Sermon Transcript — December 13, 2003
It was in Nazi Germany, during the darkest days of the last year of World War II, in a concentration camp, two young sisters, Jewish, separated from the rest of their family, found themselves in this concentration camp. It wasn't unusual for the particular people at that time, but they found themselves in a concentration camp, mom and dad had been separated and they found themselves alone, yet determined to survive. The younger one said, "In order to survive, we have to stay positive and optimistic." The older one said, "Well how are you going to do that?" So they talked about it and they worked through it and they began to work and it worked out for a while but then things got worse as the Allies got closer, the treatment got worse. Many of the young ladies, young women, were beaten, tortured and abused and the younger one said, "We have to stay positive, we have to be thankful for what we have here." The older one said, "What in the world are you talking about?" And so time went on and if things couldn't get any worse by the treatment they got, their dormitory became absolutely crawling and infested with fleas, biting, crawling all over, just absolutely all day long and the older one looked at the younger and said, "What about now?" She said, "Well, we need to be thankful for the fleas." I don't know if you ever thought about being thankful for the fleas or not, but it's interesting that later these two young girls were discovered, they survived and come to find out, of all the dorms that had the women in them, their dorm was the only one where no one was tortured or abused. Now you may wonder why. Well it was interesting because the occupiers, the Nazi officers, didn't want to go in there because of the fleas! So even fleas, at times, if you look at it, even fleas at times can be a blessing.
Now it's interesting, this time of the year everybody's out and running all over the place, grabbing, buying, getting stuff. God tells His people that we need to be thankful, that we need to have an attitude of appreciation and an attitude of appreciation to Him and an attitude of praising Him. It's interesting if you go through the Psalms, how much space there is taken up for thankfulness and praise. In fact it may surprise you, there is more material in the bible on thankfulness and praise than there is on the Sabbath. Does that mean it's more important? No. But does that mean it is important? Absolutely! God commands His people to give thanks and to praise His name, to praise God's name, we just got through doing it here.
Now on the surface, you may wonder, God is all-powerful, God is all knowing, why in the world does God need our praise? Now is God the type of God that whenever we get down and we start praising Him or talking about praising Him and thanking Him, that He says, "Right on, you bet, I deserve it all, right." Is that what He needs? Does God need our praise? Does God need our thankfulness, does God need us to say, "Thank you Father for all the things You give to us?" Is it because He's self-centered that He needs it? Is it because it makes Him greater that He needs it? Does God need it to soothe His character; does God need it to soothe His vanity? Or does God command us to do because we need it? Does God command us to do it because He needs it or because we need it? Does He want it for His benefit or does God command us to be thankful and to praise Him for our benefit, for something we get out of it?
You know we live in a society that's in a mad rush – for guess what – for stuff! You know America is the only country in the world where people have a $10,000, two-car garage filled with stuff and a $10,000-20,000 car sitting in the driveway because they can't get it in because of the stuff! And we're in a mad rush for more and more and more and you look at it, people want better and newer, newer and better. The advertising – it's "new and improved" you need this, you deserve this and you may say, "O.K., I'm thankful." Well let me ask you a question brethren. How much of your prayer is spent in giving thanks to God and expressing thanks and appreciation to God as opposed to asking for your wants and your needs? I stopped and thought about this in my own life before, not long ago and I was kind of embarrassed by the answer. You know about three minutes I spent giving thanks to God and then the rest of the time – and I won't tell you how much of the time is because you'll say, "Well he prays by the clock" which I don't, but the rest of the time was on my wants and needs and desires. I ask again, how much is spent in asking for things in opposed to giving thanks to God?
We all know ancient Israel had a problem, ancient Israel very quickly forgot their God. Let's turn back to Deuteronomy 8 here very quickly. This is written while Israel is still in the wilderness, before they go into the Promised Land, I'm just going to skim through a couple of verses here.
