Setting the Record Straight About Thanksgiving Pt. 8 Thanksgiving Is A Way of Life for the Believer!

 I am reposting lessons about the factual truth of Thanksgiving in America because this has been ignored and obscured by our culture.

The truths contained in these lessons are applicable for Christians around the world.

Bob

My prayers and greetings to you all...

We have allowed the Pilgrims to speak to us through their own words by those who lived through it. 

They were credible and accurate eyewitnesses and we learned a lot about self sacrifice, about choosing to live for the glory of God and seeing how they trusted God to help them.

Our culture ignores Thanksgiving altogether and jumps from Halloween to Christmas. 

We leap up to honor the devil with Halloween celebrations and then are dragged into an highly commercialized Christmas that is all about consumerism. 

This is very wrong and I want to explore  Thanksgiving from a Biblical perspective. 

Thanksgiving is not a season that we stop briefly for one day to observe. Rather, for a believer in Jesus Christ, Thanksgiving is to be a way of life. 

Let us define Thanksgiving. It is an expression of gratitude, an emotion from our heart expressing our pleasure in all that God does for us. 

Thanksgiving is a public celebration of God's goodness toward us and is a day set aside for worship to acknowledge God delivering us from danger and providentially supplying for our needs.

Thanksgiving to God must be from our heart.

Leviticus 22:29  And when ye will offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving unto the LORD, offer it at your own will.  

Thanksgiving is meant to be a voluntary, free will offering to God. Thanksgiving involves singing hymns to God. The Hebrew word means Thanksgiving in songs of worship or hymns of praise sung by a choir and by individual believers. 

Thanksgiving is also a time of confession centered around the bountiful provision of God for our physical lives. We are confessing the goodness, grace and mercy of God in His dealings with us. It is also a time of confessing the greatness of God's salvation through repentant faith in Jesus Christ.

Our expressions of Thanksgiving should be real and genuine. God knows our heart. He knows if we truly mean it or if we are simply going through the motions of expressing Thanksgiving. 

Express thanksgiving by telling about God's wonderful works!

Psalm 26:7  That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of all thy wondrous works.

Thanksgiving must include telling others with a loud voice about the wonderful works of God. Are you born again? This is a mighty miracle of God to regenerate your heart. Has God answered your prayers? If He has, these are part of His many wonderful works that we need to tell others about. 

Magnify Jehovah with thanksgiving.

Psalm 69:30-31  I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving. 31)  This also shall please the LORD better than an ox or bullock that hath horns and hoofs.

Do you know one of the things that pleases God? Jehovah is pleased when His children praise Him in song and magnify Him with thanksgiving. 

The word "praise" means to shine the light on the beauty of God's holiness and on His lovingkindness toward mankind.

The word "magnify" means that we make much of God because He is all glorious and worthy of our praise and thanksgiving. 

Psalm 95:1-3  O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. 2) Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. 3) For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods. 

Whenever we open our Bible to read, or when we find a private space to pray or when we gather with our church family to worship, we must come into God's presence with expressions of Thanksgiving. 

Those who have hearts full of Thanksgiving and gratitude to God for all that He is and does, are people who joyfully sing to Him because God is the One, True God of heaven and earth.

All who are born again should be the most thankful people on earth. 

We know the dregs of sin and the awful habits we used to take part in. 

God rescued us by pulling us out of the miry clay and setting our feet upon Christ, the solid rock.

God cleansed us and sent His Spirit to indwell each believer. He opens our eye to the truth of scripture so that we might know Him better and grow in our faith. Why would we not be so full of Thanksgiving that we cannot hold it in?

Psalm 136:26  O give thanks unto the God of heaven: for his mercy endureth for ever.

We ought to give thanks to God for His everlasting mercy. 

Mercy is God withholding His wrath and judgment from falling upon us because we put our faith in Jesus Christ for salvation. 

We have offended the Living God with our sins but He treats us infinitely better than we deserve to be treated. 

We deserve death, hell and condemnation because we sinned against Him. 

Yet, when we turn to Jesus Christ in repentant faith, God will cleanse us and remove all sin from us. 

Then, He adopts us into His family and we become His sons and daughters!

Should we not fervently give thanks to God for His enduring mercy?

Give thanks to God in all circumstances

1 Thessalonians 5:18  In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. 

This verse really causes us to reflect upon the goodness of God in all things that He has chosen for us or has allowed to happen in our lives.

In everything we are commanded to give thanks. You mean I give thanks to God if He allows my faith to be severely tested? 

Yes. You mean I give thanks to God when my doctor tells me I have cancer? Yes. 

You mean I give thanks to God when hardship or trials come my way? Yes. We are to give thanks in all things, not just for some things.

God will walk through each challenge with us. He will not leave us nor forsake us and He will do a work in our hearts during tough times.

A heart filled with Thanksgiving will be a cheerful giver.

2 Corinthians 9:7-11  Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. 8) And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work: 9) (As it is written, He hath dispersed abroad; he hath given to the poor: his righteousness remaineth for ever. 10) Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;) 11) Being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God. 

This text concerns giving to support the needs of local churches and missionaries. 

God loves a cheerful giver and we should give with happy hearts. 

God has given us all things in Christ and it is a privilege to give in support of His church. 

When believers give to support their local church or their missionaries, it is multiplied into a bountiful supply by God so that it meets the needs. 

This causes us to have Thanksgiving in our hearts. 

Thanksgiving is to be a part of our prayer life.

Philippians  4:6-7  Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. 7) And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. 

Personal prayer time is a great time to express Thanksgiving to God. We can come boldly to the throne of grace to obtain mercy and help in our times of need. 

How? Jesus Christ opened the way for us to pray and He is our great High Priest. 

Therefore, we should bring our concerns and burdens to the Lord because He is compassionate. 

Supplications are expressions of our physical and spiritual weakness that we tell God about. 

Presenting our supplications with Thanksgiving is the idea of anticipating that God will hear our prayer and that He will answer it. 

God may not answer our prayer in the way that we think He should, but we can be assured, He will answer with what is best for us. 

Thus, we express our Thanksgiving to God for the provision of prayer through faith in Christ. 

There is abundant Thanksgiving in heaven.

Revelation 7:9-12  After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; 10) And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb. 11) And all the angels stood round about the throne, and about the elders and the four beasts, and fell before the throne on their faces, and worshipped God, 12) Saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever. Amen. 

Thoughts to Ponder...

Have we expressed genuine Thanksgiving to God in all things?

Are we thankful and grateful for all that He has done, is doing and will do for us?

Believers in Christ should be the happiest and most joyful people on earth, but often, we are not. I think a major reason why is that we do not stop and offer Thanksgiving to God for His physical and spiritual provisions.

May the Spirit of God help us grow in this area of Thanksgiving.

Bob