Expressions of Thanksgiving

We are only a week away from celebrating Thanksgiving Day! I love this time of year as the holiday season gears up. A day set aside as a nation to honor God for His many blessings. Yet sadly the commercialization of the holidays distract us from the true meaning of the holiday. The shopping malls used to give us some time for family, but now the stores are opening even on Thanksgiving day for pre-black Friday deals.

Let us not lose what Thanksgiving was intended for. Remember the good that God has done and celebrate our Creator. List the blessings, the acts of kindness and the gifts that God has given you throughout your life. Reflect on how God has moved and provided for you. Tell others of what He has done. Maybe for one day, when you kneel to pray, don’t ask God for anything just thank Him.

In youth group and church, we express our thanksgiving to God in a number of ways, but one primary through worship. Worship means to ascribe worth or value to someone or something. When we sing praise and worship songs, we should be singing prayers of worth and praise to God. It is our time to lift our voices together to the God who created us and sent His Son to redeem us. 

Have you ever received a gift from someone that you were super excited about? How did you respond to that person who gave you that gift? How did you talk about that gift to others? How long did you share the experience with others?

When we receive something we are really excited about we talk about it. We verbally thank the person who gave it to us. We talk highly of that person as often as we can. And how long we continue to speak of it demonstrates just how deeply we were affected by the gift.

King David resonated with this in his song of repentance in Psalm 51. He cried out to God to forgive his sin and restore the joy of salvation to him. Then he follows the request with “Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you…O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.”

If you are a Christian reading this, you have eternity to be thankful for. Jesus has rescued you from the kingdom of darkness and placed you in the His Kingdom of Light. You no longer stand condemned, but forgiven. How can you not speak of His glorious Name? How can you remain silent? Rejoice and express your thanksgiving to God!

Enemies of Gratitude

Do you have a hard time being thankful? I do. It is one of those commands that Jesus gave His followers that seems so easy, but can be very difficult. I can pause and think of many things I am thankful for, but the attitude of gratitude that should be a staple of being a Christian is hard.

In evaluating my own life according to the Scriptures it becomes clear that I have allowed enemies of gratitude to slip into my life. Yes there are enemies that do not want you to be thankful to God in all circumstances. These enemies are idols in our lives.

When we think of idols we often think back to Sunday School flannel graphs of some stone man-fish character, or the golden calf of the wandering Israelites. You may even be thinking of the statues of Budha or Krishna. I often think of Kali from the Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom movie. Our immediate instinct is to say, “Nope I don’t have one of those in my life.” But wait, is idol worship limited to a stone statue?

God clearly commands us to have “no other gods before Him” and “not to make any graven images” (see Exodus 20). So we think as long as I don’t have little idol statues lying around I am doing pretty good.

However we are worshiping idols in a different manner. Tim Keller defines an idol as “making a good thing an ultimate thing.” Yes some of the good things in our lives have become idols. When we value anything above God then we have created an idol. Any idol in our life is an enemy of gratefulness.

Your comfort, your security, your money, your job, your friends, your relationships, your grades, your hobbies, etc. could be an idol in your life. When you feel entitled to something, you lose your thankfulness. When something you are holding too firmly to becomes threatened, you lose your thankfulness.

We need to have hearts like Gideon who tore down the idols of his people (Judges 6). Anything that comes between you and Jesus needs to be destroyed and put in it’s proper place. When you tear down your idols and you fix your eyes on Jesus your heart will be overwhelmed with thanksgiving!

Are you thankful? What idols in your life are preventing you from having an attitude of gratitude?

Develop and Attitude of Gratitude

Read: 1 Thessalonians 5:14-18; Psalm 7:17; Hebrews 12:28

Do you consider yourself a happy or unhappy person? We all want to be happy. Isn’t that the American way, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?” But what really is happiness? What makes you happy?

Interesting enough, in people’s pursuit of happiness they end up unhappy. I just read an article about “22 Habits of Unhappy People” which listed complaining, worrying, grudges, and negative thinking along with some other habits. Compared to another article called “21 Habits of Happy People” that recorded appreciate life, forgive, gratitude, and optimism in it’s list. It makes sense that the opposite habits of unhappy people would lead to happiness.

One thing that stands out to me is the attitude of gratitude. Unhappy people are unthankful, complainers, who allow negative thoughts to rule their focus on life. Happy people are grateful for life and thankful people.

As it is now November and in just a few short weeks we will be celebrating Thanksgiving, I want to focus on the happy people’s habit of thankfulness. When Jesus Christ came he told us that we have an enemy who is seeking to destroy life, but He came to give us abundant life (John 10:10). One could say that he came to give us a happy life. Not a fleeting emotional reaction to a surprise or victory, but a deep sense of perspective on life.

The Good News of Jesus Christ is the ground for our happiness and our gratitude. As followers in Jesus Christ we should be the most grateful and happy people on the planet. As new creations (1 Corinthians 5:17) we should becoming creatures of gratitude. Thanksgiving should flow from our lips continually as we reflect on our God.

How do we develop a thankful heart? Remember who you are, where you came from and what God was willing to do for you. We need to gain perspective on our life. If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, then you have all you need to live a happy grateful life everyday, no matter the circumstances.

The Gospel is the key to thankfulness. Remember you were, or are, dead in your trespasses and sins. Unable to do anything to earn God’s favor and destined to a real place called hell.  There is no good thing we can do to earn God’s favor, there is no ritual that will make us pure, there is nowhere we can go to escape our condition. Yet God, in His great love for us, sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to live a perfect life as a human. Jesus lived in complete fulfillment of the Law of God, which we could not do, and He was willing to be a sacrifice for our sins. He went to the cross and shed His blood for you and me, was buried and three days later He rose again from the dead! In conquering death He has offered a free gift of salvation, forgiveness of sins and a relationship with God, to all those who trust in Him alone. He gave us the promised Holy Spirit to be with us and help us in life. With this promise is that all things are working together for our good.

As we focus on the Gospel, we should realize that we are undeserving people who have received the greatest gift we could ever imagine. How could we not be thankful? Everyday, every situation and every circumstance we are in is an opportunity to see how God is working the Gospel out in our lives. We should be thankful for His kindness and His goodness.

Check your attitude each day. Are you being thankful? Make a list of how God has displayed His kindness and goodness to you specifically. Praise the Lord for these things regularly. Keep God as your focus today and watch how your attitude changes. The commands God has given us are for our good and it doesn’t surprise me that many of the habits of the happy people are consistent with them. In reality, if you want to be happy and thankful, fix your eyes on Jesus!