NOTES for Th1 5:14-23

"Give thanks in everything..." We know very well that thanksgiving is one of the most important, "supporting" pillars of our faith. But knowing this, we are often tormented by the fact that our thanksgiving feels strained and insincere; it is clear that we simply do not want to grieve the Lord. And sometimes there may be no thanksgiving left at all, only cries of emotional or physical pain, and that happens too. What happens to our faith at such a time? How can you explain to a father who has lost his beloved nineteen-year-old daughter, lost her not to illness but suddenly, simply because a car struck her to death, how can you tell him that he must give thanks for this, that he must believe... There is such cold churchliness, which simply places a person before a choice he is incapable of making. It exists. But there is another theology as well. Here is an unexpected thought from Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh: "In order to give thanks now for sufferings, in order to give thanks now for the sorrow of the earth, one must already see it glorified, one must already discern the Lord's victory; otherwise our thanksgiving is blasphemous, and we do not give thanks, we are powerless to give thanks, because we do not live by the Kingdom for which we pray." (Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh, "After the New Year's Prayer Service," December 31, 1967.) Let us look carefully at the words "otherwise our thanksgiving is blasphemous." Let us think through all their seriousness and understand that it is better not to give thanks than to give thanks blasphemously. And what we need to seek is not the fruits of faith, but faith itself. One can go everywhere looking for where to get apples, or one can plant an apple tree oneself, cultivate it, water it, fertilize it, wait several years, and then it will bear fruit.