What We Should Be Thankful For… (Thanksgiving)

The Mother immediately said, “What do you say to the nice man who gave you a piece of candy?” The little boy seemed somewhat puzzled as to what she was wanting him to say, but suddenly a smile came on his face, as if he finally realized what she wanted him to say, and he said, “Can I have more!”

The way this little child reacted to the kindness of the man, seems to be a reaction today that we often see in our society.

We live in a society that is truly ungrateful.

For example, we have politicians that are shrewd enough to recognize this.

These politicians will give about anything that is asked of them, to certain segments of our society.

Why? Because these politicians know, that this is the crowd that goes to the polls and will vote for them. Not because they are qualified for the job they hold, but because these politicians give them what they want.

The politicians become the good guys, and the hard working tax-payers, who do not want to give their hard earned tax money to these people, become the bad guys.

Instead, we are branded as insensitive people who do not care about the needs of others.

That is, we have many in this society who are holding out their hands, and they will take anything and everything that you will put in them.

The least they could do is on “Thanksgiving Day” send all the hard working taxpayers a THANK YOU NOTE.

But this is something we taxpayers will never receive.

We live in a society that fails to show gratitude.

This society feels that everyone owes them something, and so when they receive what is “owed” to them, why should they be thankful.

But there are so many things we should be thankful for, such as, we should-

I. BE THANKFUL FOR OUR FAITH

It is our faith in God that makes us become great men and women of God.

Hebrews chapter 11 is known as the FAITH CHAPTER. But every one of these great men and women listed in this chapter, are listed there because of their FAITH in the God of this Bible.

WHAT DOES OUR FAITH DO FOR US?

Many things, but let me show you three things. Our faith is-

1. A CHANGING FAITH

That is, when we accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, we became a NEW CREATURE in Christ Jesus.

Look at v. 17, we read, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

That does not mean that we became perfect, but it does mean our faith in Christ changed us, and immediately in our lives, “…old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

The sinful things we once enjoyed, we no longer enjoy. And the things we didn’t enjoy, all of a sudden we now enjoy.

We are now a NEW CREATURE in Christ Jesus. But all this occurred in our life because of our FAITH IN CHRIST.

We should be THANKFUL FOR OUR FAITH. It is truly A CHANGING FAITH.

But also, we should be thankful for our faith because it is-

2. A CHARTING FAITH

Our faith not only has CHANGED OUR LIFE, it also CHARTS OUR LIFE.

The reason today that so many have messed their lives up, is because they do not have a faith to CHART which way they are to go through life.

Because of that, many:

• Go through life guessing, hoping they are doing the right thing.

• Go through life doing what everyone else is doing.

• Go through life depending on fortune tellers to tell them what they should do.

• Go through life listening to the advice of people who are as confused as they are.

But in actuality, what they do is go through life making one big mistake after the other.

But, we have a faith that is based on the Word of God, and it charts out the direction we should go, in every area of our lives.

We should be thankful for a faith that CHARTS.

But also, we have-

3. A CHALLENGING FAITH

One thing that thrills people about sports, is the challenge it provides.

For example, many enter the field of sports and they do things they never dreamed they would be able to do.

But the most challenging thing on the face of the earth is our faith.

• There are people who are so bashful they would never speak before a class, but now they are preaching before thousands.

• There are people who would never pray in public, but now they pray frequently in public.

• There are people who have never been leaders, but now they are leading and teaching a Sunday School class.