A Thanksgiving Sacrifice
The Heart of Thanksgiving • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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A little boy was asked to say grace over the thanksgiving meal.
He looked at the large turkey, the mashed potatoes, the green bean casserole, all the fixings. He closed his eyes and said...
Lord, I don’t like the looks of it, but I’ll thank You and eat it anyway.
The sacrifice of a picky eater!
Today, we will be looking at what a thanksgiving sacrifice means by looking at it from an Old Testament view and a New Testament view.
This message actually stems from something the Lord laid on my heart for the revival this past Friday.
We live in a country that it cost us nothing to worship Christ, and we value it as such.
There is no true sacrifice to our worship. I know that this is hard to hear but it needs to be said.
The churches today are filled with people that are there out of obligation and not out of desire.
They live in the new testament church but worship like they are in the Old.
This thanksgiving message maybe different, but it is made for you to see that your worship and praise should be a sacrifice birth out of desire for the Lord.
let’s pray !
Let’s start today by looking at the Old Testament
Old Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice
Biblically, in the OT a thanksgiving sacrifice is an offering of praise and gratitude to God involving a peace offering of food and animals.
Offer a thanksgiving sacrifice to God,
and pay your vows to the Most High.
Old Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice
A literal feast
If he presents it for thanksgiving, in addition to the thanksgiving sacrifice, he is to present unleavened cakes mixed with olive oil, unleavened wafers coated with oil, and well-kneaded cakes of fine flour mixed with oil. He is to present as his offering cakes of leavened bread with his thanksgiving sacrifice of fellowship. From the cakes he is to present one portion of each offering as a contribution to the Lord. It will belong to the priest who splatters the blood of the fellowship offering; it is his. The meat of his thanksgiving sacrifice of fellowship must be eaten on the day he offers it; he may not leave any of it until morning.
The thanksgiving sacrifice was a physical peace offering that included an animal, cereal, and bread offerings. The worshipper, along with family and friends, would than share a feast with the priest and the poor.
Old Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice
An act of Peace
The offering was a way of celebrating a peaceful relationship with God, made possible through the peace offerings that signified the reconciliation between God and those who trusted Him.
“When you offer a fellowship sacrifice to the Lord, sacrifice it so that you may be accepted.
It was viewed as a peace offering for the person to reconnect themselves to God and to show by obligation their trust in Him.
Old Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice
A Response to God’s Blessings
It was a deliberate act of gratitude for God’s goodness, provision, protection, and faithfulness.
Now, on the surface, none of this seems bad. Matter of fact, it was God’s law.
Where it lost what it was meant to be is when it went from worship to obligation.
Sacrificing out of obligation involves giving up something, like time, money or comfort because of a sense of duty or responsibility, rather than out of desire or love.
Fulfilling obligations is part of being an adult, a responsible person. Like paying your bills, or a paramedic that puts himself in danger out of duty to their community.
Fulfilling an obligation out of a sense of necessity, can result in anxiety, resentment, and guilt. Like doing a religious practice out of some mandatory need or ritual. This type of obligatory sacrifice is made out of duty, social pressure, or fear of consequences, rather than a genuine desire to sacrifice.
Oh if i don’t pray enough God will be mad, Oh I didn’t give to St Jude, God will smite me.
This is when we start to think of God as some angry dude in a white rope ready to slap you down. Not the loving Father He really is.
And it is this thought that has filtered into
New Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice
give thanks in everything; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
New Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice:
A Spiritual Sacrifice
This is fulfilled through Jesus Christ, and the Old Testament sacrificial system finds its ultimate meaning in His sacrifice on the cross.
But this man, after offering one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God. He is now waiting until his enemies are made his footstool. For by one offering he has perfected forever those who are sanctified.
New Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice:
Sacrifice of Praise
We as believers are called to continually offer spiritual sacrifice of praise.
Therefore, through him let us continually offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name.
New Testament View of Thanksgiving Sacrifice:
A Sacrificial Way of Life
We need to realize that it is not a single ritual, but a continuous posture of our hearts that is expressed in all circumstances through prayer, worship, and a life lived with gratitude.
Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is very powerful in its effect.
The NT view of a Thanksgiving Sacrifice should be where we ask ourselves, am I doing this out of a have to, or because I desire to.
When you come to the Lord with a loving desire, the sacrifice of your praise and worship leads to fulfillment and not emptiness.
I said earlier the premise behind this message is that we see that our worship cost us nothing, so we view it as such.
We change it when we change our hearts.
It is living in a state of thanksgiving, not just when things are good.
I saw a short the other day.
It was a kid who was going through an aggressive form of Leukemia.
His dad was interviewing him and asked him if he was mad at God.
He said no, He was grateful to God that He found Him special enough and strong enough to handle this.
He said that He was thankful to God that He gave him this and not his sister or his brother.
Now that is a worship that has cost something. Not his cancer, but his view and his heart is all for the loving Father.
It costs him everything!
What does it cost you? What is your Thanksgiving Sacrifice? Is it out of obligation or out of desire you sit here today?
I am not asking you to answer it to me or anyone around you, those answers must be between you and God.
