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Preparing our hearts & minds for giving thanks
Well, good evening on this Thanksgiving Eve.
I hope you're getting pretty well prepared for tomorrow. Got your pies in the oven. Little joke at our house, the last thing that happened before we walked out the house tonight was the pouring of the pumpkin pie mixture into the crust to be baked and then put in the oven.
So the dog at home is probably gonna go nuts before we get home tonight from smelling the pumpkin pie. Well, anyway, I hope you're getting ready for a good feast tomorrow, a good day of Thanksgiving. So I wanna read as we begin tonight, Psalm 100.
Psalmist writes, "'Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands. "'Serve the Lord with gladness. "'Come before his presence with singing. "'Know ye that the Lord, he is God. "'It is he that hath made us and not we ourselves.
"'We are his people and the sheep of his pasture. "'Enter into his gates with thanksgiving "'and into his courts with praise. "'Be thankful unto him and bless his name. "'For the Lord is good. "'His mercy is everlasting.
"'His truth endureth to all generations.'". There are a few that have joined us tonight and we'd like to sing the doxology and that's in our number 21 in our hymnals. And I got a suggestion for those who are watching by live stream, sing it with us so that for no other reason you drown out me as we sing, all right?
The doxology, praise God from whom all blessings flow.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow
Praise him all creatures here below Praise him above ye heavenly host Praise father, son, and holy spirit. Our father, we do praise you tonight. We praise you for who you are. We praise you for all that you have done, all that you are doing and all that you will do.
We give thanks to you for your son, our savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we come together and in whose name we pray. And we thank you for your spirit, the holy spirit who dwells within, who teaches us, who instructs us, who guides us, who convicts us, who grows us up into Christ likeness and who ministers to us even during this time.
We thank you for who you are and all that you are. And we pray as we reflect tonight on Thanksgiving and the kind of giving of thanks that honors and glorifies you. I pray that you would truly speak to us and encourage us in our giving of thanks.
We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Well, I encouraged folks to send some emails of Thanksgiving testimonies, things that you're thankful for. Did receive a few things and wanted to pass those along. One lady writes, well, I'll just tell you, I'll tell you it's Jerry because in the course of her email, she said, Bob and I.
So she says, as the world outside is in crisis, it affects everyone. Not everyone can wake in the morning with peace of soul. I am thankful that through not only worldwide insanity, but personal as well, that I can wake each morning peaceful in heart for this heart is Jesus's.
To lean on him puts outside and inside in perspective. Bob and I are grateful every day for his faithful love. And we thank the Lord for that. Another individual wrote in and said this morning, I'm especially thankful for the wisdom that is pure and peaceable, gentle and reasonable and full of mercy.
How could I so often need a refreshing of what is so precious? Our merciful Lord gives to us generously and without reproach of his own qualities. And he quotes James one verses two through five, considered all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let endurance have its perfect result that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. And James three 17 says, but the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering and without hypocrisy.
Blessing, honor, glory and dominion be unto him who sits on the throne and to the lamb forever and ever. And then this individual wrote in and gave thanks for things that many of us could express as well.
She wrote, I'm thankful for my husband and his love. And many of us would echo a thankfulness for our spouses, husbands and wives and for their love and faithfulness. And then for family, both children and church family, for the foundations of this country upon which we still stand and reap the blessings thereof.
For the freedom to worship, even with masks and mitigation and thankful for God's sovereignty. Truly that is a, the sovereignty of God is a very powerful, motivator for thanksgiving. Just to be aware that he is sovereign in our day and in this time.
So thankful for that. In our, in my own personal life, I every day have a little journal, devotional journal that I keep track of things and things I read and that speak to me. And there's a section in there for gratitude.
And it tells me, name three things that you're grateful for. Three things you're thankful for. And I don't want to run into, I don't want to fall into a rut where I say the same three things every day.
