Parents especially ought to be careful about this, as we're teaching the children how to relate to others, even to God. You know you're caught in this mindset when the gift becomes a business transaction. It can appear noble to ourselves, but we can never pay back the debt we owe to God. It is unbiblical to think of gratitude as a motive for obeying God. They knew God's faithful provision and remembered it, but it didn't motivate them to future obedience.
Fear has a corrective effect.
It can be and is used positively by God to lead us to obedience. There is no disconnect between fearing God and having joy in God. He has the power to judge, but this is the same God who made a way to escape, by sending His Son among us to die on the cross for our sins, so that those who repent and believe in Him might be saved. A desire to follow God in all His ways Belief, trust, is future-oriented action we do today. God's past grace didn't lead the people to faith in future grace.