Looking at Thanksgiving

Psalm 100

Psalms 100 Make a joyful shout to the LORD, all you lands! 2 Serve the LORD with gladness; Come before His presence with singing. 3 Know that the LORD, He is God; It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves; We are His people and the sheep of His pasture. 4 Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, And into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name. 5 For the LORD is good; His mercy is everlasting, And His truth endures to all generations.

This has been a rough year for our church, for our nation, and for our family personally. Looking back at it, one could feel that anything that could go wrong did. We’ve lost many close friends in our congregation due to them becoming homebound and unable to worship with us any longer. We’ve lost several close friends in our congregation because God called them home. Our attendance has, at times, been the lowest in many years. It seems that every where we turn the adversary thwarts our attempts.

Our nation has seen the collapse of our economy, the ravages and pains of war and impending war. We have seen the constant eroding of our ability to worship freely, all in the name of being inoffensive to minority religious groups. We have seen as a nation a hostile, violent, hateful religion attempt to alter our way of life through terrorist acts. It’s been a tough year.

My family has seen personal hardship with the passing of one grandmother at Christmas, another grandmother at Easter, and a head-on car collision after one of the funerals. Even this week at Thanksgiving, my wife’s grandmother has suffered as serious stroke. It’s been a tough year.

We may feel like asking "Why should we be thankful?" We may wonder what there is to praise God about after this year. When we feel like this, we must alter our perception of Thanksgiving, and why we are thankful.

The Principle of Thanksgiving (vv 1-2)

In order to understand the need to be thankful we must understand the principle behind thanksgiving. The world around us tends to draw us away from being thankful, and toward being cynical and hard hearted. It seems like we never hear "Thank You" any more from anyone.

What about you? Are you thankful? Do you say thank you for the things that God has given you? Or do you, like many of us, dwell on what we don’t have?

A principle is something that is steadfast and unchanging in our life. A principle governs the way we act and interact. Is being thankful a governing principle in our lives today? The principle of thanksgiving must rule our life if we are to conduct ourselves before God and man in a proper way.

Thanksgiving is Joyful

The scripture says to make a joyful noise, the new KJV says to make a joyful shout. We are to shout our praises before the Lord! It’s a principle, an idea, of public confession. The whole world must hear our thankfulness. We ought to be shouting to anyone who will listen about the joy that we have.

Thanksgiving is Cheerful

We are told to serve the Lord with gladness! Happiness! Our service should never be grudgingly given. A joyful heart enables us to serve with cheerfulness.

Thanksgiving is coming to God

Our text this morning tells us to come before God, to enter His courts with praise. It doesn’t say to come in to church and expect God to fill us….it says to come to where He is. Too often we come to church with a set of preconceived notions and we sit down in the pew and say here I am. Then when we don’t get what we expect out of the service we blame God, or blame the pastor. Perhaps we should stop and think that maybe it is our fault. Maybe we aren’t getting anything out of the service because we aren’t putting anything into it. We need to enter worship seeking God not self.

Perception of Thanksgiving

Sometimes it is all in how we perceive things. Our lot in life seems to be overwhelming, when in reality we have it quite well when set up alongside someone else’s life. We often lose sight of what is good around us because we have a perception problem.

All too often we perceive ourselves to be in control, and it is at these times we begin to lose the perception that will allow us to be thankful. How we perceive things completely colors our outlook on life.

The question for us this morning, then, is how do we perceive God? Do we want a God who is to be intimately involved in every detail of our life, or do we want to treat God and the church like a filling station to return to only when we need our tanks topped off?

Verse three reminds us that we must remember that *HE* is God! He is God and He alone is worthy to be praised!

God is not just the authority; he has all of the authority. He is God!

1 Chronicles 17:20 O LORD, there is none like You, nor is there any God besides You, according to all that we have heard with our ears.

If we are going to experience thanksgiving this year we are going to have to put ourselves under the authority of the living God. He has that authority because it is He who made us. There is no way that we can recreate the actions of the creator, we have to recognize that God is a power and an authority higher than ourselves.

Hebrews 12:2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

This act of creation alone is enough to give us reason to praise. Without God we would not be here. Be thankful for God’s creation.

What are we thankful for today? Our jobs? Our homes? Our car? Our perception of our future?

What about Eternal life? Forgiveness? Prayer? Salvation? Perseverance of the Saints? The presence of God? Each of these things should bring us into thankfulness. When you realize what God has done for you thankfulness becomes natural.

Bob Aubuchon tells a story of a man named John Henry:

John Henry reminded me that when we are God's we ought to be prepared to be used by Him. He said he once entered a diner and there bellied up to the counter were several big burly truck drivers shoveling in their food. All of them looked angry and mean. As he set down to eat he started to pray over his food. He said, "You know when you are not your own you just have to do what the Lord tells you to do." He said the Spirit of God nudged and prompted him to pray for the meals of these other men . . . out loud. He said he stood and said, "Hey guys, did any of you pray before you started eating?" They all looked dumb founded and just sort of grunted. John Henry said, "I'm going to pray for your meals so stop eating and bow your heads." To which they did! He prayed thanking God for the food they were eating and sat down to eat his meal.

Do we have that same kind of courage? Are you and I willing to be thankful when and where God tells us to?

Progression of Thanksgiving

The journey of thankfulness progresses from an attitude to an action. Verse 4 tells us we must enjoy corporate public praise. It tells us to enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise.

When we join together in worship, we are entering his gates. We must do so in praise! When we praise the Lord we are telling the world that we are thankful for what God has done.

Yet when we enter into his courts we are confronted with our own private praise. Personally worshipping our lord, even in a public place. Each of us need to find that time when we can meet the creator and let his spirit guide us.

The exhortation for us is to be thankful and praise his name. Praise is a privilege that God has given to us.

Person of Thanksgiving (v 5)

Why are we to be so thankful? Because God. Bad English? Perhaps, but it says it all. Because God. God *IS*.

God is Good! God shows us everlasting mercy! God is truth!

We are thankful because of God, and who He is. We are thankful because of God and whose we are.

In Budapest, a man goes to the rabbi and complains, "Life is unbearable. There are nine of us living in one room. What can I do?" The rabbi answers, "Take your goat into the room with you." The man in incredulous, but the rabbi insists. "Do as I say and come back in a week." A week later the man comes back looking more distraught than before. "We cannot stand it," he tells the rabbi. "The goat is filthy." The rabbi then tells him, "Go home and let the goat out. And come back in a week." A radiant man returns to the rabbi a week later, exclaiming, "Life is beautiful. We enjoy every minute of it now that there's no goat—only the nine of us."

Let’s try to focus on the good things God has given to us, and be thankful for them. May you and your family have a happy Thanksgiving this week, and may you dwell on what God has done in your life.

Sermon Outline adapted from a sermon preached by Pastor Robert Aubochon at Trinity Baptist Church