Gratitude vs Thanksgiving: There is a Difference

Well, we're here on the week. Later on this week, we'll be celebrating Thanksgiving. On a national holiday, I always kind of enjoy Thanksgiving because of what it means. Remembering that God blessed this country greatly. And it's an opportunity for families to get together, and I look forward to having our kids with us and their families with us. And my sister comes over. It's kind of a nice day to gather together, especially if we remember that God is the reason that we're together and that we honor Him on that day and don't allow ourselves to become just the Thanksgiving of America these days. Just watch football and eat and think that's all there is to it. But you know, this year as I was thinking about Thanksgiving, we all know the Thanksgiving story. We remember it probably from grade school. And we remember that back in 1621, the Pilgrims had a very tough winter. And many of them died. And there in the fall of 1621, they had a bounchest harvest. And after a severe, severe trial, they took the time after a bounchest harvest to stop and thank God. But I thought, you know, there's probably more that I've forgotten about that Thanksgiving story. What exactly did happen back then? And as I researched it, and of course, you know, historians, they find these documents and they're able to add to these stories that we have as they find more information. And you know, I know Governor Bradford and some others have looked through some of the things that they've written about that Thanksgiving. There's a lot in that. And you know, we tend to think of the first Thanksgiving. And a lot of the questions are, what did they eat on that first Thanksgiving? Did they really have turkey? Probably they really did have turkey because there were these wild fowls running around everywhere. And that's what they were hunting. And that's what they were doing. They probably had fish and other things like that, too. But that's not really the story of the first Thanksgiving.

And you know, when they celebrated, when they got together on that, many of the consensus is sometime in October of 1621, to do this harvest Thanksgiving dinner honoring God, were they really just thankful for just the harvest? Or was there a lot more? A lot more that went on during that year leading up to it than just a harvest that kept them from starvation, which many of them had done as they first lived there. So I want to just take a few minutes to kind of recount for you what happened, leading up to that harvest.

Because the story of Thanksgiving, you know, we could say it began in 1620 when the Pilgrims came over on the Mayflower. They arrived in, I believe it was November of that year, and they weren't prepared. They weren't prepared for what they were going to face. You know, they didn't realize that they didn't have anywhere to go, really. They had nowhere to settle.

The Indians were receptive to trading with the Europeans, but they weren't open to having people settle there. In fact, you know, history shows that the Indians, and I use that term for Native Americans because there were a number of tribes there, but I'll just be generic in it, they would often even drive the settlers away after they were there with weapons, because they just didn't want them there. They were happy to trade with them, but they didn't really want them to settle there. So when the Pilgrims arrived in 1620, it was the cold of winter.

They had to stay on the Mayflower, and half of them, well, 44 out of 122 died during that time. Many from starvation because they just didn't have food other from exposure to the element. And so people will say, that's the beginning of Thanksgiving, you know, and then the next year was kind of a miracle as you go through it and see that they were able to have this great harvest, you know. But there was a lot more to the story than that.

Probably if you look at the story of Thanksgiving, it began back in 1608. You know, some historians say it was more like 1614. And in 1608, we'll use that number, because that seemed to be where more of them set this date than anywhere else. You had an Englishman by the name of Thomas Hunt came over to America, and he ran into these Indians, if you will, and there were a couple tribes there that were up in that area where the pilgrims settled.

There was the Naring-Gasset tried, and there was a Wampum, which is such a tough word to pronounce, Wampum, whatever. It begins W-A-M-P, okay? I'll call them the Indians, and the other one the Naring-Gasset trade. But those group of Indians that Massasoa was the chief of. You had those two tribes up there, and this Englishman came, and out of this Wampum, whatever, the Indian tribe, he actually kidnapped some of the young kids from that tribe and took them with him.

And he was going to take them over to Spain to sell them into slavery. That's what his deal was. And so when he got to Spain, the people didn't buy into it. They didn't want to buy the slaves. And so he had these Indians there that he had brought over, and one of them was who we know today is Squanto. Probably remember, people remember the name Squanto, right? He had a different name that they used back then.

But he found himself there. No one bought the slaves, and somehow he found himself in Spain, an Indian in a foreign country where he didn't understand the language, whatever. And somehow he found his way over to England. So, you know, some of the things say the Catholic Friars got him out of that area so that he was able to go over there.

