Of the readings in the
Revised Common Lectionary for 28 November 2013 (Thursday before the First Sunday in Advent) I choose to reflect on James 4:1-10. (I'm filling in with reflections on that portion of the lectionary that occurred before I started doing these.)
As it did this past year, this reading will often fall on Thanksgiving itself. (Before FDR changed Thanksgiving from the last Thursday in November to the fourth Thursday in November Thanksgiving was always the Thursday before the First Sunday in Advent.) Given how Thanksgiving has become transformed from a time of calm reflection with family to the start of an orgy of conspicuous consumption, it is a shame that those who spend so much time wailing about the War on Christmas don't complain about the War on Thanksgiving.
This particular reading gives us ammunition with which to fight the War on Thanksgiving and is a stern rebuke to those who preach the Prosperity Gospel. God is not an ATM machine who grants every prayer so long as one has a positive account with him. Indeed, because none of us can match his perfection, we are all in debt and cannot repay the debt ourselves. Yet God does not seek to foreclose on our souls. If we but confess and repent our worldly sins, he forgives our spiritual debts and reward us. Yet if one confesses and prays in hope of a reward without being repentent then you will be among those mentioned in verse 3: "you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly, so you can spend it on your passions."
