The whole multitude of the country of the Gadarenes
round about besought Him to depart from them (Lk. 8:37).
What a strange thing for the Gadarenes to do!
The Lord healed their brother who was suffering terrible torments; He healed a man who terrified them all with his condition and actions, who tore chains like a thread, lived in tombs rather than a house, and didn’t allow anyone to pass by his dwelling. And yet, the Gadarenes entreated the Lord to depart from their land. The Gadarenes heard a story about how a man who had an entire legion of demons living in him was healed, and this experience of inhuman power showed them that their region was visited by an extraordinary guest Who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil (Acts 10:38).
And yet, instead of receiving and keeping with reverent and grateful hearts the Physician of souls and bodies, such as the world had never seen, they entreat Him to depart from them! What’s with this strange state of the Gadarenes? The Evangelist says they were gripped by great fear. But why were they afraid? Where did this fear come from? Is this not the same fear that made even the demons cry out to the Son of God: What have we to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God? art Thou come hither to torment us before the time? (Mt. 8:29). It’s fearful to think about, but that’s how it was. The Gadarenes were alarmed because they’d lost their herd of swine, and fearing to lose other such property, they entreated the Lord to leave them. How crude the ingratitude of the Gadarenes! How great the ignorance of their darkened hearts!
Brethren! That we might not also fall into any temptation of ingratitude before the Lord, let us reflect upon the duty of gratitude.
The Apostle teaches us: In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you (1 Thess. 5:18). It’s God’s will for us to give Him thanks. It doesn’t mean He needs our gratitude, but that gratitude to Him is a righteous and salvific work for us.
What is gratitude? Gratitude is that sweet disposition of love for God by which the reverent soul sees and feels the various benefactions of God, highly values every Divine benefaction, and turns them to the glory of God.
And so, is it not natural, having eyes, to see the gift set before you? Is it not natural, having sensibility, to feel joy over the gifts received? Is it not natural, having a will, to want to repay a gift? In human judgment, an ingrate is considered base, even less than a man—and rightly so. Judge for yourselves—is a man who has eyes but doesn’t see, has ears but doesn’t hear, has a heart but doesn’t feel, has a soul but doesn’t breathe, truly human? No, it’s a dummy—the likeness of a man, but not a living man. If a stone doesn’t absorb water, or absorbs little of it, this is in the natural order of things; if not even flimsy grass grows on hard rock, and a scattered seed turns to dust, this too is in the natural order of things. But God didn’t create the human heart as stone, and the soul that God gave us has the capacity to bear fruit under the influence of God’s light and rain. How base and repugnant it is—to both God and nature—to be ungrateful to anyone.
But has God’s beneficent hand been withdrawn from us? Is there really nothing to see, nothing to rejoice in, nothing that would make us raise our hands in thanksgiving when we think of God’s dealings with us? Oh! It would be easier to measure the expanses of Heaven and the skies beneath it, and the depths of the ocean abyss, easier to count the breaths exhaled from the heart and the weight of the life breathed in than to measure and comprehend the magnitude and number of God’s benefactions. Who gave us life? And what kind of life? What a beautiful creation man emerged as from the hands of the Creator! God created him according to His image and likeness, having made him a little lower than the angels (Ps. 8:5).
How do we live? He who didn’t give himself existence is unable to preserve it. In Him and only in Him, the all-good and all-acting, do we live, and move, and have our being (Acts 17:28). The Lord directs a man’s steps. Our homes, our cities, and our kingdoms are anchored in Him. What shall I render unto the Lord for all that He hath rendered unto me? (Ps. 115:3). I’m a fallen creation before You, Heavenly Father! What should I expect for myself, if not trial and condemnation? For the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23).
But, oh boundless goodness! We have departed from You, yet You seek and call out: “Adam! Where art thou?”
Son of the eternal Father! You have found and taken Your lost sheep upon Your shoulders.
Sweetest Jesus! The faces of the angels are amazed at Your love, which sacrificed itself for the redemption of us sinners.
And who but the Spirit of grace, the Spirit of Christ creates in men a pure heart and a right spirit? Brethren! Everyone can know and feel how his soul, disordered by sin, comes alive to God only when fervent prayer brings the dew of grace down upon it. All our contentment comes from God.
How can we not thank our Lord? How heavy, how excessively great is in our ingratitude when we don’t thank Him—He Who blesses us in so many ways! Do ye thus requite the LORD, O foolish people and unwise? Moses said, upbraiding Israel. Is not He Thy Father That hath bought thee? hath He not made thee, and established thee? (Deut 32:6). We Christians have received even more gifts from the Heavenly Father than did Israel. How great is our folly, how great the hardness of our hearts when we don’t recognize God’s benefactions with a grateful mind and heart!
Christian soul! Heed how the Heavenly Father laments over ungrateful Israel; He calls Heaven to witness and the earth to hear His grievance. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me. He then reproves rational Israel as an example of an irrational animal. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, My people hath rejected Me (Is. 1:2–3). The ox knows his master because he relates to him as his master; the ass discerns its master by the manger where he places feed for it. But Israel doesn’t recognize the Lord by His benefactions. What a mighty rebuke to Israel!
Christian soul! Does not this reproach fall more heavily upon you? Arouse yourself, rise from the humiliation you’ve been plunged into by the sin of the hardening of your heart. Confess your misfortune to the Lord and entreat Him to enlighten your mind and inflame your heart with grateful love.
Brethren! A whole lifetime will not suffice for us; all the powers of soul and body are too little to worthily repay the Lord for His benefactions toward us. Why then do we feel so little of God’s benefactions?
