.  As soon as you buy the product, as soon as you eat the meal, as soon as you get the girl home, the happiness resets.  The high wears off, and you have to chase it again.  This is why we have a hard time remembering to be thankful for the many and various things in our lives, because we start to view all those things as being expected.  Of course we'd have a house and a job and security and safety and health, but let's talk about what would make us actually happy for a change.

Yes.  We have absolutely everything we need and more.  It's insane that we're living in the time of human history where, for the first time, more people are overweight than underweight.  We are living for the first time in human history in which people have to rent storage spaces because they have too much stuff.  They're not suffering

from want, they're suffering from over abundance.  People are being, in some cases, literally buried under their posessions, and yet we are all still chasing that next big high.  Until our happiness resets.  Until we start to take that new purchase for granted, and want to move on to the next high.

Now, what does the Bible have to say about this?  Well, quite simply, it tells us about where happiness comes from.  St. Augustine talked about this, when he said, of God, that 'our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee.'  We were made for God, and that is where we are supposed to find our joy, and everything else pales in comparison.  The scriptures talk about this, in the book of Isaiah, asking us 'Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?' Good question, and it's usually because we are hard-wired to want to continue to satisfy ourselves with the quick and easy stuff, and we find that it doesn't satisfy after all.

Paul writes in Philippians that he has learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, of abundance and need.  He can do all things through Him who strengthens him.  What is the secret to facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want?  Well, Paul had bigger problems than we do.  As I have said earlier, you are living in a time of super abundance, unknown peace, and untold mastery of the world.  You have access to more than almost everyone who has ever lived.  You have more money, more wealth, more comfort, than even Solomon in all his grandeur. Solomon in all his glory couldn't travel 800 km in a day, or warm his temple at the touch of a button, or know instantly what was happening all over the world.  You can.  So even though you know all this, what are you upset about?  Mostly knowing that you aren't ahead of everyone else, right?  There's stuff out there that you want and you can't afford it.  James 4 tells us that 'You desire and do not have, so you murder.  You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.  You do not have, because you do not ask.  You ask and do not recieve because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions.'  Yes.  You're unhappy because you want but can't have.  And it's a total bummer to think about exactly what you're missing out on. All over Facebook, people seem to have perfect lives, and you're struggling to play catch up.  People seem to have wealth and happiness, people seem to be delighted to what they have, and you're still struggling to make any progress at all.  How fair is that?  Well, you have missed Paul's secret from Philippians.

If you're the type of person who plays board games, you'll know that there's probably someone in your group of friends, or in your family, who hates to lose, and who is difficult to play with because they really take it all far too seriously.  And those people, well, you don't want to play with them, because they seem to have missed something rather important.  After you're done playing, all the pieces go back in the box.  All the bits go back in the box, and it doesn't matter who has the houses and hotels, because none of them were real in the first place.  It didn't matter who was in jail, who was in free parking, who had all the money, who was broke, because all the pieces go back in the box when the game is over.  And this is what we forget, and why we find it so hard to be thankful for all we have.  Our baseline happiness doesn't get reset with this, because it has to do with the swallowing up of death, with the elimination of death itself, and our separation from God.  The work of Christ is what stops us from falling apart, from collapsing into despair, because it's the thing that supports everything else.  There can be no real true happiness if everything else is all going to run out someday.  The true happiness, the true thankfulness that we all want to experience, is most often found there, in Christ our Lord, who swallowed up death, who broke suffering, who destroyed the vacuum between us and God.  And knowing that, being aware of it, trusting in that promise, gives you so much to be thankful for.  Not just for the work of Christ, but for everything that the work of Christ touches.  The work of Jesus means that not only can we appreciate life everlasting, but we are also in better shape to appreciate the life we have here, appreciating our family because they too are eternal, appreciating our life because our decisions matter.  We love because he loved us.  We seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and then all these things will be added unto us. Knowing Christ's work to restore us to God means that we can face hunger and abundance, plenty and want, through him who strengthens us.

PJ.