Thanksgiving
Scripture: Psalm 92:1-4; Psalm 107:8, 15; First Thessalonians 5:18
The title of my message this morning is “Thanksgiving.” This has been a difficult year and some people may be struggling with the idea of being thankful. The Covid-19 pandemic has reaped havoc on the lives of many and has affected everyone. Everyone has been touched by it in some way and yet I stand before you to remind you that we all have a reason to be thankful. It not just because you may not have gotten it or recovered from it; not because you maintained your job or found a new one if you lost it due to the pandemic; not because we are still able to maintain our lives in some fashion despite everything that has happen. No, our being thankful goes deeper than just being thankful for overcoming difficult circumstances in our lives. What I am talking about this morning is the thankfulness that is reserved for God and Him alone. Giving thanks to God is a major part of our worshipping Him because through it we yield and recognize what He is doing in our lives. We stop, we remember, and we are grateful which then comes out in our praise of thanksgiving. Giving thanks to God comes from a place within us where we remember where we could be without Him – not just in the world we live in physically, but where we will spend eternity because of the single choice He made in sending His Son to die for us. Last week I talked about what it means to repent and why it is important. Repenting is easy when we remember why we are thankful. Think about it. If we are walking in a place where we are grateful for what God has done for us, our being grateful is a state of thankfulness and it is our being thankful that causes us to want to spend more and more time in the presence of God.
I know that we understand what it means to give thanks, but I want to share a story with you to get your minds focused. I read a story about a minister who entered a crowded restaurant and sat down across from a man who was already eating. The minister paused to ask the blessing and give thanks before he started to eat as he was accustomed to doing which perplexed his fellow diner. His fellow diner asked him if he had a headache or if something was wrong with his food. The minister explained that he had given thanks to God for his food. The man responded “One of those, huh? Well, I work hard for my food and earn it by the sweat of my brow, so I never thank anyone else for it. I don’t have to thank anyone for it; I just dig in!” The minister replied, “You’re a lot like my dog. He does it that way too!”
I don’t know how many of you have owned a dog in your life, but when I read this story I thought about our family dog Eli, who died in 2018. Eli loved to eat and I mean he went at it with a passion. If you were fixing his meal and you were putting some meat in it, he would stand and watch you and just begin to slobber all over the floor. If you didn’t move fast enough he would start making these sounds to indicate that you should hurry up. There were many time when I would get frustrated with how impatient he became when he was ready to eat. When I would place the bowl down, he would literally try to push me out of the way to get to the bowl. Not once did he ever say “Thank you!” While I do believe he was grateful for each and every meal he received, he was not able to verbally tell me thank you or express, beyond eating his food as fast as he could, how grateful he was. I believe his aggressiveness in eating his food was the proof source of his being thankful for it.
I am sharing this story with you first because I want you to think about the man in the restaurant who believed that he was responsible for the food that went into his mouth so therefore there was no one to thank but himself. Do you know there are many people in the world that believe the way this man does? People who believe that God has nothing to do with what they have achieved in this life. People who believe that they are a “self-made” man or woman. People who believe that they pulled themselves up by their own bootstraps so they should get the credit for who they are and what they have accomplished. If that is you, I am definitely talking to you this morning. But if that is not you, I am still talking to you because while we could be very thankful in some areas of our lives, we may not be so thankful in some other areas.
Psalm 92:1-2, 4 says, “It is a good thing to give thanks unto the LORD, and to sing praises unto Your name, O most High. To show forth Your lovingkindness in the morning, and Your faithfulness every night……For You, LORD, have made me glad through Your work: I will triumph in the works of Your hands.” Of the people that I know, most of them like to do good things. David tells us it’s a good thing to thank God for His lovingkindness and faithfulness, and the most fitting way to do that is to praise Him. In Psalm 107 the psalmist burst out four times, “Oh that men would praise the LORD for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men!” (Vss. 8, 15, 21, 31) When we look around and think about the wonderful goodness our God, do we not feel a deep desire to praise Him and give Him thanks? However, when you think about people you know, do you feel that we also could cry out “Oh that men would praise the LORD for His goodness….?”