You know, I can thank, this is at, you know, 5 .30, 6, 6 .30 in the morning. So I'm inclined at that time always to go to, I'm thankful for a good cup of coffee. But I get, you can't say that every day.
But I try to find things in the reading that I've done for the morning for which I can be thankful. And I've been reading in Daniel lately and saw the, read today of the testimony of the three Hebrew children, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and their faithfulness when they went into the furnace.
And there's a lot to be grateful for in that story, isn't there? We can be thankful that Christians aren't persecuted in our country by being thrown into furnaces or in any serious physical way. We're thankful for our freedoms that we enjoy, thankful that our government does not dictate to us what kind of religion we have to subscribe to or how we have to practice our religion and so forth.
So there's a lot, even in our daily Bible readings, if we're alert, that we can be grateful for. Well, tonight I want to encourage us to maintain the original purpose of Thanksgiving. So the first Thanksgiving, of course, we think of that as the Pilgrim's Feast, but the first official national Thanksgiving was encouraged by President Abraham Lincoln on October 3rd, 1863.
And it was in the middle of the Civil War, and it came not too long after the Battle of Gettysburg and the horrible loss of life that occurred then. And the president was encouraged to name a day, set aside a day, for a day of Thanksgiving.
And so on October 3rd, he did that and issued this proclamation. This is part of it. He said, quote, no human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.
Isn't it interesting that a president of our nation would issue such a proclamation and specifically say to give thanks and praise to our beneficent Father who dwells in the heavens? And as we think of this day set aside tomorrow, on now the fourth Thursday of November, again, I think it's important for us to remember the initial purpose and to maintain that purpose, to give praise and thanks to our beneficent Father who dwells in the heavens.
I want us to be careful to maintain that original purpose as we celebrate this Thanksgiving holiday. And one of the reasons that we need to be careful to maintain that is because Thanksgiving can be either superficial or nonexistent altogether.
For example, in Romans 1 verse 21, Paul is writing about the world and how mankind in it has so flagrantly and egregiously forgotten God. And it says in verse 21, he says in verse 21, because that when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened.
So in this text, you notice Paul recognizes that people are aware of God's existence. It says when they knew God. People are generally aware of the existence of God. In the reality of there being a widespread surge of atheists is really rather overblown.
The number of true atheists when pressed is very, very small. Most people, you could say almost all people have an awareness of a God of some kind or another. Many will define him in a completely different way than the Bible does, but there's at least an awareness of an existence of God.
It may be a pagan awareness of God's existence. And on the other hand, it may be a thoroughly Christian indoctrination of God's existence. There are plenty of young people and adults now who have grown up in Christian homes and were taken to church and good churches where the Bible was preached and taught and attended Christian schools, graduated from Christian schools.
And yet today in their lives, they have very little use for God, for church, for religion, for the Bible. They're essentially unbelievers. And yet they could tell you a lot of things that the Bible tells us about God.
They know God. So there's an awareness of God's existence, but in that awareness of his existence, the text tells us that there is an absence of his honor. They glorified him not as God, which means that they won't give him his rightful place as God, they won't relish in who he is.
In other words, the idea of discovering what God is like and what God likes is farthest thing from their mind. It doesn't matter to them whatsoever. They could care less about ascribing any honor to God.
Well, this awareness of God's existence and then an absence of giving him honor works its way down to an ambivalence at best toward giving God any praise for his working. Neither were they thankful. Neither were they thankful.
So the work that God does is not recognized as actually being God's, because if it were, there would well up within the heart a sense of gratitude, a debt of gratitude owed to the God who is doing this work.
No, there's no recognition that the work that God is doing is actually his work. And therefore, it's not appreciated as being thankworthy. Might consider it good, but only good if it's good in my estimation, they might say.
So I won't give him thanks for it if it's not good in my estimation. The Bible tells us, exhorts us to be thankful in all things, in all situations of life, wherever we are, whatever we're going through, we're still to give thanks.
