Scripture: Philippians 4:4-9; Acts 2:22-28
For the past 5 weeks, we have been considering the
many reasons that our good and faithful God has given us for showing our gratitude
to Him later this week on Thanksgiving Day.
Of course, the Lord deserves our grateful heart and eternal thanksgiving
every day, but especially on the day that is so specifically identified as
Thanksgiving.
Today will be the last in this sermon series, but we
all should be confident that God’s gifts will continue to shower us with divine
blessings throughout our lives. The
intent of these messages of thanksgiving for the Lord are to remind us all of
what we owe to our Almighty God, and that we should be praising Him and giving
thanks to Him as often and as fully as we possibly can.
The Lord asks very little from us, other than our
faithful obedience and our honest gratitude for all that He provides. But how much do we actually give back to
Him? He only asks for us to return a
tithe out of all that He gives us in income, in abilities, and in our time, to
be used in outreach, in service to others, and in witness to all that the Lord
has done for us.
Is that too much?
Is 10% of our “First and Best Fruits” an unreasonable amount to return
to God? Is 90% too little to keep for the
living of our own lives? Think about it
as we celebrate the Lord’s generosity toward each of us!
Read Philippians 4:4-9
Rejoice and be gentle in all
that you do! Now, some folks will
respond with the thought – “How can God expect us to be thankful and happy and
gentle when life is rapidly dragging us into misery, trial, sickness, loss, all
kinds of pain and worldly oppression, and even into death?” But we have never been told to be thankful
for a life that turns sour on us. The
thought that should be leading us into joyful thanksgiving is that God will see us through, not only the best of times, but also during the worst that we
could ever imagine!
This is the attitude that every
Christian should be displaying to the world!
Those who have never given their lives over to our Lord Jesus Christ,
will be amazed, and some will even be eager to understand what it is about this
life that could possibly lead us into a love and admiration that goes so far
beyond all understanding or appreciation!
After all, isn’t this the example that Jesus has laid down for us? I don’t believe that He was all that happy
about the torture, the hatred, the denial, the pain that those last few days of
human life brought to Him. But the joyful
heart that sustained Him through it all was that His painful and humiliating
death would enable all who trusted their lives to Him through faith, would one
day discover eternal joy in the life that would, without a single doubt, come
to them!
The only problem for us is
that we have been living in an instant kind of world – instant food, instant
news, instant weather, instant love, and more “instants” than we could ever
count. The problem for “instant”
oriented people is that God works in His own form of time, and not on the time
that many folks measure Him by. Many
expect that even “peace” should be one of those instantaneous things, when it
actually takes time for it all to come together!
Then there is that string of
“whatever’s” that also have little to do with human understanding. Consider “truth” and “right” – truth in God is
always synonymous with “right”. What
about noble? The word implies honorable,
moral, just, and so on. But the world’s
version has become understood as a personal trait, and one that each and every
person should be allowed to define for themselves. The word “pure” doesn’t even seem to be
definable any more, as nothing seems to be pure in today’s culture! Even “lovely” and “admirable” have moved
beyond what scripture has always intended for their meaning, and these, too,
have taken on a personal context, and God’s desire for what has always been His
understanding of what we should strive for has become moot, at best.
All of these Godly words are,
in truth, absolute and eternal, and not the human kind that seem to be relative
and up for change every time you turn around.
This passage from Philipppians is intended to call everyone to stop
redefining, rewriting and misquoting the words that Almighty God has set down
for our edification, and to begin living and loving in the way that the Lord
has always lived and loved for us.
And the concluding sentence
tells us that when we begin to live and love in God’s virtuous way, and put His
way into practice on a daily basis, not only will His peace rest upon us, but
the God of Peace will also come into our lives, to live within us for all time. And this will fill us with the true and
complete reason for fulfilling thankfulness.
Read Acts 2:22-28
These
words are a portion of Peter’s proclamation at Pentecost. When he refers to the “miracles, signs and
wonders” of Jesus’ life among us, he is basically telling the people to simply
believe what their eyes have seen and ears have heard from the Lord. They are also to decide for themselves if
anyone other than God has ever had the authority and power to bring all of this
to bear for the world.
The
power of Pentecost is Spirit based. The
truth of the Lord’s salvation is Spirit affirmed. The promise of Jesus Messiah’s coming, both
then and on the day that is yet to come, is given by Jesus Himself, and the
Father, as well as the Spirit, and finally by God’s word in scripture. Everything that came from the teachings of
Jesus was God inspired, everything that Jesus endured throughout His life,
including the evil that denounced Him and took His life was necessary to
fulfill God’s perfect plan. And why did
the Lord Jesus accept this task of rescue for the sinful likes of you and
me? Because only His death, resurrection
and eternal life, along with our acceptance through faith that it is God’s
truth, God’s purpose, and God’s desire that no one should perish without the
opportunity of hope – a hope that only the Lord could promise and that only God
could bring to completion.
And
verse 28 is our response in faith to
the Lord’s eternal blessings for our life – please join me in claiming these words for
our own lives - 28 You have made known to me
the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.’
By faith, we are in the presence of
God through Jesus, and if that isn’t the very best reason to be thankful, there
isn’t a single ounce of gratitude that will ever overflow from our life.
