Thanksgiving is Today

   It is easy to see myself as good, if I don't look too hard at the way I live, but I have to wonder sometimes what God sees.

   I read the Scripture this morning from Luke 18, a parable spoken by Jesus:

“Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’"

   Which person am I, not in my limited vision, but His?

   People may come up and say, "look what all you are doing", meaning, " look how good you are", but I think "you don't really know or see". "if you only knew" is my silent response.

   The Pharisee wanted others to see how good and pious he was, but the tax collector knew his own life and heart.

   God loved both of these men. One knew he needed it, and the other felt he did not.

   The words from my favorite hymn, the first stanza:

"How deep the Father's love for us,
How vast beyond all measure
That He should give His only Son
To make a wretch His treasure"

   I may think I am "good", but I know who the "wretch" really is. God does, too.

   The passage in Luke continues with these words:

" I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” 

   Justified: declared innocent or guiltless. Not by what he could do by himself, but what God would do through his great steadfast love.

   Thanksgiving is not only on next Thursday, it is any day that we realize what He has done for all us wretches.