In Everything Give Thanks

Thank you for listening to this message from the ministry of Morse Corner Church in Leverett, Massachusetts.

Morse Corner is a non -denominational church that is committed to the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Our church was founded in 1896 by two students of the famous evangelist

D .L. Moody. We seek to encourage and edify the body of Christ through the proclamation of God's word through the ministries of the local church.

If you'd like more information, visit our website, morsecornerchurch .com. We hope you enjoy the message.

So try to stop and imagine in your own mind how a godly

Jew would have felt entering into the temple. Just an amazing structure that they understood was the house of God.

If you could go back in time and enter, how would you feel, right? But how would they have felt to enter into that place?

They understood what that place was. So try to think about that and then ask yourself, how do you feel when you walk into the church?

You know, I'm here most days during the week and I'll admit when the building is empty,

I don't necessarily feel that way. But when it's full of people, I absolutely do.

Because the temple of God is your body. The temple of God, the house of God today is the church.

This is the house of God. But it's not the building. It's you.

I hope you feel that way when you enter into the assembly. That you can say the same thing, in a sense.

Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, into his courts with praise. Be thankful unto him and bless his name.

So in this age, the house of God is the church. So enter into his gates with thanksgiving.

Verse 5, the Lord is good. His mercy is how long? How long does it last? Everlasting. And his truth endureth how long?

To all generations. Mercy here, depending on what translation of the

Bible you use, it can be translated God's unfailing love, or many modern versions will say his steadfast love.

God's love is steadfast. It's everlasting. We don't deserve it.

We cannot earn it. If you've been born again into the family of God, which is pictured through baptism, you have this assurance that the love of God, if you're in covenant with God through Christ, you have that promise that his love is steadfast.

It will be with you forever. This is a lonely time of year for many people, but you have the love of God with you and you have his people.

So take advantage of that. This is the guarantee that God's love never fails.

His mercy is everlasting. And now his truth. Okay, this is very important. Are you listening?

Say amen if you're listening. Okay. Truth these days is a valuable commodity.

Right? Truth these days is in short supply. You hear people and just this whole idea of truth.

We know the postmodern view of truth that there's no such thing as absolute truth.

And then all you got to do with that is say, well, is that true? Well, I mean, think about the statement, right?

But there's people, people in positions of influence and authority who say things openly like you need to speak your truth.

That person has their truth. You have your truth. I have my truth. What about the truth? Whatever happened to the truth?

That's what the Lord offers the truth. How do you know the truth?

By the word of God. It's in the Bible. The word of God and the spirit of God. Jesus is the truth.

I am the way, the truth, and the life. Those who hate the word of God, because really that's what we're up against.

There's the people who love the Lord, love his word. We recognize that's the truth.

And then there's kind of, there's people in the middle or maybe they act like they don't care, but there's so many people who hate the truth.

They've been trying to eradicate the word of God ever since, well, go back to Babylon, go back to the beginning.

There's always people trying to eradicate the word of God. But we have a promise here that the word of God, what?

It endures forever. Here's another great promise that no matter how hard they try, they can never eradicate, get rid of the word of God.

I'm thankful for that. We have the truth and the truth endures forever.

That's the foundation. Everything else is, you know, the sinking sand. It's shifting under your feet.

The truth today will be different, you know, the truth today will be different a few months from now.

And we've seen that on display, full display. So as we approach the holiday, we have so much to be thankful for.

We have the house of God. We have the truth of God and his word. We have the people of God. We have the love of God.

Did I already say that? It doesn't matter. Hey, we have the love of God, amen? Amen. So as we approach the holiday, we can be thankful and reflect on these things without ceasing.

So as we start to wrap this up, what are we thankful for? Just think about in your mind, what are you thankful for?

What are you most thankful for? I, for one, am thankful for the history of the

Thanksgiving holiday, for those godly men and women who separated themselves from the

Church of England, who was persecuting them. They fled tyranny, got on a boat, and set sail for this land that we love so very much.

This country exists because of Christians, right? Is that a new idea?

No, it's not. This country exists because of Christians. So I'm thankful for the early settlers.

And if you think about it, they had it way worse than we do, and yet they were still thankful.

So are we thankful to God? To a large degree, being positive and being thankful, it's a choice, right?

It's a choice. So we need to be intentional about it. We have a choice to be thankful about every day.

Let's put that to the test, okay? I have a little experiment. Humor me, if nothing else, okay?

Let's go through this little experiment. Are you thankful?

What does that verse be? Give thanks in all things and everything? Give thanks, right? Well, I don't really mean that.

It's what it says. The Word of God says, in all things. So let me pose these questions to you.

Are you thankful when things around your house break, break down, stop working?