Psalm 100:1, 4 says, “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands….Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise: be thankful unto Him, and bless His name.” As I read these verses, I want you to share something with you that we don’t see. David says we are to make a joyful noise, enter into our Father’s presence with thanksgiving and praise. What he doesn’t say New Light is this: we are to do this when everything in our lives is going right. He doesn’t say we are to do this when all our bills are paid, when no one is sick or hurting. No. David says this is to be WHO WE ARE. This is to be our lifestyle. We are to make a joyful noise when we are having a bad day. We are to enter our Father’s presence with thanksgiving when we have more month left than money. We are to praise Him when we are sick, when we are in pain – when we don’t feel like it.
I want to share something with you from a personal perspective. There is nothing worse than doing something for someone and they refuse to acknowledge what you’ve done by simply not saying “Thank you.” I know because there was a time in my life when I struggled to always say “thank you” when someone did something for me. First and foremost I was ashamed that I was in need and second that shame was rooted in pride. So when someone did something that highlighted my need, I sometimes struggled to acknowledge it. Now imagine how you would have felt if you were the one who helped me and I refused to acknowledge that you had gone out of your way to help me. Would it not hurt and it make you feel that I did not appreciate you or what you had done for me? This is how I made people feel! Now imagine, if you will, that if I did that to people I could see how I probably did that to God also. Imagine the patience that God has exercised towards me as He taught me what it means to be thankful and how to express it. Imagine how many times I might have disappointed Him when He sent someone to help me and I could not through my pride acknowledge it. But I am so very thankful that God saw all of my days and knew that one day I would understand in my old age what it means to truly be thankful for the things He has done and for the people He has used to get His will done for me.
New Light, when God sent Jesus to die for us, He didn’t have a backup plan. He gave us His very best from the git go. Knowing that He gave us His very best should be reason enough for us to continually shower our Father with praise and thanksgiving. Giving thanks with a grateful heart is like jumping up and down when you get the present you always wanted. You are so grateful that sometimes tears of joy begin to flow freely. You were not planning to cry, but you could not stop it once it started. Giving thanks with a grateful heart is a heart choice. We give our Father our thanks because we love Him. He’s our Father and He takes care of us. Our lives should be lived with an attitude of thankfulness and we see this in the next verses we’re going to read. First Thessalonians 5:16-18 says “Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; in everything, give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Sometimes some of us misunderstand rejoicing and think it is to be done only when something good happens to us. The same is true for prayer. Some believe we should pray only when we need God to do something for us or for someone else. Now what I am about to say next will be a challenge for some because they believe we should only give thanks for the blessing and not for the hardships. This is where most of the Church is today. Why should I be thankful during hardships? That doesn’t make sense to me. Turn with me to Philippians 4:11-13. We’re going to read how the Apostle Paul dealt with hardships. “Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Paul said that he knew how to live when he didn’t have a lot of money and when he did (the words abased & abound). How could Paul live this way? How could he live above his circumstances, both good and bad? New Light, like Paul, whatever situation we may find ourselves in, we can handle it because our faith is in what Christ has already done in us. It is one more reason to give our Father thanks! I want you to know this morning that we can rejoice and give thanks for everything because through everything God is still God! When my bills need paying, God is still God so I can give thanks! When all my bills are paid, God is still God and I can give thanks! When my friends leave me; God is still God and I can give thanks! When I get new friends that stick closer than a brother, God is still God and I can give thanks! Like Paul says, I have learned that I can rejoice in everything because God is still God in my good times; bad time; happy times; and sad times. In my best circumstances I can rejoice and give thanks. In my worst circumstances I can rejoice and give thanks. I can do this because God is God and my security rests with Him and He does not change. I have learned this because of the time I have spent in the presence of my Father. With this understanding I can choose to give thanks or I can choose to not give thanks and just be in the midst of what I am dealing with. My willingness to give thanks is a testimony of what I know about God and His relationship with me. This understanding came through trials and a lot of errors. I am not perfect in my thanksgiving, but I have learned that it is not about God and what He is doing; it is about me and my response to Him in the midst of what He is doing.