Gratitude sees and recognizes God’s benefactions; it doesn’t overlook what has been received from the Lord. Thus, if we offer little gratitude to the Lord, then of course it’s because we don’t see His benefactions.
How does this happen with us? A proud mind recognizes only its own merits and ascribes to itself what it has, even only what it thinks it has. Is it possible to expect grateful reverence for the Lord? Pride pays no attention to much that is received from above, dismissing it as a trifle unworthy of notice, while regarding other things it consoles itself, saying: “This was acquired by my own calculations, by my own skill.” Pitiful self-deception! I am poor, destitute, blind, and naked before You, Lord!
Christian soul! Reproach within yourself the thoughts of pride by reflecting on the immeasurable weakness of our nature; repeat to yourself the words of the Apostle: Who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it? (1 Cor. 4:7). Our sense of gratitude before the Lord is often and strongly weakened by the human mindset that regards those who are great in intellect, rank, or power as the cause of their happiness. But if everything, both great and small, is the gift of our one Master, if the great do neither more nor less for us than what the Heavenly Father is pleased to grant, then is it not strange to render honor to the servant and forget the master, or to give the servant that honor which belongs to the master? Doesn’t this also mean making idols for yourself on earth, changing the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of a corruptible man?
Neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase, says the Apostle (1 Cor. 3:7). Was it by our hand or the hand of another that the seed of goodness was cast into us; was it by our hand or the hand of another that the seed sown was watered? If God doesn’t grow a good seed in us, all our labors are in vain. The farmer casts seed into the furrow. How much is needed for a ripe ear of grain to appear! And this “much” is not at all within the farmer’s power. Light, heat, and precipitation, without which the seed dies, are at the mercy of the Master of nature.
It’s exactly the same in our affairs. The frivolous carelessness of our pride passes over the works of God without thinking about Him, with the certainty that they’re daily affairs caused by our forces or those of gifted people. We’re fed, given drink, and clothed, but by whom? We don’t know. We think it had to be so and so it was. We awaken from our unconsciousness, we grieve and take offense only when something doesn’t go our way; then we assert in our souls some kind of rights in our favor, as if someone had committed to handling our affairs without us, without obligating us to anything; then it’s seen that we too are ready to acknowledge God as the giver of all things, only for some reason we’re very displeased when He seems to forget us—us, who until that moment hadn’t thought of Him at all. Such frivolous audacity! Such nonsensical pride!
The Apostle Paul writes about the Gentiles: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened… Wherefore God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting (Rom. 1:21, 28). This is the path by which they descended to the depths of impiety and debauchery. Ingratitude occupied too important a spot here. God was known to the ancient peoples. But they didn’t honor Him worthily for His glory, didn’t thank Him worthily for the benefactions they received from Him. Their hearts became cold to the mercies of the Most High, their love for Him weakened, and their knowledge of Him was lost. Darkness and desolation, vices and impurity increased; man became like an irrational beast that eats its fill of fodder and is concerned with nothing save crude satiation. The self-willed impiety of ingratitude is finally punished by the very impurity that the pagan soul has come to love.
Brethren! The same thing can happen in Christians hearts too. Look around you. If God is good enough to pour out grace even upon the graceless, then He’s also righteous enough to punish the impiety that despises the gifts of His goodness and is careless about bearing fruits worthy of His mercies. Otherwise, God’s punishment is the natural fruit of ingratitude; because ingratitude brings spiritual desolation to the soul, drowns its best inclinations, and plants savagery within it.
On the other hand, with a grateful soul, the more often it turns to God with gratitude the more it grows in love for Him and is illuminated by the life-giving light of His perfections; and the more freely it opens itself before God, the more widely it opens before Him, the more capable it becomes of receiving the gifts of His grace. There’s no doubt that in any case we can and must open our heart to receive something from above: “Open your mouth wide and I will fill it,” God tells us. God is good; He only awaits us to draw near to Him for His gifts, and He doesn’t delay in granting them to us. Thus, our ingratitude only rewards us with poverty, whereas gratitude attracts an abundant dew of new mercies and bounties from above.
How can we not thank the Lord? Or rather, how can we thank Him worthily? We’re poor—poor in everything. Nothing we have is ours—neither goods, nor strength, nor time. But He’s so good that He accepts His own gifts as the gift of our thanksgiving.
He’s so good that He looks with love even upon our awareness of our own weakness and of the greatness of His love. He’s so good that He graciously accepts as our acceptable sacrifice the exercise of the powers and abilities granted by Him, and exercised through His very grace. So, do you desire to be grateful to the Lord? Sanctify your strength by serving the Lord; don’t be lazy, don’t refuse to respond to the call to come to church and offer praise and thanksgiving to the Lord. Nothing can be more necessary for you than the Lord; don’t forget Him.
Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31). Do you want to be something other than ungrateful earth, destined for destruction? Dedicate to the Lord that which He has blessed you with; bring Him the fruits of your labors that He may send down a blessing on your labors again. For unto every one that hath shall be given (Mt. 25:29). Do you want to be grateful for His love? Do His will and hasten to atone for your sins with repentance and give up desires that displease Him. Don’t despise the riches of His goodness and meekness and longsuffering, as though you don’t know that God’s goodness leads you to repentance (see Rom. 2:4).
The Lord Himself tells us that Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me (Mt. 25:40). So here’s yet another means, and the most accessible of them, to express gratitude to God! Give to your poor brother whatever you can; in the person of your brother, the Lord will receive your gift as an acceptable sacrifice of thanksgiving to Him.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen (Rom. 16:24).
