The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Gratitude: Thanks for Nutt'n or Thanks for Everything!

Episode Date: November 27, 2020

Happy Thanksgiving! Today, Jeff talks about how we can cultivate an attitude of thankfulness for everything we have, and how we can practice greater gratitude in our daily lives. Let’s start saying “thanks for everything” instead of “thanks for nothing!” Snippet from the Show “The secret to happiness is gratitude.” - GK Chesterton Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail] Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit ascensionpress.com/thejeffcavinsshow for full shownotes!

You're listening to the Jeff Kavana show, episode 194. Thanks for nothing. Or thanks for everything. Hey, I'm Jeff Kavins. How do you simplify your life? How do you study the Bible? All the way from motorcycle trips to raising kids, we're going to talk about the faith and life in general.

It's the Jeff Kaven show. Welcome. Welcome to the show. Again, this is the Jeff Kaven show, talking about all things related to being a disciple of Jesus Christ, following him, reading his word, listening to his voice, carrying out his mission. That's the center of my life, and that's why I do the show, and I'm glad that you could join me. And we can spend some time this week. It's a big week, Thanksgiving week in America, and we can talk about Thanksgiving, and that's the title of the show. how many times do you hear people say, well, thanks for nothing. And sometimes our attitude towards

life is represented by that statement, thanks for nothing. But I would rather change it into thanks for everything. And that's what we're going to talk about on the show today. Thanks for everything. It's cold here in Minnesota now. I've got a roaring fire in the cabin. And you might hear that in the background a little bit, and I absolutely love the smell when I leave the cabin, go out by the lake or walk around a little bit. The entire area is permeated with the smell of burning oak, and I just love that smell. Behind me is a card table. Emily has been putting on, she's not here right now, but she's been putting together a crossword puzzle, Claude Monet's lily pad. I'm not into the crossword puzzle thing, but she absolutely loves it. The ice is about a half-inch

thick on the lake behind me, and it's a process that we just can't stop in Minnesota. No sense in trying. Later, we're going to walk on water. We walk on water in Minnesota. I walked out to the lake, I walked out to the lake this morning and noticed deer tracks frozen in the earth. I love it. I love it. every night about 5 p.m. The deer come out into the backyard. It's like a tradition here in the woods, and I really like it. Well, our attention now moves from election news to good news because it's Thanksgiving here in America. So I want to remind you, if you want the show notes, I'm going to give you a lot of scripture today about Thanksgiving and having an attitude of thankfulness, an attitude of gratefulness. And if you want those show notes, all you have to

do is text my name, Jeff Kavans, one word, Jeff Kavans, and you can text it to 33777. And by the way, heads up, I'm working with Father Mike Schmitz. We're going to be putting on a special adventure, a one-year read-through the Bible. You can find out about that in the show notes. And I'm going to be joining him from time to time to go through the entire Bible in a year. And we have some big surprises along the way. You won't want miss out on that. So you can go to ascensionpress.com or go to the show notes here, and I'll get you all hooked up where you can hear Father Mike Schmitz go through the Bible in a year with some commentary. How often do we look at Facebook or Instagram to see what others have been doing? And oftentimes when people do that, they grow discontent about their own lives.

How often do we see someone else's blessings and become jealous because we don't. have what they have. Well, we end up with an attitude that says thanks for nothing, but I really do think that we need to be thankful for all that we have. We can find so much to praise God about in our lives. And I have found, to be honest with you, that when we change our attitude and stop looking at what everybody else has or everyone else's likes on social media, whatever it might be, we turn our attention to the things that we do have and the blessings we have in our life. We can find so much to praise God about. You know, this word thank, as long as we're talking about Thanksgiving, this word thank is derived from an old English word, thank. And I

don't know how to say that with that English accent exactly, but it's T-H-A-N-C. And it means thought. Thanksgiving is related to thinking. gratitude is the disposition. Thanksgiving is its natural expression. And you can turn around your life in terms of feeling down and isolated and discouraged with COVID-19, discouraged with so many other things going on in the world, including the church for some things. You can turn it around with your attitude, and that's an attitude of gratitude. thankfulness, because it unites the mind and the heart is an expression of the whole person. One of the stories that I am touched by all the time, and I'm not going to go into it in great detail,

