Sermon Tone Analysis

Psalm

Introduction:

This Psalm was written in the backgound of a man who had experienced a severe sickness or some situation of danger.

Having been delivered, he then gave thanksgiving for what the Lord had done and made promises of what he would do in gratitude for his deliverance.

An “attitude of gratitude” shows that one is a mature person.

Ingratitude has been the “chiefest of sins”.

This Thanksgiving Sunday I encourage you to reflect on the many goodnesses of God and examine our hearts to see the quantity and quality of our gratitude.

Let’s take a look at what the Psalmist said he would do in appreciation for all that the Lord had done for him.

I will take the cup of salvation

Sometimes we see a pastor or lay person trying to scare people into becoming Christians.

Paul taught that it is the “goodness of God” that leads to repentance.

A young pastor, wise beyong their years, was riding on a train with a group of military men during WW2. he conversation developed around religious themes and the preacher shared some ideas that even unbelievers, if they had any biblical background at all recognized that they were not able to be maintained.

This young man who was still a Bible College student replied using several passage of scripture.

One of the soldiers came to the young preacher, who was in the military and asked him for some advice about his spiritual matters.

Very wisely, the young man said “Now before we discuss this matter, let me ask you, am I talking to a saved person or not?”

In other words you have not settled the problem of your personal relationship with Jesus Christ as Savior, the only advice I can give you as the ultimate answer to your need is that you repent of your sin and trust Christ as Savior.

The young student was wise.

Trusting Christ as Savior and becoming a Christian does not mean that we will automatically have all of the answers to life’s questions immediately, but it does mean that we will have a working basis wherebywee, with the help of our Savior, can resolve the problems.

Until people do become Christians they simply have the inner working of the Holy Spirit to give them strength for the difficulties of life.

Sometimes we see a pastor or lay person trying to scare people into becoming Christians.

Paul taught that it is the “goodness of God” that leads to repentance.

People who can be scared into religion don’t usually last long in their committment unless they learn soon in their Christian life to live by love and faith.

When one of our greatest scientists who was noted for his new approaches and creative thinking, was on his deathbed was asked, “What are your speculations now?”

He replied saying he had no speculations, then went on to say:

2 Tim

In preparing for this message, I have read a lot of scriptures and articles on thankfulness, gratefulness.

This time of year we see beautiful decor with things like Grateful, thankful, blessed.

In preparation , I could not help but pose the question to myself, do I think thankfulness is a state of mind or a way of life?

And as any good pastor would say I think there are strong points to it being both.

Look at Ephesians:

Where Paul is writing these words to encourage and be thankful while in prison.

I find the irony of these words here to be thought provoking and challenging.

Are you thankful no matter what?

Circumstances can affect our level of thankfulness, even though we have much to be thankful for.

So should our level of thanksgiving be rooted in circumstances?

Where should our focus be?

In our text it talks about the cup of Salvation how I see it is this:

giving thanks for everything no matter what the circumstances.

Remember when you first gave your heart to God? Everything looked brighter, better, and nothing could ever dull the goodness you felt.

I look at that as the cup of salvation.

The cup of salvation that is being talked about in our text is an act of worship and it was accompanied with other forms of adoration, hence the Psalmist says, and call upon the name of the LORD.

He means that he will utter blessings and thanksgivings and prayers, and then drink of the cup which the Lord had filled with his saving grace.

Upon the table of infinite love stands the cup full of blessing; it is ours by faith to take it in our hand, make it our own, and partake of it, and then with joyful hearts to laud and magnify the gracious One who has filled it for our sakes that we may drink and be refreshed.

From this I ask the question am I thankful no matter what?

Do I take the cup of salvation, giving God praise and adoration for the things He has blessed me with as a way of life?

Is thanksgiving a state of mind or based on favorable circumstances?

I will pay my vows unto the Lord

The psalmist does not go into detail concerning the vows he had made.

Perhaps he prayed in his crisis and promised that if God would deliver him he would change his way of life in certain areas.

He agreed with God that he was deficient in bringing his sacrifices to the altar.

When we get right with God on the matters of life, amazing miracles can take place in other areas of our life.

But we need to be careful!

When we make vows, we must keep them or we will be worse off than ever before.

Jacob vowed at Bethel, but as far as we know, he stayed 20 years in Haran working for Laban and seemingly ignored those vows.

Your vows must be kept.

We would never want to be known as a person who does not keep their word.

Your word is all you have to prove your integrity and once you break this it is hard to get it back.

Other translations say “I will keep my promises to the Lord”.

I prefer vows because it feels stronger.

Promises get broken way too easily but vows are something declared before God to keep and to me feel more sacred.

A vow we as Christians have pledged to keep is to honor God in all areas of our lives and I believe a vital area is stewardship.

Stewardship is an important part of living.

In fact, for the Christian, next to accepting Jesus Christ as personal Savior, it is probably the most important element in our life.

We need to honor God in all aspects of our life.

I believe that something we need to acknowledge is that fact that we honor God with the blessings that He has given us.

How can we do this?

First of all that is giving First Fruits.

Honoring God with our giving.

Giving God what is His.

He needs to be given what is His with a grateful heart.

We need to

I believe what is said here “pay my vows unto the Lord” is give to Him what is His, to honor Him in how we have been instructed to.

More and more often I see this attitude and manner of living being compromised in Christians today.

We need to recognize that we honor God when we tithe.

We live in a generation and time where we don’t give on principle, but giving on priniciple is what has built our church and has sustained it.

Giving on priniciple means giving because we have been instruted to do so by scripture and we need to live that out in our daily lives.

If we are members of the church whether officially on non officially we need to be tithing to the church.

It is explicit in scripture and therefore how we should instruct our children and demonstrating it in our lives.

I am not preaching this today because I am doing so for selfish ambition, we should know one another better than that.

It is my duty as your pastor to remind this assembly to be doing this.

We are not to stop our giving because of anger or disagreements, the money is God’s and when you stop giving it you are robbing God!

I would never want to stand before God and have to explain why I did not make tithing my priority.

I cannot think of one reason that would excuse that behavior but there are Christians who think they wil be able to explain this away.

This morning we are to remember we have been told countless times to give, to give firstfruits, to give a tenth or earnings, and to do so with a grateful heart.

If you are here today as a leader I address you.

If you are not giving your tithe to the church on a regular basis you should not be in leadership.

What if you were to find that I was not tithing my 10th to head office?

I am sure you would not be pleased that I am failing to set that example as your pastor.

The same is true for leaders in our church, this is for board members, musicians, worship leaders, singers, children and youth persons, ushers, greeters.

I am not giving exemption to others but leadership means you stand out, you lead, you give an example therefore this is an area of leading by example.

If this is an area of struggle, this morning when the call is given at this altar I believe we need to make matters right.

We need to stop worry about what others think of us and worry how we are before God.

Are we living up to our vows to the Lord?

Are we making church a priority?

If we do not honor the Lord in these ways we will not have a place of worship in the furture.

Do you see the level of importance on these things?

It means life or death or the church.

We want to live up to the standards of scripture right?

Jesus is the most generous person who ever lived.

He left the comforts of heaven, took on human flesh, and gave his life on the cross so that we might live in him.