But he found himself in England. He was there for a number of years. And while there, he learned to speak English. He learned what the Christian God was and what the people of England worshipped, which is different, of course, than what the Indians in this country did. But he became familiar with the English culture. As he was, he was a... So, he came back to America. His entire village had been wiped out by disease.

Somehow that entire village was there. There's a name for it. But it was just gone. He was the only survivor. And history indicates that he is the only one of those Indians who went over there, that there's any record that he ever came back to America. So we have Squanto over here, who's got this unique background, coming to a village, back to a village, coming back home, if you will, and every single person is gone.

Every single one is just totally wiped out, and the village where they live there is just cleared land, ready to be inhabited, but no one there. The reports are that there were dead bodies still laying around there, as the rest of the Indian tribe, the tribe that they came from, just didn't do anything with it.

Now, it turns out also that of that tribe, the tribe that begins with W, 75% of them were wiped out by this disease. But of the Narangacit tribe, which was a rebel, not a rebel, a rival tribe, almost no one was affected by that. So it was something that had to do with that tribe, that one was pretty much wiped out, and the other tribe was pretty much left alone.

So here we are in 1619, and we have this Indian who has this unique background, who's able to speak English, who understands the culture of Europe, who has come to understand the European mindset, and he's there in this place with absolutely no place to go, and here comes the Mayflower in 1620. In 1620, as I mentioned, they land. They have absolutely nowhere to go.

They're not prepared. They don't have a charter for any kind of settlement. So they stay on the Mayflower for that winter. And in March, when they're able to come out, again, 44 of the 102 died during that time, right? There were 18 families of the women that came over, of the 18 women that came over in those families, only four survived. The rest of them died.

And many of the historians will say they probably died because there was so little food they gave up their food so their children could survive, and they just starved to death. So anyway, kind of a harrowing situation that they all went through at that time. But in March, they came aboard, and they found this vacant land, this cleared land, right?

And so they moved into that cleared land. Massasoit, who was the chief of this Indian tribe, watched what was doing, and he knew what was going on. And even through the winter, he fed them a little bit of supplies of what was going on. But in March, he comes to talk with them. Well, you can understand that it's sitting there in America. They can't communicate, but there just happens to be Squanto.

Squanto, who's there, who knows how to speak English. And somehow, you know, out of everything that goes on, Squanto is there. He can interpret, and there's this relationship that develops. Massasoit, you know, the chief, is kind of interested, the historians say, because he's got this rival tribe that is now very strong. He isn't very strong because 75% of his tribe have been wiped out. So he kind of looks at the English favorably, still a little tenuous about them, but he looks at them favorably because they can be allies. And so they work together.

And Squanto is an enormous help to the people during that time. Well, first of all, they move into this land, and the Indians don't challenge them, because this land is just sitting vacant, already cleared. They don't challenge them, because they're not going to go back into that area. And whatever the name of that land was at that time, that's what became Plymouth.

That's what became Plymouth. So if it wasn't for that vacant land, no one really knows what would have happened to those pilgrims that have come over. They had been sent back to Europe, just like every other people that had come during that time. But the land just happened to be there, and it was favorably set up that they could move in, they could settle there, they have an Indian who can work with them and interpret them. And as he goes through the summer, he teaches them how to work the land. They didn't know what to do. Land in America is different than land in England.

And so, I remember when we moved to Florida, it's like, oh, you can grow this and you can grow this. And let me tell you, the land in Florida is different than the land in Indiana, we learned. So you've got to kind of figure out what's going on. It's the same difference between England and America. The Squanto was able to show them, this is what will grow, so they planted the maize crops, they were able to live off of that. He showed them that you can use fish for fertilizer and enrich the soil, and they had this Bounteous Harvest in 1621, from starvation to Bounteous Harvest.

And the pilgrims, the pilgrims, it wasn't escaped on them, everything that went on. You know, here we have this horrible time that we landed in. Here, just by chance, question mark, we have this Indian who can speak with us, who can teach us, who knows English, who understands what we believe and understands our God. Just by chance, we have a village of cleared land that we can move into, that the Indians are willing to have us move into.

Just by chance, they need to have someone to befriend them. And then, they teach us to have this Bounteous Harvest. So when you look at what the pilgrims were thankful for at that time, they were thankful for the harvest.