but you can read it on your own. It's the story of the healing of the lepers, and you can find it in Luke 17, 11 through 19. I'll put that in the show notes for you. It's 10 lepers who have been struggling with leprosy, which, back then means that you're, you're out of the camp. You are isolated. You ever feel like that? Isolation? Yeah. Me too. And I think we're all going through it right now, feeling isolated from our friends, from church, from colleagues at work, from family. And it can have a real negative effect on people. Well, that's what the lepers were going through in Luke 17. And Jesus comes by, and what happens

he heals all 10 of them. All 10 of them are healed. All 10 of them have a life now that they felt was lost and there was no hope. But the interesting thing about this is that Jesus observes that only one of the 10 turned around to do something, to say something that made all the difference. They turned around and they simply said what? They said, thank you, thank you. Now, the church fathers and the doctors of the church tell us that these physical healings we see in scripture are almost as it were a sacramental pointing to the deep spiritual healing that the love of the Trinity brings. And so that is extended to you today. Jesus is extending healing and wholeness to you today. In our response, that one in Luke 17 should be thank you. Thank you. You see, a person with a thankful heart

has a proper perspective. And that's what I hope we gain in this period of time, this period of isolation like spiritual lepers in a sense. G.K. Chesterton said, the secret to happiness is gratitude. That's a big thing to say, isn't it? I mean, G.K. Chesterton is no lightweight. Some people think he's the most quoted Catholic in the modern era. The secret, let me say it again, the secret to happiness is gratitude. He also said when it comes to life, the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude. That's a great quote. I think so often the people who take things for granted are the people who say, well, thanks for nothing. and they are actually sitting on so many blessings,

but the person who is tuned into Christ will say thank you, and they'll have an attitude of gratitude about everything. So check your heart. Where do you stand? Restless, never satisfied? Continually thinking about your problems and your circumstances? Or are you refocusing your heart on all the blessings in your life at this time of the year? You see, ingratitude. Ingratitude is a clear indicator of a heart turned in on itself,

proud and never satisfied. Paul said in chapter one of Romans, in verses 21, I'm not going to read it all, but 21 through 32, it'll be in the show notes. Paul examined some of the most wicked depravities in the world. And you can go ahead and read that list. It's a long list of wicked depravities in the world. And you could probably think of some of those depravities. But here's what's interesting. In the midst of that list of wicked depravities is found a thankless heart at the root of all of it. A thankless heart is at the root of many of the wicked depravities in the world. You see, when we're not thankful, we're not recognizing Christ. We're looking at the problem. We're looking at ourselves. We're not looking at Christ. We find our lady at the complete opposite, the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Magnificat in Luke chapter 1. What does she say? She says, the mighty one has done great things for me. That's a great scripture for you at Thanksgiving time. That's just so beautiful. Let me read it again. The mighty one has done great things for me. Let me reword that for a moment for you.

the mighty one has done great things for you. That's the truth. And recognizing it and giving recognition and saying, thank you, Lord, is the key here. St. Teresa Vavala said, in all created things, discern the providence and wisdom of God. And in all things, give him thanks. I'll put that in the show notes for you, too. No extra charge. Great quote from St. Teresa Vavala. Catechism of the Catholic Church says in paragraph 224, one of the implications of having faith in one God is it means living in Thanksgiving. That's so beautiful. Let me give you some tips for cultivating thankfulness at this time of the year. I've got several of them that I'll give you along with some really outstanding quotes from some of the church leaders in the past. And you

might want to take note of this. I'll give it to you in the show notes, but take these scriptures and meditate on them during this Thanksgiving season. Number one, some tips for cultivating thankfulness, and I've said this before, but it bears repeating again, it is a holy discipline. When you cultivate a life of thankfulness, it isn't something that is just arbitrary or, you know, a whim. It is actually a discipline. It's independent of feelings.

