Thanksgiving: Making Someone the King of My Heart

  Naaman, after being cured from his leprosy, wants to thank the prophet with generous gifts. The prophet, however, refuses to take anything from him. Naaman insists, but the prophet does not allow him to give anything. Naaman has received the gift of new life, he has been saved from death by God’s prophet, and he cannot do anything to express his joy and gratefulness to the prophet. What does Naaman do? I find it amazing: he asks for another favour. The one who wanted to give something, who felt obliged to give something in return, now asks for more gifts: “please let two mule-loads of earth be given to your servant; for your servant will no longer offer burnt offering or sacrifice to any god except the Lord.” Let me make a few points about thanksgiving.

1. Giving thanks is not paying for what you have received. It is realizing that what you have received is priceless. Giving thanks is giving yourself back to the giver in any way you can. And it is, first of all, acknowledging before the giver that you owe yourself to him or her: “I am what I am thanks to you.” To give thanks is recognizing that the giver is the source of your good, and therefore recognizing that he or she is good to you. When you give thanks in this way, you are open to receive more, because you know that that person is good to you and may give you more of what they have. Giving thanks is giving the other person the best possible gift: acknowledging that they are good, that they have given because they can, that they can give because they are fortunate, that they have given because they want to give, and this desire to give makes them good.

2. When you give thanks, you put the other person on the throne, because you recognize that you would not have what you have if it were not because of them. But this is not humiliating in any way, for two reasons. First, because you are the one making them kings by acknowledging their gift. Second, because you set them on the throne of your own heart: “You are so good to me!”

Loving someone is actually making them kings of our hearts. This is why to love is to serve: not because we give them something they need from us, but because we give ourselves, which is what makes them happy. When you give thanks, you make the other person happy, because they realize that, in a way, you belong to them…

But here is the trick: you belong to them because they already belong to you! The person you are thanking is someone who has already given you something because you are important for them. You were already the king of their heart!

3. It is important to be thankful. To be thankful is to acknowledge not so much the goodness of the gift but the goodness of the giver. To be thankful is waking up to the fact that we have been loved. By people, certainly, but first of all by God Himself, who put those people in our lives, who inspired those people to help us, who maintained them in good health of body and soul so that they could do so much for us.

Being thankful for life means acknowledging that there is a God who wants you alive for a reason, and then live for that very reason, so as to make happy the God who wants to make you happy. Being thankful is giving yourself to the God who has already given Himself to you, on the Cross, and at every Eucharistic celebration.

The way to give thanks is offering ourselves to God. Offering our persons to His service, our minds to His truth, our freedom to His commands. It is like saying to God, “Lord, you be the King of my heart! What You want, this I want; what You think, this I think; please keep healing my heart and filling me with more gifts, that I may always thank you. Fill me, O Lord, with abundant, infinite gifts: my debt to You will be so great, that You will need to take me to Heaven with you, so that I may thank you forever!