The Power of God to Deliver and the Power of a Thankful Heart to Remember

I'm thinking about Thanksgiving today; this Thursday we'll be celebrating all the goodness of God in the past year, and not only in the past year, but in all of our lives. One of my favorite passages in the Bible is Psalm 103, where the psalmist David writes (sings out): "Praise the Lord, oh my soul and all my inmost being, praise his holy name. Praise the Lord, oh my soul, and forget not all his benefits." Then David enumerates the many benefits the Lord showers upon him. There are times when I am down, discouraged, anxious perhaps, and then I think of this psalm, and I begin to thank God for all his goodness and benefits to me, and my heart begins to fill with joy and praise, and my spirit is lifted to a higher place.

 

I came across a story many years ago, which illustrates the redeeming power of God in a time when all seemed lost. This story tells the power of God to deliver and the power of a thankful heart to remember God's goodness. This story is taken from Captain Eddie Rickenbacker's biography: 

 

It is gratitude that prompted an old man to visit an old broken pier on the eastern seacoast of Florida. Every Friday night, until his death in 1973, he would return, walking slowly and slightly stooped with a large bucket of shrimp. The sea gulls would flock to this old man, and he would feed them from his bucket. Many years before, in October, 1942, Captain Eddie Rickenbacker was on a mission in a B-17 to deliver an important message to General Douglas MacArthur in New Guinea. But there was an unexpected detour which would hurl Captain Eddie into the most harrowing adventure of his life.

Somewhere over the South Pacific the Flying Fortress became lost beyond the reach of radio. Fuel ran dangerously low, so the men ditched their plane in the ocean...For nearly a month Captain Eddie and his companions would fight the water, and the weather, and the scorching sun. They spent many sleepless nights recoiling as giant sharks rammed their rafts. The largest raft was nine by five. The biggest shark...ten feet long.

But of all their enemies at sea, one proved most formidable: starvation. Eight days out, their rations were long gone or destroyed by the salt water. It would take a miracle to sustain them. And a miracle occurred. In Captain Eddie's own words, "Cherry," that was the B- 17 pilot, Captain William Cherry, "read the service that afternoon, and we finished with a prayer for deliverance and a hymn of praise. There was some talk, but it tapered off in the oppressive heat. With my hat pulled down over my eyes to keep out some of the glare, I dozed off."

Now this is still Captain Rickenbacker talking..."Something landed on my head. I knew that it was a sea gull. I don't know how I knew, I just knew. Everyone else knew too. No one said a word, but peering out from under my hat brim without moving my head, I could see the expression on their faces. They were staring at that gull. The gull meant food...if I could catch it."

And the rest, as they say, is history. Captain Eddie caught the gull. Its flesh was eaten. Its intestines were used for bait to catch fish. The survivors were sustained and their hopes renewed because a lone sea gull, uncharacteristically hundreds of miles from land, offered itself as a sacrifice. You know that Captain Eddie made it.

And now you also know...that he never forgot. Because every Friday evening, about sunset...on a lonely stretch along the eastern Florida seacoast...you could see an old man walking...white-haired, bushy-eyebrowed, slightly bent. His bucket filled with shrimp was to feed the gulls...to remember that one which, on a day long past, gave itself without a struggle...like manna in the wilderness.

Praise the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within me, praise his holy name! A thankful heart is a powerful antidote to discouragement, worry, fear, and anxiety. Let God live in your thankful heart this season.

Submitted by Tom Horst, MA, Marriage and Family Therapist