It is the mature believer, the mature Christian. The mature Catholic sees the hand of God in every circumstance in their life. It's putting on a new lens. It's seeing things differently. It's observing life from the perspective of the Trinity. Paul said in Ephesians 5, he says, addressing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart,

always and for everything, giving thanks in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to God the Father. Isn't that beautiful? Always and for everything, giving thanks. Wow. Are you doing that right now? Or are you complaining? Are you seeing everything through negative lenses? In everything, give thanks. He also told the Colossians in chapter 3, and whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. That's amazing. St. Teresa of Calcutta, you know her as Mother Teresa. She said the best way to show my gratitude to God is to accept everything, even my problems with joy, with joy. So it's a holy discipline, it's independent of feelings. That's number one. Number two,

way of cultivating thankfulness for you is recognizing the small and ordinary things. I think sometimes we look, you know, when someone says, well, you should give thanks to God. We start to immediately go to the big things and then we end up with nothing. We say, well, there's nothing big in my life that I could give God thanks for, but it really starts with the small things, the little things. Someone once said, The only thing necessary to make an unappreciative, to make us unappreciative, let me start that over. The only thing necessary to make us unappreciative of a blessing from God is that we should receive the blessing often and regularly.

Isn't that the truth? That's really the truth is that the unappreciative person doesn't say thank you often for these little blessings. think of the opportunities for the lepers the following week after being healed look for the blessings in the mundane that's a real key isn't it the catechism says in paragraph 2638 as in the prayer of petition every event and need can become an offering of thanksgiving in that beautiful every petition Every single event in your life can become an offering of Thanksgiving. You might want to take some time this week and just make a little list of some of the simple petitions in your life and some of the events, even the small events in your family, work with your neighbor, and make those an offering of Thanksgiving.

Number three, cultivating thankfulness. thank God in the midst of adversity. Boy, we've got a lot of that right now, don't we? We really do. Paul said, give thanks in all circumstances in 1st Thessalonians 5. Give thanks in all. He didn't say give thanks in some circumstances or give thanks when it's an obvious blessing. He said, give thanks in all circumstances. And my friend, I am confident. I am confident that God will manifest in your circumstances when you give thanks. It's beautiful. You know, Paul is an interesting character because he wrote several epistles, not from the beaches of Brazil, not on, you know, the ski slopes of Colorado, he wrote them from a prison. And in Philippians 1-3, he's writing and he starts off

and here's his first words to the Philippians in prison. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. And that's something that you can even remember someone in your life or something that happened to you or someone who blessed you. And you can just pause and say, my word, I thank you, God, as I remember that teacher, as I remember my parents, as I remember that friend, I thank you. That's beautiful. So there's three ways of cultivating thankfulness, and I do have several more I'm going to give you, and that's going to be on the other side of this break. I'll be right back. What if this year your Advent could be different? What if you could learn how to welcome Jesus into your heart from the people who did it first.

This year, Ascension's Rejoice Advent Journal invites you to experience Advent with Joseph and Mary as they await the birth of their son, Jesus, the Savior of the world. Together with the guided meditations found on rejoiceprogram.com, this journal will help you to see the marriage of Mary and Joseph in a new light. You will ponder what was in their hearts and minds as they awaited the birth of Jesus. Rejoice will help you open. your heart to the peace and the joy of the holy family as you prepare for the coming of Jesus this Christmas. Visit rejoice program.com to purchase your copy today.

Okay, so we are talking today in the show about cultivating thankfulness in our lives, and we're going from thanks for nothing to thanks for everything, Lord. Thank you for everything. The fourth one, the fourth point is set aside some time every day to express thanks to God. Did you know that in ancient Israel a daily habit of Thanksgiving was important to the life of the nation? For the Levites, the Levites were officially appointed. Think about this now. The Levites were officially appointed to stand in the temple every morning and every evening to do what? to give thanks to God.

First Chronicles 23, I'll put it in the show notes. Daniel, in the book of Daniel chapter 6, Daniel knelt, he knelt down to his knees three times every day to thank God. My friend, I love you, and I want to give you the best on this show. I want to give you suggestions. I want to give you ideas on how to walk as a disciple. For this next week, can you make a point out of just setting on your Google calendar three times every day that you're just going to get on your knees and thank God for everything in your life? Will you do that?

In my show notes, I have my email and contact information. I'd like to hear from you and find out how that has transformed your life. You know, you can, with these fancy phones now and watches today, you can set an alarm even three times a day. just remind you, get on your knees. Knees to the ground, heart to God. Catechism says in 1418, visit the Blessed Sacrament. It's proof of gratitude. Maybe you can't get in there, but you can do it at home. But if you certainly can sign up for adoration in your church, do it. My wife and I are substitutes in our church, which means we typically get called for midnight to six in the morning. and we almost always say yes, because it's an opportunity to show gratitude to God for all that we have.