Deut. 8:7-9 – God says, "For the Eternal your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs that flow out of the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity…remember, this is after 39 years plus of wandering…in which the stones will be stones of iron out of whose hills you will dig copper." Great natural resources.
V. 10 – "When you have eaten and are full, then you shall bless the Eternal your God for the good land which He has given you." So once you're full I want you to thank Me and be thankful. Why? Let's read on. Why does He say that?
V. 11 – "Beware that you do not forget the Eternal your God by not keeping His commandments or judgments and His statutes which I command you today."
So God ties in an attitude of thankfulness with not being forgetful. Ancient Israel promptly forgot God. Now it's interesting because at the very time God is giving these instructions, what's happening every day? Seven days a week? Israel is experiencing a miracle seven days a week. Six days a week they go out and gather manna. The seventh day of the week is a miracle because they go out and there isn't any. So seven days a week Israel is experiencing God's miracles and yet God turns right around and says you've forgotten Me. That's the message of the book of Deuteronomy, you've forgotten God, and again, that's a big part of life, not forgetting God. And a big part of not forgetting God, frankly brethren, is being thankful and having an attitude of thanksgiving.
Over in the New Testament, you're all familiar with the example of the ten lepers that Jesus Christ healed. Ten of them were healed – how many of them came back to give Him thanks? Anyone remember? One! One out of the ten. And what point did He make out of it? He said that one was who? He was a Samaritan. Now why do you think He might say the one was a Samaritan? Well because it's likely the other nine were Jewish and I ask a question. In that time…I know Dr. Levy could answer this and Mr. Antion and several others of you…but in that time, who had the most to be thankful for – the Jewish people or the Samaritans? The Jewish people had much more going to be thankful for and yet who was the only one to come forward and give thanks for the healing?
Now you say, Well that's unusual. Actually I think if you look in the world today, it's a fairly normal reaction, I think you can find that people's thankfulness is almost in inverse proportion to the blessings they've been given. The more people have, the less thankful they are, the less people have, the more thankful they are. If you've ever been to Africa, which some of you have been, Mr. Kirkpatrick's been over there several times, those people have virtually nothing compared to what we have and yet they're happier, they're more joyful, they are more thankful for what they have than most of us are in this country and it's very interesting that, kind of a phenomenon, that the more you have, the less you appreciate, seems to be.
Today, as I said, everyone, especially at this time of the year, is very consumed with getting things, giving things, making their list and getting ready for what they have to buy. But again, people don't stop and give thanks. Now why is this so important that God commands us to stop and give thanks? We see that He does, but why? Why? Are there benefits, spiritually, brethren, to us? That's really what I want to get into, are there benefits spiritually for us from being thankful, from having a thankful and from praising God? Are there definite spiritual benefits that come to us? Well yes, there are. There are a lot of fine examples of thankfulness in the bible. David is one, Daniel is one, again there are a lot of examples of people that were very thankful. In fact David, interestingly, had many situations in his life that were not ideal and yet you look through the Psalms and David wrote the majority of them, they are very very positive and thankful and just praising God throughout. If we want to have that approach that David had, we need to learn to be even more thankful for what we have and what God has given us than we actually are right now.
Now you say, well what do I have to be thankful for? Well again, we could start counting and you couldn't get done before dark. But I want to look at a very important principle here and that is, it's important to realize thankfulness is an attitude and approach of mind, it is not based on physical things, but happiness is an attitude and approach of mind. It comes from a love of God and appreciation of Him. Thankfulness doesn't come from outward circumstances. All you have to do is go to some of the Third-world countries and you see that very clearly. Most people have difficulty with it because we tend to equate thankfulness and blessings. If I asked you to count your blessings and asked you to sit down and list your blessings, probably most of us, before very long get down to things like houses and cars and this and that and the other thing and yet, how far down the line are those as far as the blessings that come from God?
