Thanksgiving is more than a day!
I have often approached this time of the year with a little bit of remorse with regard to the attention that we I have given to the Subject of thanksgiving.
It seems often times that our thoughts on the matter are often reserved for a day or perhaps a week of reflection, or maybe a special Sunday Emphasis and a few family gatherings.
I have often felt that the blessings of God, the fulfilled promises, the tender mercies, the loving kindness, the grace, the providence of God deserves much more emphasis than just a designated day on our calendar, and I believe that such a subject should demand more emphasis in our Biblical Studies than just a passing glance because it’s “that time of the year.”
The time when we make, for the most part, a very feeble attempt at being thankful for the things we’ve been blessed with.
Let’s face it; in our society today Thanksgiving has little to do with thankfulness for what we have and much more to do with how much more we’re going to get.
We’re going to get the big meals
We’re going to get an extra day off
We’re going to get some time with the family (and nothing wrong with any of these)
We’re going to get a great sale at the store as soon as we can get through with all of this Thanksgiving Stuff!!!
Can I tell you in all honesty that true thanksgiving is:
First of all is not just a day on the Calendar, but a life to be lived; the life of gratitude.
not about getting for ourselves, but giving to the Lord the glory, honor and praise due Him!
“To God be the glory Great things He has done, so loved He this world that He gave us His Son!”
The Benefit of Thanksgiving
I want to challenge you for the next four messages from this pulpit to be a thankful person.
I believe that there are powerful benefits to being a thankful person
If we spent half as much time being thankful for the things we do have as we do worrying about the things we don’t, then our lives would be simplified on many levels.
I can make you a list of things in your life that would be different if we were truly thankful people.
There are many today whose bank accounts would look different if they were truly thankful for the things they have.
There are a sad multitude in our nation whose families and marriages would be very different if they were thankful for what they have been blessed with.
A lack of thanksgiving will bind you, a lack of thankfulness will blind you, a lack of thanksgiving will break you, a lack of thanksgiving will confuse you and cause you to have a skewed vision of what really matters in life. A lack of thanksgiving will cause you to be a poor steward of the things you have been given.
The heart that is thankfull is a heart that is satisfied, a heart that is thankful is a heart that is content before the Lord. A thankful heart is a heart that is at peace.
Body
I want to share with you today the story of a man who endured many things in life, some good some bad, but even though he endured many things the blessing of God was evident on his life even at times when he was very undeserving.
The day finally came when he looked back and realized that He had indeed been blessed by God and it’s from this man’s own account that we learn this first attribute of a thankful heart.
A thankful realizes that it’s not worthy of the kind of blessings it has received.
Jacob
Genesis 25 tells the story of the birth of this man
His name is Jacob
He is one of a set of twins
Two men who are very diverse in their personalities, physical stature and skill sets.
What happens over the next couple of chapters has the makings of a hollywood production
There’s family favoritism (Isaac the Father loved Esau but Rebekah the mother loved Jacob)
There’s plotting & deceit (Jacob steals his brother’s birthright then he and his mother conspire against Esau, take advantage of Isaac’s failing senses and steal the Patriarchal blessing from Esau)
There’s revenge (Esau vows to kill Jacob.)
Finally Jacob at the instruction of his mother has to flee to a foreign land to escape the hot wrath of his brother.
You read the story for yourself, but what happens over the next 14 years goes something like this:
Jacob is dispatched by his mother to go to a foreign land where some of her relatives live.
Upon his arrival there he comes upon this young woman named Rachel who happens to be from the same family that he is looking for.
Jacob falls in love with this young woman and pledges to serve her father for seven years to be able to have her hand in marriage. They both agree to this arrangement
When the day of the wedding comes Jacob gets a taste of his own medicine, Uncle Laban has up pulled the old switcheroo, and Jacob has not married his sweetheart, but instead the older sister and has to serve his father in law another seven years to gain Rachel’s hand in marriage.
For 14 years Jacob faithfully serves this man who continuously cheats him and changes his wages
The day finally comes for Jacob to return to his homeland and he packs up his wives and children, heads that way and is harassed by his father in law.
I don’t know how you measure things, but when I read this story I must confess that it may have had it’s moments but overall it’s been a rotten fourteen years!
Here he is heading home
His father in law is harassing him
He’s not sure when he arrives if his brother is going to kill him.