St. Ambrose said, boy, this show is rich in quotes, isn't it today? St. Ambrose said, no duty is more urgent than that of returning thanks. These are saints, my friend. They won the race. They're in heaven with God. no duty is more urgent, Ambrose says, than that of returning thanks. Number five, thank God publicly and corporately. Where do we do that? We do it in the Mass. The Mass is called the Eucharist, and Eucharist means Thanksgiving. Before the elements are consecrated, Jesus gives thanks in the glory. We give you thanks. We praise you for your glory. In the liturgy of the Word, The word is concluded by the word of the Lord. And our response is what?

Thanks be to God. And the Eucharistic prayer. Listen to this. Just listen to the richness of the preface to the Eucharistic prayer number two. It is truly right and just. Our duty and salvation always and everywhere to give you thanks. Father, most holy, through your beloved son, Jesus Christ, your word, Through whom you made all things, whom you sent as our Savior and Redeemer, incarnate by the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin.

Fulfilling your will and gaining for you a holy people, he stretched out his hands as he endured his passion so as to break the bonds of death and manifest the resurrection. That is rich, very, very powerful. and even in the concluding right in mass. What do we say? The words are, go in peace to love and serve the Lord, and our response is, thanks be to God. That is beautiful. Number six, cultivating thankfulness,

try voluntary fasting from something that you take for granted. That thanks for nothing can be turned into a thank for everything. Thank you for everything. Give up eating for a day. Then thank God for your next meal. Walk to work if you can, and then thank them for your car. Thank God for your husband, for your wife, for your children, for your home. And number seven, keep a record of God's faithfulness to you. In other words, count your blessings. It was St. John Chrysostom, the golden throat who said, happiness can only be achieved by looking inward and learning to enjoy whatever life has,

and this requires transforming greed into gratitude. Thank you, St. Chrysostom. You hit it right on the head there. Number eight, show gratitude and thankfulness towards others. This is a really important thing at Thanksgiving. I'm going to challenge you not only to get on your knees like Daniel three times a day, but I'm going to challenge you to start thinking of three people in your life that you could write a note of thanks to. I can think of three people right now, and I'm going to do it. I can think of three

people right now that I'm going to put the pen to paper, and I'm just going to give them a little note and thank them and mail it to them. No email, no text. Well, you can do that if you want, I suppose, but there's nothing like getting a note from someone who took the time to take a piece of paper and a pen and write to you and thank you for something you did in their life. Paul said in 2 Corinthians 9, Paul told the Corinthians that generosity is not only supplying the needs of God's people, but it is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. And the church even tells you a couple of things that are under this banner of thanking and showing gratitude towards others when it says in paragraph 2220,

thank those who have passed on the faith to you. Who was it? Who was it that passed the faith onto you? Who was it that shared the riches of Christ with you? Well, thank those who did it. And if you're taking care of your parents in their old age, which I am right now, and I know many of you are, and I know it takes time and it takes patience and love and care and tenderness and gentleness. if you take care of your parents in their old age, the church tells us in paragraph 2215 and 2218, that that is a form of thanks. That's a form of thanks. And then number nine, are you suffering from anxiety or worry? Well, the answer to that is watch television in the middle of the night. Kidding. Totally kidding. Paul says, and he commands those people who are suffering,

from anxiety to cultivate a life of thankfulness when he says in Philippians 4, have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with, with, with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God. So if you can't sleep at night, Psalm 11962 says, rise and give thanks. Now, I know that in the last month, you probably have had a hard time sleeping, or you got up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep, or you woke up extremely early and thought, ah, what do you do? Don't turn the TV on. Give thanks. Just take a few minutes. Go over your list. You'll be surprised at what it does for you in the middle of the night, the darkest time of the day. That's it. Those are my nine tips for you on how to cultivate thankfulness at this time of the year. St. Teresa of Lazoos said, Jesus does not demand great action from us, but simply surrender and gratitude. That is incredible.