Are you thankful for rising home heating bills?

Are you thankful for piles of laundry in a cluttered house? Are you thankful for income taxes?

Say, Mike, you know, up to this point I was with you, but now I'm not so sure.

Let's think about this. It's a choice. We can be thankful for a broken dishwasher or clogged gutters because it means you have a house.

We can be thankful for our heating bill because it means we're warm. The pilgrims,

I don't know how warm they were, probably not as warm as us. We can be thankful for piles of laundry and clutter because it means a loved one is nearby.

And we can be thankful for income taxes because it means we're employed. Maybe I'm going too far with the income taxes.

I mean, I want to believe what I'm preaching here. But the point is obvious.

It's all about perspective. Everything in life really is about perspective. If we wanted to, we could and we will find things to complain about.

I do it, you do it. We all tend to complain. That's true.

And I think it's okay to let off a little steam and frustration once in a while. Just make sure it's not making you bitter.

That's one thing we don't want to be. We don't want to be bitter. There's a lot of bitter people out there, and we don't want to be against them.

We want to try to encourage them and show them all the wonderful things that they have to be thankful for.

So if you do find yourself becoming bitter, because it's an easy thing to do these days, my advice, recognize the source of the bitterness.

Or if someone is kind of rubbing off on you and it makes you that way, stealing your joy, recognize the source of the bitterness.

Television. The news.

I mean, it's important to know what's going on. But if you find yourself watching Tucker Carlson or CNN and you're fit to be tied, time to shut it off.

It'll be there tomorrow. Okay, in conclusion, I think it goes without saying, it should be one of the things, as Americans, we're most thankful for is our salvation.

Or as Christians, as Christians in America, we're thankful for our freedom, our liberty, our family, the great meal we're going to enjoy, but we're thankful most of all for our salvation.

If we have that, you know, everything else is just, yeah, gravy.

Did someone say that? It's all gravy beyond that. And we've seen and heard about the things that are happening in other countries and kind of highlights the fact that we still have a great deal of freedom left.

Amen. Praise the Lord for that. Why? Because historically God has blessed this country because God's people are here and at work and God still has a remnant here.

God is still being gracious to America because there are millions of born -again

Christians here in the United States and there's thousands, tens of thousands, even in Massachusetts.

I mean, we have two solid evangelical churches in Leverett. Amen. That's a miracle.

Jesus calls believers to be the salt of the earth. We are preserving the good.

We need to be about that business, preserving the good that is there. There's a lot to be concerned about, that's true.

And there's plenty to complain about, that's true. But I think God here in the text is telling us, be thankful.

It's that simple. Be thankful. So here's what I'm thankful for.

I'm thankful for all the good things. I'm thankful to God for all the good things, even the bad things.

I can be thankful for, because God has promised in Romans 8, 28, that he will cause all things to work together for good, even the bad things.

I don't understand how he will do that. I just know he will do it because he said he would do it.

I'm thankful that a small group of settlers started this custom of setting aside a day to give thanks to almighty

God. We all learned in school about the trials that they had and many died, that's true.

And when we look at their problems, you know, ours really don't compare to the problems and the struggle that they had.

The early settlers of this country risked their lives on the open seas.

They fled, again, religious persecution. They had no permanent home. That is why they were called the pilgrims.

They had no government agency to help them out, and yet they persevered.

They had to grow and hunt for their own food. They had no money, and they had no place to spend it, even if they had it.

Here's the point, we live like kings compared to them. The first settlers had none of the comforts that we do, no means of communication, no hospitals, no sense of security, except the

Lord himself, and that was enough. So in conclusion, I hope this message has been an encouragement to you.

I hope all of you have a wonderful holiday. And just a reminder, if someone doesn't have any plans, you don't have anywhere to go,

Thanksgiving dinner will be served here at Morris Corner Church at 1 p .m. So everyone is invited to come out, bring a friend, and we will give thanks to God for all that he has done, amen?

Let's close in prayer. Lord, we thank you for your love towards us.

We thank you of how you provide. And Father, we want to remember those and pray for those in other countries who have it really, really hard right now.

We wanna pray for those and remember those who are less fortunate. Also for those in our own country who are suffering right now.

Lord, give us opportunities to minister to them as the scripture tells us, we should be careful to maintain good works because these things are good and profitable to men.

We pray all this in the powerful name of Jesus Christ, our Savior, amen. Thanks for listening.

I'm Pastor Michael Grant from Morris Corner Church. If you'd like to listen to the complete message or if you'd like more information about the ministry, visit our website, morriscornerchurch .com.

And we'd love to have you join us some Sunday morning here in Leverett. Until next time, may the grace of God be with you.