Well what can we expect to happen brethren if we work on thankfulness, what can we expect to happen in our lives if we become more thankful and have more of an attitude of thankfulness and appreciation? It's interesting, a thankful attitude brethren, puts us into a right frame of relationship with God. A thankful attitude puts us in a right frame of relationship with God, by that I mean it puts us in a relationship so that when we go before God, we're in a right frame of mind and we have a right relationship with the Creator. So back in Daniel 6 - Daniel, you remember, when into captivity in Babylon as a very young man, he rose up through the ranks, became the right hand man to King Nebuchadnezzar, and continued to serve under the various kings of Babylon. When Babylon fell, Daniel went right on, unlike most situations, Daniel went right on and became a loyal servant and a trusted confidant of Darius and Cyrus. But in Daniel 6 we find, this is a situation where Daniel ended up finding himself being in the lions den, but Daniel 6, the king had been tricked into making a decree that anyone who prayed to anybody but the king would be cast into the lions den.
Dan. 6:10 – Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went home. And in his upper room, with his windows open toward Jerusalem, he knelt down on this knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God…notice…as was his custom….Daniel prayed and gave thanks.
Now Daniel had a high position, Daniel wasn't just your run of the mill guy, Daniel had a high position as a very trusted loyal confidant to the king and he could have been consumed by vanity, sometimes people get a position and it consumes them as to enabling them. Again, Daniel had the attitude and approach of being thankful to the great Creator God. Daniel had to have that attitude. Why? Because he had to remember his position, but more important, he had to remember his position in relationship to God's position. It's easy sometimes for us to remember our position, but we have to remember our position in relationship to God's position. What he had he got from God, what he had he depended on God for.
Growing up, when I was growing up, back when I was 7 or 8 years old and we were required to memorize two Psalms, the 23rd Psalm and the 100th Psalm. Now I wasn't too anxious to learn to memorize those Psalms until the person who was wanting us to learn them put a ten-dollar out and said the first person to learn it gets the $10. Now being your typical young guy, that suddenly became a challenge – and not only that, but that $10 looked good. But it's interesting, the 100th Psalm is a very interesting Psalm; let's turn there just a moment. Psalm 100. I think it goes a long way toward giving us some very important principles. Again, how does this relate to the way we go before God?
Psa. 100:1 – Make a joyful shout to the Eternal all you lands! Serve the Lord with gladness.
Many of us are employed by the Church and you guys do a fantastic job back here, you're kind of in the background but we really do appreciate it. You're the ones that enable us to be able to do what we do out there, without you guys back here it couldn't be done in the field. Sometimes you go along and you wonder, hey do they even know what we're doing? How do we do? But again:
V. 2 – Serve the Lord with gladness; come before His presence with singing!
Do you ever get down on your knees singing before God? For some of us that would be disputable, whether it might be a joyfulness noise or not! But at least we're making a noise! But he goes on:
V. 3 – Know that the Lord, He is God; It is He that made us.
You know we come before God's presence in a positive frame of mind, you know what He's got. We are His sheep. Notice:
V. 4 – Enter His gates with thanksgiving…
Where do we come before God? Well we do it here, and we start with thanksgiving, one of the reasons we have services and have singing at services. But also, when else do we go before God? When we get down on our knees. Do we go before God with thanksgiving?
V. 4 - …and into His courts…before the throne of God, before the throne in the third heaven, amongst all the holy angels…with praise.
I got to analyzing my own life and too often I get down and whenever I tend to get down – "God, help! I need You, I need Your help!" Well we do, no question, but do we acknowledge what He has already done for us? He goes on:
V. 4-5 – Be thankful to Him and bless His name. Now what does that do? For the Lord is good;
You go before God, you want to know God's good and God answers. We all know that but we tend to sometimes forget it and sometimes we get down and say, well yeah, but what have You done for me lately? But again, thankfulness focuses our minds on God and that's an easy focus to lose today. So again, thankfulness puts us in a positive frame of mind and a positive relationship with the great God.