Now, let me wrap all of this up for you, starting with a quote from St. John Paul II. My hero, the one I want to be like, the one that I ask for prayers from, the one I met in his library when I was covering him on EWTN. He says, remember the past with gratitude. Live the present with enthusiasm. Look forward to the future with confidence. Isn't that good? I'm going to give it to you in the show notes,

so don't worry about pulling over on the side of the road right now. In rewinding, he says, remember the past with gratitude. Let me ask you a question. does the past affect you in your life? Are you caught up in the past? Is your life today determined by the past? He says, remember the past with gratitude. Can you think of those things in the past that you can show gratitude for? And as far as the present goes, he says, live it with enthusiasm. The future? Look forward to the future with confidence. You see, we're created in the image and likeness of God, and that means that we're capable of living in the past because God is yesterday, today, and forever, and we too have

the ability to live in the past, which is not a good thing many times, but you can remember the past with gratitude. My wife and I did this just the other day. We were thinking about some of the places that we've lived in the past, and yes, there were troubles and there were difficulties. There were hurts. Yes. But we started to talk about the things. things in our past that we were grateful for. And now we can live in the present with enthusiasm, and we can look forward to the future, look forward to the future with confidence. Now, I know that there's a lot of bad news on the television and on the internet, and people are always sending you clips of what's going on on text and Instagram and everything else.

But let me just say a few things right now as we conclude. And I want you to open your heart, now, and I want you to hear this because I think it's healing and it's beneficial. I want to say thank you. I want to say thank you for taking the time during this difficult period to read and play with your children. Thank you. Thank you for listening to a friend who is losing it right now. Thank you for listening to them. Thank you for going to Mass when the church is open and spending time with God. You're to be thanked. I think that's a wonderful thing to do. And I want to thank you for creating an atmosphere of warmth and hope in your home. Thank you. And I want to thank you for supporting your local business that is struggling. That little, that little, you know, order of food

from a local restaurant that is struggling and they're going through a dark time and maybe they're depressed, thank you for supporting them. That is a good thing to do. And number six, I would say is thank you for not withholding your offering at church just because everything is closing. Thank you for supporting your local church. Thank you for praying. Thank you for praying for your local church. And I'd like to tell you thank you for voting. Yes, thank you for voting. And I would say thank you for being patient as you homeschool your children for the first time and the businesses at home as well. Thank you for your efforts there. Hear that from me. Hear that from the Lord. Thank you. Thank you for being patient. And thank you for helping your neighbors who are

elderly and their children aren't around and you notice that things need to be done or they might need an errand run. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for seeing Jesus in his church during times that are challenging and not speaking evil of her. Thank you. My friend, it's been good to spend a few minutes together this week as we celebrate in America. And I know that many people listen from around the world, a shout out to our friends in Australia, Malaysia, and China, our friends in South America who are listening, thank you for taking the time. And I want to pray for you and just go over the show notes here and take a couple things that you could take out of it and put into practice. Please, I've said this before, and I truly mean it, please do not take podcasts as entertainment,

but as a brother coming alongside of you to walk this walk, take some things and do it, put it into practice. Don't be a hearer of God's word and not a doer. You don't want to deceive yourself. You want to put this into practice and become the person that God has created you to be, a servant of God, a son of God, a daughter of God, a faithful disciple. Let me pray for you. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Lord, I lift up my brother. I lift up my sister to you today in this difficult time. And Lord, we are thankful for all the small things in our life. And we're thankful for the ability to even communicate on a podcast. I am grateful, Lord, for my children. I'm grateful, Lord,

for our home and for food. I'm grateful, Lord, for heating in our house. I am grateful for transportation. I'm grateful that I can walk and I can see and hear and touch and feel. I am thankful Lord for the church. I'm thankful for our pastor. I'm thankful for my friends who have been friends for so many years and remain faithful. May I be as faithful as they have been. I'm thankful for the Eucharist and I'm thankful for your word and I'm thankful for the catechism. I'm thankful for songs of praise. I am thankful for freedom. In the name of the Father, in the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen. Hey, meet me on parlor, me, we, and rumble as well as some of the other social media outlets. We'll carry the conversation on there. And I always go by the name

Jeff Kavins. That's what I was born with, so that's what you can look for. And we may put some of that in the show notes. Have a great Thanksgiving week, and may God bless you, and I'm thankful for you.