The Power of Thanksgiving

Intro:

This morning, as we approach the Thanksgiving Holiday, I want us to turn our attention towards the subject of giving thanks and praise to God for ALL of His blessings to us as a church and well as the individuals who make up this local body of believers.

It’s sad to think that we need a Holiday to force us to think about that which should already come so naturally…so effortlessly, so enthusiastically…yet it seems that we do need the not-so-subtle reminder.

It seems that we DO NEED the annual opportunity and invitation to sit down so that we can reflect and ponder the countless things that we have ONLY as the result of God’s divine grace, mercy and providence.

Praise and thanksgiving run contrary to the culture in which we live...

- we are pressured by society and advertising to think not about what we have, but to focus instead on those things we DON’T have!

- We focus on our wants, wishes and desires

- We focus on things that are missing from our lives to the detriment of being thankful for that which we already have.

As a result, we’ve lost the art of being thankful.

We’ve robbed ourselves of the pleasure of giving praise to God for the million little things He does for us each and every day that we’re alive:

Starting with our first breath each morning and ending each night when we are once again able lay our hearts down on our comfortable bedroom pillows.

I’m not sure if you know this or not, but thanksgiving and praise are not just suggestions in scripture - they are actually commanded by God, for us to do!

They are not only to be followed within the confines of a church gatherings- rather they are commands to be followed each and every day in the life of a believer.

* Praise and thanksgiving are the byproducts of a blessed life.

* They are the first fruits of gratitude for all the things He does for us on a daily basis - our health, our homes, the meals we eat, the clothers we wear, the vehicles we drive, the jobs we go to, the finances he provides to pay our bills...

Each of these things is an opportunity for thanksgiving and praise

To take any of that for granted, to remain tight-lipped in the face of God’s abundanct grace just seems foolish…and selfish…and..well… lame!

Psalm 95:1-2

Come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come to him with thanksgiving. Let us sing psalms of praise to him.

— When’s the last time you shouted joyfully to God for your salvation?

— When’s the last time you wrote a love song or a worship song to Jesus? Using your own words? your own story? Your own answers to prayers.

Worship isn’t about singing other people’s songs of praise - its about writing and singing our own stories of God’s grace and acts of providence in our lives!

Ps 100:4–5 tells us how to enter into the presence of the Lord...

Enter his gates with thanksgiving; go into his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good. His unfailing love continues forever, and his faithfulness continues to each generation.

Notice that it doesn’t say to jump right into our prayer requests

it doesn’t tell us to get right to the part where we tell God what we want and need him to do in our lives...

To the contrary, it tell us to:

Enter with THANKSGIVING

to start out by thanking him for all he’s done

to recount our blessings, one by one

It tells us To go into his courts with PRAISE

To give. THANKS and PRAISE to His name

To recognize that he is GOOD

To think about His faithfulness and love

It tells us to pause before making any requests. To make sure that the first words uttered from our lips to Lord on a daily basis flow with thanksgiving and praise...

I think that if believers followed this simply recipe for prayer, it would eliminate a lot of selfish prayers…and needless requests.

Praise and thanksgiving are not to be AFTERTHOUGHTS - They are to be the appetizers for our prayers - for they shape and mold our thought pattens and teach us to recognize God’s goodness, His mercy and his never ending love that is constantly being shown in our lives.

Eph 5:18–20

Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts. And give thanks for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus…

— Good times and parties don’t start with liquor and wine

—Instead they start with with singing psalms and hyms in our hearts to God.

—They start with giving thanks to God for all His blessings...

1 Th 5:18

Be thankful in ALL circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.

—This means that we don’t have to wait for the perfect moment, we don’t have to wait until our prayers are answered or until we are walking in victory over sinful habits - we can START RIGHT HERE and NOW by learning to be thankful in every moment for what God has done!