It's why I go through that exercise every day of taking the time, forcing myself to think of things to be thankful for, to be grateful, and write those things down. Because honestly, you know what this is like.
You can be going through some things in your life and you're not in a frame of mind to give thanks. Well, I'm not going through a good thing right now, so I'm not going to give thanks, no. We're to give thanks in all things.
But the person who is aware of God's existence, but won't give him the honor that he's due or and is ambivalent about his working will never have a sense of gratitude if what they're going through or what they're experiencing is in their opinion, not good.
There are others who have an attitude that goes like this, that I'm the one that got myself educated. I'm the one that did the work in school to get my learning so that I could have the skill or the trade or the career that I've pursued.
I'm the one that's working so hard in that career, in my job and so on and so forth to get my income and to succeed in my job and to get the promotions and so forth and to have the income that I have so that I can buy the things that I have and I can put the food on my table that I have and I can have the house that I live.
See, I've done all of this. Why would I need to give God any thanks is the attitude. It's all up to me after all is the attitude in that sense. So any thanksgiving that such folks would offer is general, generic and good oriented.
What I mean by that is this. I'm thankful, they would say, I'm thankful for my health, if it's good. I'm thankful for my wealth, if I have any. I'm thankful for my good fortune. But the question is, to whom are you thankful?
I suspect that a lot of people in their homes tomorrow as they sit around their thanksgiving table will take a minute and offer thanks for something. You know, they'll have everybody say, what are you thankful for?
What are you thankful for? What are you thankful for? And they'll go around the table and everybody will say something. But the question is, to whom are you grateful? You see, to whom are you grateful?
What about hardship though? What about trials? What about setbacks? Am I thankful in those things? Am I thankful for those things? Am I thankful for those trials? You know, one of the testimonies of thanksgiving, remember he said, he wrote, quoted the James 1 passage, consider it all joy.
Consider it something to be thankful for when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Lord, I may not be enjoying this trial, it may not be fun, it's not exactly pleasurable, but I'm thankful for it because of what you're producing in me.
How many sitting around the thanksgiving table tomorrow will speak of that kind of thing in their giving of thanks? No, we need to be careful to maintain the original purpose of the thanksgiving holiday because after all, thanksgiving can be rather nebulous and superficially offered.
But there's another reason that we need to be careful to maintain the original purpose of thanksgiving, and that is because thanksgiving can be very self-centered, can be very self-centered. You remember the parable, we looked at this on Sunday morning a few weeks ago in Luke chapter 18, where the Lord gives the parable of the Pharisee and the publican.
And you recall what the Pharisee did when he offered thanks, is he's standing and praying in the temple. Verse 11 of Luke 18 says, "'The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, "'God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men, "'extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even this publican.'".
And then he goes on to talk about what he does. But notice the nature of his thanksgiving. Remember President Lincoln's established purpose for that day set aside for giving thanks. He said, we want to observe this last Thursday of November as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.
But here's this Pharisee standing, and he just says, I'm thankful for who I am compared to others. I'm thankful that I am not as other men. He doesn't even offer thanks to God. He just says, I'm thankful that I am not as other people.
I'm thankful for who I am compared to other people. And I'm thankful for what I have and how I got it compared to other people. I'm not an extortioner or unjust. I'm thankful that I'm not an extortioner.
I'm thankful that I got everything I got by honest means and by good hard work. And I'm thankful for what I don't do compared to other people. I'm thankful that I'm not an adulterer or a publican. In other words, as he's offering thanks, he's saying, I'm thankful that I am uniquely virtuous.
I am so holy. I am righteous. This is a very self-centered, self-directed giving of thanks, is it not? No, if we're going to maintain that original purpose of thanksgiving, giving thanks to our beneficent father who dwells in the heavens, giving thanks for all of these good gracious gifts of the most high God, then that thanksgiving really needs to be God-centered.