It does something else for us though, it helps us to be grateful for what we have. Anybody remember back when United started? Look around and most of you do. Remember the first Sabbath service you were together under United and how excited everybody was and how happy and thrilled we were? Remember the first issue of the Good News that came out? I remember being down in Orlando when that came out and you couldn't get to the place where they were being distributed, it was absolutely packed. You know we were so grateful for what we had. Eight years has passed, how are we doing now? When we look at it are we still as grateful or do we now say, We should be doing more? Well we should be doing more; we will be doing more, with God's blessing. But again, are we appreciative? Are we thankful for what God has given us where we are right now? James 1:17 – James makes a very interesting statement here, again none of these passages are passages that you're not familiar with. You know thankfulness helps us to really realize this and focus in on it.
James 1:17 – Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation…God doesn't differ, God doesn't change, we realize the source, it comes from God and we're very appreciative of them…no variation or shadow of turning.
So again, we need to realize that the blessings God has given us, we need to appreciate. You know we have many fantastic blessings and God is blessing His work very greatly right now and His churches very greatly right now and yet sometimes we begin to look at it and we begin to compare if we're not careful. Where are we now with where we were fifteen years ago? That's a problem. Where are we now compared to where were we eight and a half years ago, that's a much better viewpoint. Where are we now compared to where we were eight years ago? Seven years ago? Again, we look at it and when we have that attitude, it tends to enable us to begin to not only appreciate but to utilize the blessings God's given us. Now it's good to strive for perfection, we're all told it's good to strive for perfection, but it's not good to always be dissatisfied. There is a difference in striving for perfection and always being dissatisfied with where we are.
I talked to a young man one time, he said, "No matter what I do, I can't please my father, nothing I ever do is good enough." And the dad said, "Well I just want him to be better than I was." But again, there is a right way and wrong way. Appreciation, thankfulness enables us to be able to say, yes, we're not there. But like the little kid that you've seen the picture of, with the bowl of spaghetti spilled on top of his head, he said, "God's not through with me yet." God's not through with us as church yet, He's going to do big things before everything's said and done, but again, where are we now? How much of your prayer is focused on all your needs? There are many needs, there are a lot of people that need our prayers, we have a list that comes out twice a year, page after page after page, it can almost be overwhelming if we look at it from that point of view but on the other hand, if we balance that with asking for and thanking God at the same time, then it begins to balance out. How much of your prayer is spent in being thankful, thanking God for all He does for us? You know Paul said in I Corinthians 15:57, we're not going to turn there, "Thanks be to God who gives us…what…the victory." Now how many of you have already experienced the victory? Anybody already experienced the victory? He's talking about the resurrection. No. But it is interesting that Paul's talking about it because with God there is a certainty of it, God is certain of it.You know it creates a mindset, seeing things more as God does.
You know another thing a thankful attitude does? It creates a barrier to sin; thankfulness creates a barrier to sin. You say, well how is that? Well covetousness and thankfulness are at opposite ends of the spectrum. Who was the first covetous malcontent to ever come along? We all know his name was Lucifer, later changed to Satan and he loves to attack us in this area, to get us stirred up. Hebrews 13, just a page back from where we are here in James, Heb. 13:5. God says:
Heb. 13:5 – Let your conduct be without covetousness…live without covetousness…be content with such things as you have.
Contentment, it requires thankfulness to be content. Now it's easy to convince yourself, I need this, or, I deserve this. Or maybe even, "I could do that better than…" and then begin to unknowingly, unintentionally, because of human nature, begin to work the angles to get it. You know thankfulness and covetousness can't exist together for very long, one will ultimately swallow up the other. Thankfulness and covetousness, one will ultimately swallow the other one up. Which one is going to swallow up which? Are we thankful? Well it will solve other sins too. You know it's hard to lust when you're thankful for what you have; it's hard to go out and steal when you're appreciative of what you have. If we're really thankful and appreciate the Sabbath and we use it for what God intended, it's kind of difficult at the same time to be going out and trying to find ways around it. If we're thankful for what we have, they all fall into the same thing. Thankfulness, along that same line, is a huge deterrent to a critical, negative, judgmental attitude. You know today brethren; there are many many many independent Christians. Now I don't know about you, but to me, "independent Christian" is an oxymoron. You can't be independent and be a Christian, they don't go together and again, many of them have some little unique truth no one else has or understands but us and when you're in that ballpark you have to focus on that in order to justify your independent position! Now people can become very negative and very critical of others. Let's look over in II Timothy 3:1.
