Thanksgiving Day – November 28th, 2024
Trinity Lutheran Church, Block, Kansas
Rev. Joshua Woelmer
Text: Luke 17:11–19
“Faith Gives Thanks”
Theme: God gives blessings to all, but only faith recognizes and gives thanks for them. God gives good things to good and evil people.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
We as believers may be tempted to think that if we pray to God and have enough faith, then he will give us what we want in the time that we want it. We may think that God won’t do such things to unbelievers, that surely they will lead a worse life precisely because they are unbelievers.
Then, we may be disappointed when the opposite happens, right? You come to church and pray to God, but bad things still happen. Or you look at your friend who never goes to church, and it seems like he is really thriving and doing well for himself or herself.
The truth is, God gives blessings to all, but only faith recognizes and gives thanks for them. God gives good things to good and evil people.
The best example of this is found in our Gospel reading. As Jesus was passing along between Samaria and Galilee, there were ten lepers who came out to him and cried out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us” (13). You might think that this is evidence of faith. It seems to be so. Many others cry out with these words and are healed.
But, look deeper—did they only cry out because they wanted to be healed, or did they cry out because they believed that Jesus was more than a miracle worker? The answer is evident as Jesus sends them to the temple and heals them on the way. Only one had true faith in Jesus. He returned, “praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks” (16). We will look more in detail at his faith later.
The truth remains though: all the lepers were healed, both the one with true faith and the others with a false faith that Jesus was merely a miracle worker. God works this way even in our lives today. He sends healing through doctors and medicine both for believers and unbelievers. He establishes homes and families for believers and unbelievers. Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matt 5:44–45).
God does send blessings out of his goodness upon all humanity because His Son has died for all humanity, even if some do not believe in Him. What are the things that you have received from God’s gracious hands? We read some of them just now: “body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses…clothing and shoes, food and drink…and all I have.” Take just one thing out of that list and consider what your life would be like. One or more of these might be taken away as one ages, but you still have much from the gracious hand of God.
Sometimes you only realize that when God begins to take things away. So thank God for what you have before that happens. I know I’m preaching to the choir, those of you who are here today, but we should thank God each and every day for his daily gifts and blessings. Luther’s meaning to the Fourth Petition of the Lord’s Prayer summarizes this point that I’ve been trying to make: “God certainly gives daily bread to everyone without our prayers, even to all evil people, but we pray in this petition that God would lead us to realize this and to receive our daily bread with thanksgiving.”
It is not only the daily bread and the physical blessings that we thank God for. Let’s look again to the Samaritan leper. He praises God as he falls at Jesus’ feet. Jesus commends his faith by saying, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well” (19). Our translations always soften this phrase. It really says, “your faith has saved you.” He has been saved from more than leprosy by his faith in Jesus. Although he does not yet see what Jesus will do on the cross or by the grave, he already has a deeper salvation. Ephesians 2:8 reminds us, “For by grace you have been saved through faith.” This man was saved from the leprosy of sin and death.
Jesus would later die for all his sins, but this man was saved just as Abraham, Moses, David, and all the Old Testament saints were saved: by faith in the coming Messiah. Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. He died for your sins. We now can see this gift more clearly than this man could. But that should lead us to be even more thankful for Jesus’ salvation.
Even though not all believe in this salvation, that can lead us to a greater witness. You do not need to explain everything about the faith when you witness to someone. Even thanking God for his gifts and thanking Jesus for salvation is a good witness to those who do not believe. Thanksgiving comes from faith. We thank God not only for his “First Article” gifts that relate to this life, but we thank Him for his “Second Article” gifts of salvation through Jesus and also the “Third Article” gifts from the Holy Spirit that give us faith, hope, and love.
So let us give thanks. Do not be like the nine healed lepers who only believe in Jesus for what they can get out of him. God is more than what you can see him doing in your life. He is life itself, and in Him we find all the fullness that we will ever need for this life and the next. All praise and thanks be to Him alone.
Now may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen.
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