Somewhere along the way having gone through 14 years of trouble and carrying a load of worry at that very moment Jacob stops and says these words:
Then Jacob prayed, "O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, LORD, you who said to me, 'Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,' I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. (Genesis 32:9-10 NIV)
The basis of what Jacob is saying here is “Lord, even in the heartache and the pain I realize that you have been at work in my life. God, I know that most of this I brought upon myself, nevertheless you have been faithful and I am not deserving of any of it.”
I want you to camp there in your mind and I want to share with you a singular thought today concerning thanksgiving
I want to share with you today that in your quest to become a thankful person you will find that there are many adversaries to thankfulness.
Chief among the foes of thankfulness is the idea of entitlement.
Entitlement is that thing within us that says, “I have because I am due it.
The Entitled
I’m sure at the simple mention of the word it conjures up all kinds of thoughts and feelings.
I know I have my own personal thoughts concerning the matter as I’m sure you do.
There are those in our world today who carry with them a sense of entitlement that causes many of us to cringe because it’s a sense of entitlement that has given birth to a kind of laziness that says I’ll just sit here and you’ll take care of me because I’m entitled to the care you provide.
These are the people who feel entitled to certain care and certain provisions just because, and usually because they sees themselves as the victims of some circumstance therefore they are entitled.
We call them lazy
We call them free loaders
We find it hard, even unjust, to have to help them when there is no willingness on their part to help themselves.
There is yet another kind of entitlement perhaps a little less recognizable and certainly more justified in the minds of the public and that is the person who feels that they have “earned it.”
These are a people who feel as if every good thing they enjoy in life is the fruit of their own doing.
Don’t get me wrong we can make good choices in life that will lead us to good places, and your poor choices will lead you to poor places, but the truth is we have to have some favor along the way to get to where we want to be.
I am a proponent of hard work and believe that it should be rewarded, and the Bible says of a man who will not work that he should not eat, but we must remember what the Bible says about the matter:
You may say to yourself, "My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me." But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today. (Deuteronomy 8:17-18)
Did you know that there are people right now who have made the same choices that you have made, who have taken some of the same actions that you have taken, but due to circumstances beyond their control do not have or enjoy the things you enjoy!
I realize today that there are ministers who have made some of the same choices that I have made and done some of the same things that I have done in their ministry who sit at very different places in their ministries today.
If you pass by and see a turtle on the top of a fence post I can promise you that he didn’t get there by himself; somebody helped him.
There is a sense of entitlement among many people of faith
“If they had only done what I have done then they would enjoy the things I enjoy.” You don’t know that! God causes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust.
I don’t care what you’ve done to be so spiritually superior to those around you, if it were not for the grace of God over our lives we would be no better off than anyone else.
I’m often struck with the thought as I study the Bible that it was not without reason that many things are addressed therein.
You are saved by grace, not of works lest any man should boast.
O, foolish Galatians who has bewitched you? who made you believe that a journey that you began by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit you will now complete in the flesh.
These are indicative of hearts that are convinced they are entitled to certain spiritual blessings because of their works and therefore are not truly thankful for their salvation through Christ Jesus!
It’s true that God blesses obedience, but there are a lot of people who have been obedient to the call and it cost them martyrdom.
The summary statement of the entitled people is that people who feel a sense of entitlement are generally an unthankful people.
People who feel entitled seldom feel blessed, and the truth of the matter is that we are all sustained by the blessing and mercy of Almighty God.
Conclusion
When we look at the life of Jacob it would be easy for us to say “poor fella’ things should have turned out different for Him.”
You’d be right in saying that.
Things should have turned out different for Him; A lot worse!
It would be easy for Jacob to look at the blessings of God and think that he simply got what he deserved for all of the suffering and heartache that he had to endure, or all of the hard work he had invested, or because of his spiritual lineage.
Jacob stands at this point in life:
Not feeling entitled because of His sufferings
Not being entranced by his role as a victim
But recognizing the blessings of God.
If you are here today with health and strength in your body, clothes on your back, when you leave if you’ll have food in your stomach, and a roof over your head, you’re doing better than you deserve, and none of us are worthy of such blessings
A thankful heart realizes that it is not worthy of the kindness and faithfulness we have been shown by the Lord.”
Are you a thankful person?
Is Thanksgiving a part of your heart?
Why don’t you spend some time in the coming days cultivating a heart of thanksgiving.
The songwriter says:
When upon life’s billows you are tempest tossed,
When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,
Count your many blessings, name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done.
Count your blessings, name them one by one,
Count your blessings, see what God hath done!
Count your blessings, name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done.