They were thankful for that, certainly. But they recognized that God's hand was in that every step of the way. And there are historians who say, because of that and how everything worked out, of course, they don't often give God the cry that they'll say that the pilgrims recognized divine providence in what was going on. Because of that, the history of the world was changed. Here you have America settled by Plymouth, and as word got back into England that now they know what they're doing, more and more settlers would come year by year, and the rest is history.

But as you look at Thanksgiving, that first Thanksgiving that they did in 1621, they had 53 people that were remaining. And they invited Massasoet to bring people with him, because they wanted to have this feast, this Thanksgiving, to God. And as they did that, certainly they were grateful, but they wanted to do something and rejoice. Some people, some historians, and some accounts will say, the pilgrims who knew the Bible well looked into the Bible, and they saw that there was a festival at harvest time, that the people of God would get together and rejoice before him. And they patterned that after that.

They didn't understand the eight-day Feast of Tabernacles that it talks about in Leviticus 23, but they saw that you get together and you thank God. Some historians say that, not all. And as you look at the consensus, I didn't look up to see if maybe the Feast of Tabernacles coincided, because no one knows exactly what the date that they kept the first Thanksgiving. But they stayed there for three days, three days rejoicing with the Indians who brought 90 with them.

So they had this group together that worked together and had this miraculous thing happen at that time, and the purpose of it was to give thanks to God for everything that he had done. Not just the harvest, but everything that had happened during that time. And so they were mindful of that. Now, for you women, you'll appreciate this. It said that, you know, if all the things that were happening, feeding 143 people, there were four women, right? Four women who survived during that time, they were the ones who prepared all that with the help of some men, and they were able to do that for the 140 people that were there for three days, for three days that they were there as they stayed together and rejoiced.

My purpose for saying this is, you know, when you look at what happened in that first Thanksgiving, and as we look to commemorate that here this coming Thursday, you can see God's hands, God's hand all over that first Thanksgiving. And as those pilgrims gathered together there on that day, and they knew the hardships they had been through, they were grateful. But you know what? They were down, they were like deep down grateful and thankful in a way we can't even imagine. Look what they had been through. Look what they had been through. Look at what they saw God work in their lives. Look at the miracles that had happened with them, and they were thankful in a way that you and I may not even be able to appreciate.

You know, there are degrees of gratitude. We can be thankful, we can be grateful for a lot of things in our lives. We can be thankful for a lot of things in our lives. But the real measure of how grateful we are is what we do with that gratitude. The pilgrims could have been gracious, and they could have been forever thankful to God and said, you know, thank you, thank you, thank you.

But they did something about it. You know, we are grateful people. But in the Bible, when you look at gratitude, which doesn't show up at all in the Bible, there's one verse that uses the word grateful. But when you look at the word Thanksgiving, it's a different word and a different concept than what gratitude is. Gratitude, we can all be grateful for things.

But Thanksgiving takes it to a different level. It's an action word. Gratitude is a noun. It can describe what we are.

Oh, the pilgrims were grateful. They turned it into Thanksgiving. They actually did the work to show God how grateful they were.

And they started this tradition that we still keep today. Much of that has been lost on the American people today. But it's still there, and they turned their gratitude into action. And as you look in the Bible, you can see that when God talks about Thanksgiving, it's not just an attitude. Yes, it's an attitude and it's something we need to do, but it's something that we do with it. It's an action word. Now, we can compare the pilgrims to someone in the Bible who had a similar event in their lives, an attuning, if you will. The pilgrims, they knew forever in their lives what they had gone through and what God had done. We can look at the Apostle Paul, and he had a similar situation. Here was a man who was out looking for Christians, looking to condemn them, even standing by and was consenting to the death of them. And then God rescued him, if you will. God opened his eye, showed him the truth. And Jesus Christ trained him for all those years. And he went about his life from that time forward. He was a changed man. He recognized that the path he was on was only going to lead to death.

Without God, he had no future. He knew that he would have ended up dying if he had been fighting against God during that time. For the rest of his life, who knows what would have happened. But God gave him the key to eternal life. And he spent the rest of his life being grateful to God, yes, but he put that gratitude at work. He spent his life thanking God and putting that thanks into action. Not just saying thank you, thank you, thank you in the words, but actually putting it into practice. Let's look at Philippians 4.

