The Behavior of Gratitude!

Luke 4:38-39 And he arose out of the synagogue, and entered into Simon’s house. And Simon’s wife’s mother was taken with a great fever; and they besought him for her. (39) And he stood over her, and rebuked the fever; and it left her: and immediately she arose and ministered unto them. 

We have been taught from early on in our lives to say “Thank You” at at kind gesture.  If someone gives us a stick of gum, if some one offers us a compliment, a warm “Thank You” tells the giver that their act of kindness did not go unnoticed.  To fail to offer a word of appreciation is generally understood to be just plain rude.  Depending on the nature of the kind gesture, the lack of appreciation can be interpreted as arrogance or selfishness.   

As we got older, we also grew to understand that the larger the act of kindness the greater the expression of appreciation. For instance, If my car breaks down and I am stranded I might buy lunch for the friend who comes to help.  Sometimes the words “thank you” are just not big enough to fully convey the appreciation felt.

In our text today, Jesus has come to Simon Peter’s house because Peter’s mother-in-law is ill with a fever.  The text says that she has a “great” fever.  Although the text does not specifically say this, I would guess that they were afraid that she was going to die.  Jesus, being full of compassion that he was, comes and instantly ends the fever.

I want us to really focus on the woman’s response after she was healed.  The text says that: 

Luke 4:39 .... immediately she arose and ministered unto them. 

The word “ministered”, as used in the King’s James version, simply means to serve.  The NIV version used the phrase “waited on”.  She got up and served Jesus and those responsible for bringing him there.  She was so thankful, she was so grateful that she wanted to express it by serving them with what she could do.  Could she have really served them in any manner as to “repay” them for helping her?  Of course not!  Life is too precious to be able to “repay”!  But that is not why we DO things in return.  It is all about the expression of appreciation.

What would have been the alternative behavior?  She could have gotten up, thought “whew...I escaped that bullet” and served HERSELF!  What if she popped up and said “thank you” and THEN went about serving herself?  Better?  Not really!  The act of healing her was much too big for simple words.

For those of us that are Christians we have similarly escaped death by the hand of Jesus and healed from the disease of sin.  Furthermore, the price that he paid to offer us this renewed life was far too significant.

1 Peter 2:24 Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. 

So what is our subsequent behavior saying?  Have we been behaving like Peter’s mother-in-law by serving to express our gratitude?  Or have we gone about serving ourselves?

Let us contemplate the enormous gift that God has given to us by giving us new life and to a greater degree serve him to express our gratitude!