Needs to be God-centered. So for the balance of our time, these next few minutes, I just want to share with you, I think there's five different things that we can be thankful for that are God-centered.
And I'll share them with you in a couple of passages of scripture along the way. So in the first place, give thanks that God is holy. That he is holy. Psalm 30, verse four says, "'Sing praises to the Lord, O ye his saints, "'and give thanks to his holy name.'".
Give thanks to his holy name. And in Psalm 97, 12, he says, "'Rejoice in the Lord, O ye righteous, "'and give thanks to his holy name.'". We can give thanks that God is holy, that he is set apart from us.
He is other than we are. Aren't you glad that God isn't like us? Who of us would we want God to be like? Who's your favorite hero? Would that person suffice to stand in for God? I speak as a fool. Of course not.
And even if you would know somebody who had great virtue and great character and all the rest of that, just how much power and how much strength and how much control does that person actually have? Aren't you glad that God is holy, that he is set apart, that he is other than we are?
Give thanks that God is holy. Psalm 75, verse one, encourages us to give thanks that God is near. This verse says, "'We give thanks to you, O God. "'We give thanks for your name is near. "'We recount your wondrous deeds.'".
And by wondrous, he's talking about those deeds that are distinguishing and that are clearly his work, including those deeds that the scripture tells us he has performed. But we give thanks that he is near.
Now, that is not always easy for us to keep in mind, is it? I mean, we can go through our day and we can do all the stuff that we have to do and we can have very little consciousness of the presence of the holy, of the presence of God in our very midst.
But he is right here. He is very near. He is constantly with us. In him, we move and we live and we have our being, the apostle Paul said. So he is near and we can give thanks for that. He is not a God who is a far off and that we have to labor to try to get him to come near, as if we are those prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel who are screaming and crying out and cutting themselves and doing all kinds of things to get their God's attention who is so far off, so far off that he's non-existent.
But they don't know that. Aren't you glad your God isn't like that? You don't have to scream to get his attention? You don't have to do a bunch of, you don't have to jump through a bunch of hoops and do a bunch of cartwheels to try to get him to notice you because he's somewhere else?
No, give thanks that he is near. And then thirdly, give thanks that he has revealed himself to us. Matthew 11, verses 25 through 27, the Lord Jesus declared this. He said, I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children.
Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, Jesus said, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
So aren't you thankful, grateful, in the general sense that the God who created us has also revealed himself to us? Where would we be without the revelation that God has given to us of himself? What kind of understanding would we have?
We need only go to some of those areas of the world where the revelation of God has been nonexistent and to see how they grapple with existence and the creation and life without any real knowledge of God as he has revealed himself in the scriptures.
Aren't you grateful that just in general, God has revealed himself to us? But then to be more specific, if you've come to faith in Jesus Christ, you are God's child, and God in his grace has revealed himself to you as Savior and the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, I trust that is one thing that you are extremely grateful for and you will never lose gratitude that God has revealed himself to you as the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, and he has graciously saved you.
So then fourthly, give thanks that God provides generously. This is usually where we go first in our thinking, isn't it? We look at the bounty on the table on Thanksgiving Day or whatever in our lives, and we give thanks for these generous gifts that God has given.
But we should. In fact, Jesus in John 6, 11, when he's breaking the bread for the feeding of the thousands of people, says, Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated, so also the fish as much as they wanted.
Jesus himself stopped before feeding these thousands and gave thanks for this generous provision. I trust it is the habit, the practice, but not merely a habit at your table before partaking of a meal to just bow your head in gratitude to God for the food that he has generously provided.
Again, I know of folks, unbelieving folks, pagan people who have the attitude that they're the ones that did the work and they're the ones who bought the food and they're the ones that earned the paycheck, they don't have to give thanks to God, God didn't put that food on their table, they got it themselves.
Giving no thought to the fact that had God not given them breath and strength and energy and health, they'd be impoverished. They'd be impoverished. Jesus gave thanks, let us give thanks for the generous provision that is on our table, however abundant that is.