And it defined his life, if you will, when you look at Philippians 4 and you look at what Paul wrote. And his entire life that we have in the epistles that he has, in Philippians 4.6, he says, Be anxious for nothing, but in everything. And again, when the Bible says everything, it means everything. But in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.

In everything, give your thanks, make it with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which suppresses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. For Paul to write that verse and say, in everything we do, whenever we pray, make sure that it's always with thanksgiving.

It's always remembering what God has done. Every prayer, every time that we approach Him, really all through our life, thankful to God for the change, the life-altering change that He's made in our lives, and opened our minds to the eternity that He's given you and me. That should permeate everything we do, and it should be kept in mind. And Paul says that. Don't worry about it. God has opened your mind. You are God's people. Let everything be done. Go ahead and pray and ask Him, and let it be done with thanksgiving. Now, if you look at the Greek word that's translated, thanksgiving, there, here's what it means, according to Strongs, actively. Underscore that word actively. Actively grateful to God as an act of worship.

Not just, I've got this feeling in my heart that I'm thankful to God, actively grateful to God as an act of worship. You know, Paul did what he did, lived his life the way he wrote. That's why he could write in Romans 12, verse 2, you know, it is our reasonable service to sacrifice our lives to God. You read about Paul, and you see everything that he went through. He was beaten, he was shipwrecked, he did everything he could, everything he did in life, he did it, but he always had this attitude of thanksgiving, no matter how hard my life is, everything I do, I will sacrifice my life because you know what, God? Jesus Christ sacrificed His life for me, and I am not only grateful, but I will live my life with thanksgiving, and I will mark everything I do to please you by the things I do. My gratitude will be marked by the actions that I take in thanks to you. I will be actively, actively grateful. And as you look at Paul's writings and you read what he says in the Bible, you can see that that permeate how it just permeates his life, this attitude of thanksgiving, no matter what he went through. He was happy to go through it because it was what God wanted, and it was his reasonable service to please God because what of God had opened his mind to and what God had promised him. The same thing that God promises you and me. You know, it was, you know, in Greek culture, the Greek culture back at the time of Christ when the Greeks were at the top of their history, if you will, they had some, they had the philosophers there who did uncover some, you know, truth in life. You know, they had their foreign gods and their pagan gods that showed that they weren't totally there, but they were able to have some insight into life. And one of those philosophers, Cicero, he said this, he said that gratitude, gratitude is the mother of all virtues. You've probably heard that quote somewhere. It's the mother of all virtues. What he meant when he said that was, you know what, if you are grateful, truly grateful, everything else stems from that. Everything else stems from that.

And you look at the Bible, you look at the Bible, and you look at Paul as an example. We could talk about Peter, we could talk about other people as well. People that were grateful to God and actively demonstrated that gratitude to God by the things that they did with their life. Not just sitting back and saying, I'm grateful, yeah, I'm happy, but actually doing, doing the things that would, would mark their gratitude by doing the things that would please God, you can see that it engendered so many of the things that God wants us to develop in your and my life. So when Paul says, when Paul says, be thankful in everything, with thanksgiving, actively demonstrate your thanks to God, you can see in his life how it developed. Well, before we get into that, let's go back and look at a few scriptures here. Let's turn back to Leviticus. If you remember the Old Testament, you know, we had the tabernacle, we had the temple, and there were offerings. We've talked about the five type of offerings that were, that were offered by the Israelites during that time, and God, you know, showed what he wanted, and we look at those sacrifices today, and we can learn some of what God wants of us, right? In chapter 7 of Leviticus, and in verse 12, I'll just begin in verse 11. Leviticus 7 verse 11, it says, this is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which he shall offer to the eternal. If he offers it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mixed with oil, unleavened wafers anointed with oil, or cakes of blended flour mixed with oil, and so on. So there was a sacrifice of thanksgiving. We are thankful to you, God. We will take the action to give you a sacrifice. Not just say thank you, but actually do something with it, and we'll bring you a sacrifice.

Forward in Leviticus to chapter 22, and verse 29, and it says, and when you offer a sacrifice, when you do something with this thanks and this gratitude that you have, when you offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the eternal, offer it of your own free will. You be motivated by it. I'm grateful to God. It's time for me to sacrifice to him and show him my gratitude. Not just say it. It's good to say it. Good to do those things. Good to have that feeling. Do something. Do something with it.