If the preceding verses weren’t enough to convince you, perhaps this last one will. Listen to the Words found in Psalm 100

“Shout with joy to the Lord, all the earth! Worship the Lord with gladness. Come before him, singing with joy. Acknowledge that the Lord is God! He made us, and we are his. We are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving; go into his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good. His unfailing love continues forever, and his faithfulness continues to each generation.”

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Worship…joy….thanksgiving…and praise

These should be the hallmarks of the Christian life. These words and subsequent actions should be what defines our lives as Christians.

Shouts of joy! Hearts of gladness…recipients of God’s unfailing love

Yet if media reports about Christians are to be believe…that is not exactly the things that we are known for...

- But it’s time for all that to change!

- It’s time for us as believers to become grateful

- Its time for us to continually give Him Praise

- It’s time for us to shout from the rooftops all the great things He has done for us

Perhaps we just need a simple reminder to become people who praise and worship instead of becoming a people who grumble and complain.

There’s brief story found in the 17th chapter of Luke, where we see the impact and difference that thankfulness and praise make in the life of a believer. It’s found in verses 11-19.

It’s a story we’re all familiar with:

10 lepers, huddled together, living in a miserable state of existence, resigning in themselves to the terrible fate of living life with Leprosy - a disease that would slowly but surely end their lives, and would do it by inflicting terrible suffering along the way.

Scripture tells us that one day Jesus reached the border between Galilee and Samaria, he enters a village and hears loud shouts of help coming from the mouths of a group of lepers. They scream out for help and healing - for a simple touch from the master’s hand so that things might go well for them and so they could return to the homes, families, churches and careers.

“Jesus, MASTER, have mercy on us.” Was the cry on their lips.

The word “Master” means chief commander. These men recognized that Jesus was in command of even disease and death. They trusted that He was likely the only person who was capable of bringing healing to their bodies. So they shouted out with great desperation for Him to have empathy - pity- on them and bring healing to their bodies.

Applicaiton: I want you to think about the desperate situations going on in your life today…Do you see Jesus as Master? Do you see him as being in command of whatever is happening in your life?

As master over your relationships?

Master over your finances?

Master over you healing?

Master over your sadness?

Master over your unbelief?

Master over the impossible?

Because if we fail to see Him as master of all things - over every area of conflict, difficulty and disease, then we will not be able to turn to Him with complete trust and confidnece that HE ALONE can bring deliverance and healing to our situations.

Now what is interesting about Jesus’ reaction to these lepers is that he doesn’t lay hands on them. He doesn’t pray over them. He doesn’t declare them healed. Rather he gives them a command to follow.

“Go show to yourselves to the priests”

- The local priest had duties other than leading worship on each Sabbath.

- He was also something of a health official. If a person was miraculously healed of leprosy, it was up to the priest to inspect the body, to test for a complete removal of the disease, and to announce the person healed.

- In such cases, the person would have been cleansed, and at that point, it would be fine for the leper to see his wife again, to hold his daughter again, to look for work again. If the priest gave him the OK, he would be healed!

So when Jesus commanded these lepers to present themselves to the priests, he was, in essence, asking them to respond in faith that, through their obedience - what they desired would happen.

I don’t know about you, but I like the Lord to do things in a manner that makes sense to me.

I would much prefer him to say “You are healed” or to lay his hands on my body.

But if he said this in response to my great plea…I'm not sure how I would respond...

You want me to ....what?

You want me to show myself as healed to the priest? But I still have leprosy. I still have pain. I still have discomfort.

But how many of you understand that God’s ways are not like our ways. That his thoughts aren’t like our thoughts.

- He knows what is best for us.

- He know how to best meet our needs.

- He knows how to deliver us from the what ails us.

And sometimes he asks us to step out in faith BEFORE he brings healing, deliverance or answers to our prayers.

Now we don’t know if the lepers spent time discussing what Jesus asked before they stepped out in faith, or if they were just so despirate that they figured what did they have to lose…all we know is that all ten men WENT.

Would you?

Yet how many of us know that HOW WE RESPOND to Jesus’ commands, determined the type of blessing that we receive.