Thanks for everything

I am not so hot on thankfulness. I get obsessed with the things that are not, taking for granted the good things that are. I focus on what I want rather than on what I have. Recently, I have been disgracefully ungrateful!

But God challenged all of this on a recent leadership conference. One of the speakers was Jim Collins, best-selling author and business thinker. Collins recommends “counting your blessings” as a useful practice for leaders. Why - because he has observed that teams headed for failure are often led by people that have become infected with the “hubris born of success”. Success can go to a leader’s head causing hubris or outrageous arrogance.

Collins argues that a leader may counter hubris by listing at least 100 blessings before noting just how few of these successes can be attributed solely to himself. This humbling exercise is a good antidote to hubris.

The fact that there are benefits to thanksgiving should come as no surprise to Christians, for the Bible contains repeated exhortations to be thankful. For example, the Apostle Paul makes this sweeping command: “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him (Col 3:17)”. Further, Paul maintains that mankind’s slide into destruction began because “although they knew God [by observing creation], they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him (Rom 1:21)”.

Both these verses underline the importance of glorifying God and thanking Him. The command to glorify God in the Colossians verse is expressed in the words “do all in the name of the Lord Jesus”. When you do something “in the name of Jesus”, you do it as His representative. That is to say, you do it the way Jesus would have, hence displaying His character. This glorifies God by showing those that can’t see Him what He is like.

You are probably aware of the Christian’s call to glorify God. But how often do you neglect thankfulness?

I am sure you can guess what I did when I got back from Joburg last Wednesday. I wrote a list of 100 things in my life I can thank God for. As the list grew, I could feel low level depression and dissatisfaction lifting. So when are you going to start writing?