Thanksgiving 2023

Kid's church

1 Thessalonians 5:16–18 (NIV)

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

Did everyone have a great thanksgiving?

Did everyone eat a lot of turkey?

So let's look at these verses. The Bible tells us that we need to rejoice always, pray continually and give thanks. This is what God wants us to do.

Now if we do this , then the way we think will be more positive and we will keep Jesus on our minds so that we can always think pray and rejoice for all the things that God has done in our lives.

Do you want to know what a good practice is? Everyday you should list 5 things that you are thankful for.

What is one thing you would like to thank God for in your life?

Let us pray

Introduction

If you have your Bibles please turn to

1 Timothy 1:12–17 (NIV)

I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service. Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Thanksgiving is a great time of the year. It is a time when friends and family come together for a time of fellowship and enjoying at least one meal together. Hopefully it is also a time to pause from a busy life and spend sometime thinking about what you are thankful for in life.

One of the biggest things I am thankful for is God's grace. So we are going to go through these verses from Paul as I think they best explains God's grace.

It is grace at the beginning, and grace at the end. So that when you and I come to lie upon our death beds, the one thing that should comfort and help and strengthen us there is the thing that helped us in the beginning. Not what we have been, not what we have done, but the grace of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. The Christian life starts with grace, it must continue with grace, it ends with grace. Grace, wondrous grace. By the grace of God I am what I am. Yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Everything in this world begins and ends with the grace of God. The very foundation upon the lives that we have built is the grace of God. The very fact that we are here in this building today is the grace of God.

We are going to look at two points from these verses.

Who we are

The grace of God

And so to truly understand the grace of God , we must understand ourselves. As we read these verses, Paul is not speaking in exaggeration.

1 Timothy 1:13 (NIV)

Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief.

What we must understand is our reality. I fear that one of the biggest issue that people are dealing with is the simple fact that they do not live in reality. Paul lives in reality , here is who I was before God intervenend . He has no doubts about what he was saved from. I fear that many people do not think they are in need of saving. They do not think of themselves as sinners. Society has normalized sin, even in the church sin is becoming nomarlized. This becomes dangerous because we take advantage of God's grace. Here are a couple of things we do

One is that we compare ourselves to other people. We tell ourselves that , well its a good thing I am not as bad as that guy. When we do these types of things we totally miss the point. Because one, only God is the judge and two we miss our own sins.

Matthew 7:3–5 (NIV)

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

Jesus tells us to take a look at ourselves first. Just a side note, you can see at the end of the verse that we are still supposed to help our brother.

And so we need to take stock, take stock of the reality of what we are. We need to take stock of the ways in which we aren't living in God's grace.

Now here is the amazing part. That reality can change, through the power of Jesus Christ. God never leaves you in this sinful reality but we can't experience the full grace of God when we aren't honest to God about ourselves.

Now we come to the thing that we should all be thankful for in our lives

1 Timothy 1:15–16 (NIV)

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life.

So there first flows into the Gospel. Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. This is the greatest act of grace that God has ever given humanity. It is through our reality that we are sinners that God works and saves us. That God's immense patience is shown to the world. It is God's patience shown every day that He has allowed more time for people to repent. He has allowed time for more people to find Jesus and give their lives to Him and receive eternal life. These verses are the Gospel according Paul.

I want to finish at the start of the verses.

1 Timothy 1:12 (NIV)

I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service.

I thank God , that He considers me trustworthy of such a calling on my life. I thank God that He was patient with me and that He provides His grace over and over again. Since I have been following closely to the Lord my life has gone in a direction that I never saw coming. God has put so many great people in my life that I never thought would be in my life. For example I remember going to my first ever men's group. And here was a group of guys talking about things that actually mattered. It blew my mind.

Let us pray