And in Matthew 26, verses 26 and seven, at the last supper, Jesus says, now as they were eating, Jesus took bread and after blessing it or giving thanks for it, he broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, take, eat, this is my body.
And he took a cup and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them saying, drink all of it, drink of it, all of you. Jesus gave thanks for the generous provisions of a loaf of bread and a cup of wine.
How long shall we not give thanks for the generous provision? Having food and raiment, let us be content, Paul says. Well, having that food and raiment, let us be grateful that we have it. Give thanks that he provides generously.
And then, fifthly, give thanks that he listens, that he listens. In John 11, verses 41 and 42, Jesus is standing at Lazarus' tomb, he said, take away the stone. And says, in verse 41, so they took away the stone and Jesus lifted up his eyes and he said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me.
I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around that they may believe that you sent me. But then in Matthew 7, it says, not just that Jesus is heard by the Father.
In Matthew 7, verse 11, Jesus says to the disciples, he says, if you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?
Well, if he will give good things to those who ask him, then it necessitates the fact that he hears them. He hears what they request, he hears what they ask. This is why Peter exhorts us in 1 Peter 5, verse 7, cast all your cares, your anxieties on him because he cares for you.
Why would he tell us to cast our anxieties upon our Heavenly Father if our Heavenly Father isn't listening? Oh, but indeed he is. What are you anxious about? What are the cares that fill your heart and your mind in this particular time of the year, this particular year, this particular point in time in our nation's history?
What are the anxieties that fill your heart? How many of those anxieties have you spoken to your Father about? He is listening, and he will listen if we take them to him. And then lastly, give thanks that he reigns omnipotently, that he reigns omnipotently.
One of the individuals said, give thanks that God is sovereign. Well, Revelation 11, verses 15 through 17, speaks of this omnipotent reign, particularly of our Lord Jesus. It says in verses 15 to 17, then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven saying, the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.
And the 24 elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying, we give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, for you have taken your great power and have begun to reign.
Aren't you thankful this year that God reigns omnipotently? The COVID crisis has us all a bit flummoxed, has the whole world in a state of uncertainty and confusion, total lack of awareness of where this is all going.
Is this gonna subside? Is this gonna get worse? Is it gonna mutate? You know, how many people are really ever gonna die from this thing? And all the rest of this, that's the COVID thing. And we look at our nation and the turmoil over the election and the conflict related to it all, the lawsuits filed in the courts today, the uncertainty of whether or not an election that's been certified in this particular state is actually going to be certified and on and on and on.
And we wonder, but aren't you glad? Aren't you thankful that our God reigns omnipotently? None of this is outside of his control. None of this is outside of his power and authority. He is ruling over it all.
He's using it all for his glory, for his ultimate purpose. We may deal with hardship in the course of that purpose, but in that hardship, let's at least give thanks that our God reigns omnipotently, that he knows what he's doing.
So on this Thanksgiving, let's be sure that we maintain the original purpose of Thanksgiving, that we give praise and honor to our heavenly father, our father who dwells in the heavens. Let's pray. And so our father and our God, we do give thanks to you tonight.
We thank you for who you are. We thank you for the fact that you are indeed holy, that you are not like we are. We're thankful that you are near to us. We're thankful that you provide so generously for us, for your people.
And we're thankful that you listen. You listen attentively, that your ear is always open to the cry of your children. You're ready to hear as we pour out our cares upon you. And we're also thankful that you reign omnipotently.
I pray that with that awareness and with that gratitude of our heart, it would also affect how we live from day to day. So father, bless your people. Bless your people with ample reason to give thanks.
And this we pray in Jesus' name and for his sake, amen. All right, well, may the Lord bless you and keep you and give you a good Thanksgiving holiday, however you celebrate it. If you're meeting with family and friends, enjoy the time of fellowship around the table.
But again, be sure to give much thanks. Good night and God bless you.