We could turn to many scriptures, but let's look at a few of them. Perhaps in books we don't look at as often. Let's go to Jonah. Jonah is there. He's one of the minor prophets.

Amos Obadiah Jonah Micah.

And Jonah, you know, he finds himself in a position where he's in the great fish's belly.

You remember the story about Jonah. And basically, he's dead. He knows he's not going to get out of that belly on his own. He is totally dependent on God. There's nothing he can do. And let's just read through what Jonah writes his prayer that he gives from the fish's belly. Chapter two of Jonah, verse two, it says, and he said, I cried out to the Lord because of my affliction, and he answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol, they knew I'm dead. I'm dead in this fish's belly. Out of the belly of Sheol, I cried, and you heard my voice. For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the floods surrounded me. All your billows and your waves passed over me. You know, he was there. He was there in a fish's belly, but we could find ourselves in the same situation, where it just seems like things just happen over and over and over and over with us. And there's no way out. And no matter what we do, we just can't seem to find our way out of this situation or that situation, whatever it might be, or whatever keeps compounding in our lives, that we just have those waves come over us. You know, Jonah had no way out, but he knew he had God. He knew he had God, and he came to that, and it's a lesson for us. Then I said, I've been cast out of your sight, yet I will look again toward your holy temple.

I'll have faith in you, he's saying. No matter what's happening to me, I will look to you. You will be the one to deliver me. I can't do it on my own. The water surrounded me even to my soul. The deep closed around me. Weeds were wrapped around my head. I went down to the moorings of the mountains, the earth with its bars closed behind me forever. Yet you have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. Everything else failed. It just was there, no hope.

But I looked to God. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord. Oh, I can look to God.

That's who can deliver me from this. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Eternal, and my prayer went up to you into your holy temple. Those who regard worthless idols forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay what I have bowed. Salvation is of the Lord. I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving.

I'll be grateful in my heart, but I'll do something with that thanksgiving.

Verse 10, so the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah unto dry land.

I think Jonah was forever grateful for what God had done. Now, later on in the chapter, he has to learn a lesson about himself when he has to learn that you love all mankind. But he remembered what God had done, and he learned a very valuable lesson that's there for us as well.

And he says, when you do this, I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving. A couple chapters back in Amos, Amos 4, speaking to Israel of that day. God is, as you recall in our times in Amos, not happy with the way Israel was living their lives. They were at ease. They had a lot of comforts. As you read through chapter 4, you see that God is kind of talking about them. They're this people that have a lot of money, kind of taking it easy and whatever. Yet they kind of have a...they're playing games with God. They kind of know what it is, but they don't really have their heart into it. Amos 4, verse 4. Come to Bethel, he says, and transgress. You come to me, but you know what? You sin. At Gilgal, multiply transgression. Bring your sacrifices every morning. They were going through the physical rituals. Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days. Verse 5. Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, even though back in chapter 7 of Leviticus is with unleavened, right? They were doing the things, but their heart really wasn't in it. There wasn't really the gratitude. There wasn't the change in their lives when they were grateful to God. They were going through the motions here. Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven. Proclaim and announce the free will offerings for this you love, children of Israel.

Oh, you're just going through the motions. It's not changing your life. Thanksgiving, the gratitude you have is supposed to result in a change of what you do. And when that marks what you're doing, that you become different people. You become different people, and your life is for a different purpose. Go back to Jeremiah, Jeremiah 30.

Jeremiah 30. Clearly speaking of a time yet ahead of us, when God will bring Israel back to the land that He had promised them, after all the things that the Bible says will occur between now and the time of Jesus Christ's return, in chapter 30 of Jeremiah, verse 18, says, Thus says the eternal, Behold, I will bring back that captivity of Jacob's tents, and I will have mercy on his dwelling places. The city shall be built upon its own mound, and the palace shall remain according to its own plan. Then out of them shall proceed thanksgiving. Oh, out of them shall proceed thanksgiving. They'll be grateful, but there will be action with it. Out of them shall proceed thanksgiving, and the voice of those who make Mary. I will multiply them, and they shall not diminish. I will glorify them, and they shall not be small. When their gratitude turns into active thanksgiving, and the way they live their lives, and the way they praise God, and when they do the things that he wants them to do. And finally, let's go back to Psalm. Psalm 107 should be a good—I'm not going to spend an enormous amount of time in Psalm 107, but as we talk about thanksgiving, it's a good chapter—a good chapter to, you know, to look at. As you go through chapter 7, what God does is He recounts all these situations you and I can find ourselves in, that the Israelites found themselves in. Let's just look at a couple of them. I'm going to read one section, but look at verse 8. As these stanzas disappear, as He talks about, this is what happens to these people. They wander in the wilderness. They can't find their way. In verse 8, Psalm 107 says, Oh, oh, that men would give thanks—there's the action word—that they would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men, for it's He who satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness. Oh, that they would give thanks to God.