II Tim. 3:1 – But this know…Paul's talking here about the time in which we live..in the last days, perilous times will come; men will be self-lovers, lovers of money…or greedy…boasters, proud…full of themselves, notice all these…blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy…
Now you look at it and unthankfulness keeps pretty heavy company there and it's actually, if you look at it and you think about it, an unthankful attitude actually contributes to being full of yourself, because thankfulness, by it's very nature has to acknowledge somebody else, doesn't it? Has to acknowledge that God does certain things and again, it actually contributes to these things and you look at it and a good focus brethren is what is important. A lack of focus on God, too much focus on our self creates problems. You know something brethren? Self will always let you down, God never will. You know self will always let us down, God never will – even times when He delays and we don't understand. You know the early New Testament Church in Acts 2, brand-new, they were all excited, they were really willing to go through things together, weren't they? They even sold – some sold possessions to help supply the needs of others so they could all stay there at Jerusalem after the giving of the holy spirit. It was an exciting time, nobody wanted to go home! Everybody wanted to be there and be a part of things, to see what happened. Now were things convenient? No, I'm sure they weren't real convenient, people had to do some sacrificing and yet there was excitement.
Remember what happened first time in United? We were thankful for a place and thankful for a church and we were thankful just to be able to be together and to continue to believe the things we'd always believed. We'd lost a whole lot, we were thankful just for survival. What about today? Eight years later, have we as a congregation, as a church overall begun to take some things for granted, have we gotten so used to certain blessings that we're annoyed by little inconveniences? We all have certain inconveniences in our lives. Mr. Pinelli knows, I'm grateful to be where I am. Now I'd just as soon not have four congregations but hey, we have people out there that need pastors and we've got a lot of pastors that are pasturing three congregations, four congregations, a few even more than that! Again, you put a lot more miles on. Yeah! Someone told me, "Man you look a lot older than you did last time I saw you." I said, "Well, when you go buy a car you've got to look at the mileage too, not just the model year!" Again, are we thankful for what God's given us and the opportunities we have?
Anybody recognize this? Some of you do I'm sure. This is not the old book, it's not the old-old book, it's the old-old-old book, but it's not the old-old-old-old book! There is a song we used to sing in here, a lot of you will remember it and it's entitled "Count Your Blessings." Anybody remember that song, we used to sing it. It goes "When upon life's billows you're tempest tossed, when you're discouraged thinking all is lost, count your many blessings, name them one by one and it will surprise you what the Lord has done." Too often we forget to stop and count our blessings brethren. It goes on with other verses of it, but again, look at it. Thankfulness also, interestingly enough, leads to tranquility and peace of mind. You know brethren, a person who is thankful isn't a big worrier for the most part, he's not much of a fretter. Why? Well because being thankful gets our mind off our problems. Let's look at Colossians 3:15. Paul said:
Col. 3:15 – Let the peace of God rule in your hearts to which also you were called in one body…and notice what he has connected up with the peace of God…and be thankful.