Psalm 50:14-15 says: “Offer to God thanksgiving, and pay your vows to the Most High. Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.” Before we do anything else, before we ask God for anything, verse fourteen says that we should offer to God thanksgiving. We offer thanksgiving to God as part of our praise and worship to Him. We do that first, not after He has done something for us, but before He has answered our prayers. So let me give you an example. When someone does something for you, saying “thank you” is a simple form of giving thanks and we do it so naturally with each other and yet we struggle to do it with God. It is easy to give God thanks for things we know that He has done, but more difficult to thank and praise Him for things we are waiting for Him to do. It is more difficult to praise and thank God for what He has done that we do not know He actually did it! You see, God is constantly doing things for us that we know nothing about! Once we understand that God has already promised to do what we have asked, we can treat God like we do each other, giving Him thanks beforehand. Our hearts should be one of praising Him for what we know He can do versus waiting to see Him do it and then thanking Him afterwards. It is definitely permissible to say thank you after the fact, but we should have the mindset of always praising God and giving Him thanks because as I said previously, there are things that He is doing for each of us behind the scenes that we know nothing about.
In verse fifteen God makes a promise. He says that we should call on Him in the day of trouble and He will answer. Going back to what Paul wrote in Philippians, this is something that we must learn New Light. If our mindset is that of being thankful first – and not after – we have no problem understanding that God is going to come to our aid. When we get to this point, we can begin to give God thanks for what He has done and for what He is going to do. How many of you have ever heard a testimony where the person got up and talked about being thankful for things God had done for them? How many of you have heard someone get up and give a testimony around being thankful for things that God is going to do even though He has not done it yet? When you hear someone begin to thank and praise God for what He is going to do then you know that person knows his or her God. They have learned and now live in faith expecting God to still be God! The last part of verse fifteen says that after God has answered our prayer, then we will not only thank Him, we will glorify Him.
Now I want you consider this, our praise and thanksgiving to God is more valuable to Him that any sacrifice that we could offer. Why? Because our praise and thanksgiving comes from the heart, a heart that is grateful for what God has done for us. Likewise, when we don’t give God thanks it can be costly, especially if we identify as one of His children. In the first chapter of the book of Romans, the following is recorded, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness.….. Because, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened.” (Romans 1:18, 21) When you read this whole chapter you see how Christians were giving themselves over to the lust of the flesh and chose to deny God and everything He had done for them. They literally refused to acknowledge what God had done for them and thank Him for it. The chapter ends with Paul saying, based on their choices, God released them to fulfill their own lustful desires which would ultimately lead them to the lake of fire. When we are not thankful for what God has done and is doing in our lives, it’s an indication that our hearts are slowly drifting away from Him and we are causing grief for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
The last Scripture I want to share with you this morning comes from Philippians 4:6. It says: “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.” Now I want to speak very specifically to what some of us are facing. Our economy is not the best right now and people are worried. Jobs are being lost and families are worried. Some are in a crisis and wondering if the family unit will last. When you turn on the news there is always some report of something bad happening especially with Covid-19. With all of these things constantly bombarding our minds it is easy to wonder if we have a reason to give God thanks. But notice the first thing Paul says in Philippians: do not be worried (anxious) about anything. Jesus said something very similar in St. John the 14th chapter. Our natural response to the things happening around us is to worry. We worry if something will or will not happen. If it will happen we worry how it will happen. If it will not happen we worry about why it will not happen. We worry about any and every thing and then we wonder why we struggle to pray and believe that God will answer the prayer. This is not by happenstance, it is by design.
Do you know that it is difficult to be thankful when you are worried? It is difficult to feel blessed when you are worried. It is difficult to give God true praise when you are worried. It is difficult to remember and reflect on the things God has already done when you are worried. Understand this if you do not understand anything else: Satan wants us to constantly operate in a state of worry because when we are worried, we are not giving thanks and praise to God. Generally when we worry we are focusing on the problem, not the answer. We are focusing on the failure, not the promise of victory. We are focusing on the giants, not the rock and the sling shot. We are focusing on the loss, not the gain. So Paul urges us to not worry and then he gives us the reason why. He said that with everything we face we should take it to God with thanksgiving. We can go to God with thanksgiving because of the promise! Because we have the guarantee! Because God has never failed us before! Because everything we have and will have comes through the grace of God. For every reason we can find to doubt and worry, we can find another reason to give thanks for things God has already done for us and what He continues to do for us! Be thankful this week New Light!
Until next time, “The Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up His countenance on you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26)
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