Salvation by Thanksgiving: Praising God Always

St. Paul tells his readers to “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, as you teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Col. 3:16). It’s a reminder to live the life of a Christian in a state of continual thanksgiving towards God. Elsewhere, he calls us to “Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thes. 5:16-18). But what does that look like, and why is it important? It’s easy to praise God in the good times, but how do we praise Him in times of suffering or temptation, and why should we?

We can find the answer to these questions interwoven throughout Scripture, and in the writings of the great Saints throughout history. The Psalms, in particular, focus on the need for thanksgiving. The shortest Psalm in the Bible, Psalm 117, simply says, “Praise the Lord, all nations! Extol him, all peoples! For great is his steadfast love toward us; and the faithfulness of the Lord endures for ever. Praise the Lord!” That’s the entire Psalm. That’s all that needs to be said. We’re thankful, because of God’s steadfast love for us. It’s a love that we don’t have to (and can’t) earn, and unlike the fleeting human loves we know here on earth, it’s steadfast, it’s reliable. We have a God we can lean on, whose strength is inseparable from His love. In the prayer of St. Francis de Sales, “O Great and Good Creator, what do I not owe Thee, Who didst take me from out that nothingness, by Thy Mercy to make me what I am? How can I ever do enough worthily to praise Thy Holy Name, and render due thanks to Thy Goodness?”

So the first answer to why we should thank God is that He lovingly created us, and He loves us still, because His love is steadfast. That’s a cause for great joy. But there’s also an evangelical dimension to our thanksgiving. King David instructed his people, “O give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make known his deeds among the peoples! Sing to him, sing praises to him, tell of all his wonderful works!” (1 Chronicles 16:8-9). And we hear in Psalm 57:9, “I will give thanks to thee, O Lord, among the peoples; I will sing praises to thee among the nations.” In other words, we should go out “to the nations,” to the world, proclaiming the good things that God has done: in creation and in salvation, and in a special way in our own lives. This call to evangelize through thanksgiving is perhaps nowhere more applicable than the modern age. We have little time for logical argument, but we love sympathetic stories. If you can share how God has changed your life, that’s a powerful witness. And the more you spend time in thanksgiving for God, the more you’re able to share “to the nations” just what it is that you’re thankful for.

Thanksgiving should also inform how we approach the Mass. Psalm 100 says:

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the lands! Serve the Lord with gladness! Come into his presence with singing! Know that the Lord is God! It is he that made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him, bless his name! For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures for ever, and his faithfulness to all generations.

After all, “Eucharist” is the Greek word for “Thanksgiving,” and the whole Mass is a sacrifice of thanksgiving. So we should seek to approach God in Mass with an appropriate spirit of thanksgiving. The USCCB explains that one of the reasons for the Preface for the Eucharistic Prayer is because the introductory dialogue “establishes that this prayer is the prayer of the baptized and ordained, is offered in the presence of God, and has thanksgiving as its central focus.” So if you’re not entering into Mass with a spirit of thanksgiving, you’re missing the central point. St. Josemaria Escriva encouraged Christians to continue this thanksgiving by spending time in prayer after Mass as well:

Love the Mass, my children, love the Mass. And be hungry to receive our Lord in communion, although you may be cold inside, although your emotions may not correspond to your desires. Receive communion with faith, with hope, with burning charity.

A man who fails to love the Mass fails to love Christ. We must make an effort to “live” the Mass with calm and serenity, with devotion and affection. Those who love acquire a finesse, a sensitivity of soul that makes them notice details that are sometimes very small, but that are important because they express the love of a passionate heart. This is how we should attend the holy Mass. And this is why I have always suspected that those who want the Mass to be over quickly show, with this insensitive attitude, that they have not yet realized what the sacrifice of the altar means.

If we love Christ, who offers himself for us, we will feel compelled to find a few minutes after Mass for an intimate personal thanksgiving, which will prolong in the silence of our hearts that other thanksgiving which is the Eucharist.

In addition to spending a few minutes after Mass making an “intimate personal thanksgiving,” St. Josemaria also recommended a simple prayer right after you receive the Eucharist: “‘When you receive him, tell him: Lord, I hope in you: I adore you, I love you, increase my faith. Be the support of my weakness: You, who have remained defenseless in the Eucharist so as to be the remedy for the weakness of your creatures.'”

But what about when things are tough? As we’ve just seen, Josemaria called us to ” be hungry to receive our Lord in communion, although you may be cold inside, although your emotions may not correspond to your desires.” But there are also times in life when things are just painful: the death of a loved one, spiritual desolation, physical or mental illness, etc. Perhaps God seems to have abandoned you. The Israelites knew this feeling well. The Jewish city of Bethulia was under siege, and the opposing army was intentionally cutting off food and water to slowly starve the people to death. Divine assistance didn’t come immediately, and the people began to despair and talk of surrendering themselves, and the holy things of God. Judith (the eventual heroine through whom God will deliver His people) rebukes the elders and the people, and reminds them: “In spite of everything let us give thanks to the Lord our God, who is putting us to the test as he did our forefathers” (Judith 8:25). Josemaria gives similar counsel: “Thank you, Lord, because — as well as allowing us to be tempted — you also give us the strength and beauty of your grace so that we can win through! Thank you, Lord, for the temptations you allow us to have so that we may be humble!”

And so we can see that the Christian message is one of constant thankfulness to God, and that this is how we should approach evangelization, the Mass, and our daily lives, whether in times of great celebration or great difficulty. The prophet Habakkuk prayed a hymn of thanksgiving amidst trouble (Hab. 3:17-18): “Though the fig tree do not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.” And there is a very real sense in which the thankful are the ones who shall be saved. God promises in Psalm 50:23, “He who brings thanksgiving as his sacrifice honors me; to him who orders his way aright I will show the salvation of God!”