Now these two are mutual but they're complementary. The more God's peace is in control, the more settled and more thankful we'll become. On the other side, the more thankful we are, the more God's peace will rule. A lot of problems today in our society are treated by chemicals and by drugs; discouragement, depression, anger, they all have medicines for them and some of them work and some of them don't, some of them give relief and have side effects. You know thankfulness and praising God are antidotes for discouragement and depression as well. An attitude of thankfulness and praising God is a very strong antidote for discouragement. Now that's not saying in every case there aren't clinical problems, definitely. But in many cases when we get down, when you get down, ever notice what direction do you look when you get down? What are you looking at? Yourself! When we get down we get focused on ourselves. What happens when we start praising God and giving thanks? Where is our focus? Not on ourselves! It's outward and it's upward. It's interesting, these have side effects too, but they're positive side effects. The only side effects of this treatment is positive. Let's look at I Timothy 6:6. Paul, here in a very familiar statement for all of us:
I Tim. 6:6 – Godliness with contentment is great gain.
Kind of the same thing we were talking about, the love of God and peace and praising.
V. 7 – For we brought nothing into this world and it's certain we can carry nothing out. Couldn't convince a lot of people of that right now, they're gathering up and accumulating "stuff."
V. 8 – And having food and clothing, with these we should be content. But those who desire to be rich…again, those who are looking for things instead of being thankful for what we have…fall into temptation and a snare and into the many foolish and harmful lusts.
You know greed and many other things are tied to a lack of contentment. Contentment, again, comes not from things, contentment doesn't come from things. There was a bumper sticker awhile back that said, "He who dies with the most things wins." They came out with another one shortly after that said, "He who dies with the most things is dead!" Very accurate you know! Contentment doesn't come from things, but it comes from knowing God is in charge and that He will take care of us and bless us abundantly along the way, whether we're talking about a church or whether we're talking about individuals. Yes, we have a part to do, yes we have to do what we can, but we look at it and God will bless us abundantly and He is in charge. After all, where else would we rather be?
How much prayer brethren is taken up with thanks versus how much for our needs? I want to challenge you this afternoon to start taking more time to thank God, listing your blessings, not just physical things but the blessing of God's word, the blessing of His calling, the blessing of a tranquil mind, a peaceful mind and all the other things we have. Take up more time in thanking God and talking to Him about those things and balance the time a little more. Let's look at Philippians 4:6. Here's an attitude and an approach that Paul advocates and I think you'll find it works.
Phil. 4:6 – Be anxious for nothing…quit worrying, don't worry…but in everything, by prayer with supplication…notice even strong crying…with thanksgiving. It's interesting, most of us when we get down into prayer with supplication, the last thing we're thinking about is thankfulness. We're thinking about, "God, I need Your help and I need it now!" Which sometimes is very accurate. But he says…by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your request be made known to God. Notice what he says:
V. 7 – And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ.
Supplication with thanksgiving. Brethren, it will enliven our prayer life, it will lift you up and give you a more positive perspective, even in your prayers. You know a thankful attitude helps us not doubt in our prayers and in our prayer life, it helps us not doubt in life in general because it gives us faith because we look at it and when we're being thankful to God, we're focusing on what? On what He is doing and has already done and it reaffirm God's care and God's concern. It acknowledges what He is and what He does for us everyday. A deeply thankful person will have faith because you're constantly relating and reflecting on God. I think most of us, and I know in my own life, need to take much more time to express my thanks and appreciation. Not only to God, but especially to Him, but also to our fellow workers, to those who labor, to those who enable us to be able to do what we're doing as a church, to God who gives us the increase.
As Christians brethren, we've got difficult times ahead, there are going to be needs, there are going to be wants. You know I've never known God to not take care of my needs…a lot of my wants He hasn't taken care of yet, but I've never known him not to take care of any of my needs. So brethren, we need to be deeply thankful, not just today, but each day, every day, focus on the real blessings, make thankfulness brethren, a part of your life, a regular part of your life and your prayer life and I think I can say safely, that you will notice a difference. You'll notice an exhilaration, maybe a little lighter step, a little bit more of a positive outlook, positive frame of what's going on and where we're headed and what God's doing than there's been for some time. Hopefully I've exhorted you here today and encouraged you to be thinking more about thankfulness and if I haven't made you thankful for anything else, at least you can be thankful that now he's done!