Go down to chapter—or verse 15. Again, they find themselves in untenable situations. They cry out to God—verse 13—verse 15—oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men, for He has broken the gates of bronze and cut the buyers of iron in two. It's Him who makes things possible, just like it was Him who coordinated and orchestrated what went on back there in Plymouth in 1608, if you will, to 1621 and beyond.

In chapter—in verse 17—you see that it goes—another situation that men find themselves in. Let's pick it up in verse 20, where God has said in the first two stanzas, it's me—it's me who does these things for you. In verse 20, He sent His word and healed them, and He delivered them from their destructions. Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men. Let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving and declare His works with rejoicing. If they're grateful, if they understand what God has done, let them do something with that gratitude. Gratitude's great. Gratitude without thanksgiving leaves a lot to be desired. A lot to be desired. Look at verse 31.

Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men. Let them exalt Him also in the assembly of the people and praise Him in the company of the elders. Talk about it. Give Him the credit, the sacrifice of praise. Do something with your gratitude. Make it known what has gone on. Verse 43, whoever is wise will observe these things. They'll read this chapter. They'll see themselves in this chapter. Whoever is wise will observe these things, and they will understand the loving kindness of the Lord. He is very good to do what we ask, but He expects that when He gives to us, that we will give Him thanks, not just in our minds, but that will turn into action.

You know, we see that concept of traits of God that are great to have, but God expects them to be action words. One of them is faith, right? Great to have faith. I believe in God. I trust in you. I know that you'll do that. James 1.20 says, faith without works is dead. Faith without works is dead.

You can say you have all the faith in the world demonstrated. Demonstrate the faith you have. 1 John 3 verse 18, it talks about love, agape love. He says, don't love just in word. Don't just say I love. Put it into action. Show me your love. Show me your agape. We can talk about sorrow when we learn that we've done something wrong and we are sorry we've done it and we feel that remorse toward God. It's great to be sorry. We should feel that remorse, but it needs to turn into action and a change. Let's go to 2 Corinthians 7. Pick it up in verse 8.

You remember what Paul, in his first epistle that we have recorded here, what he wrote to the Corinthians, and he was correcting them, as we've talked about in the Bible studies. He was correcting them pretty well about the things they weren't doing right, and he wasn't sure what they were going to do with it, especially the situation with the man who was sinning and still among them in the congregation. In verse 8 of chapter 7, he says, even if I made you sorry with my letter, and I knew that you would look at that letter and you'd feel kind of sorry, wow, we haven't been following the things that we've been taught, Paul, even if I made you sorry with my letter, I don't regret it. Though I did regret it, he didn't want them to feel sorry, but it was necessary. I perceived that the same epistle made you sorry, though only for a while. Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow led to repentance. Great to feel sorry, but it can't stop there. It has to lead to action, and we know what repentance is. Repentance is turning from our old way to God's way. If it's just sorrow, okay, I get it, I haven't been doing what God said, I'm sorry, and it doesn't result in action, we're missing the boat. It's incomplete.

It's incomplete. For you were made sorry in a godly manner that you might suffer loss from us in nothing, for godly sorrow produces repentance. Leading, watch what repentance does, leading to salvation not to be regretted, but the sorrow of the world that just stops with sorrow.

But the sorrow of the world produces death. For observe this very thing that you sorrowed in a godly manner. What diligence it produced in you. When you repented, look what it motivated you to do. Look what the effect it had on you. What diligence it produced in you. What clearing of yourselves. What indignation. What fear. What vehement desire. What zeal. What vindication.

When we turn our gratitude into thanksgiving, it can have the same effect on our lives.

If we're just grateful, that's good. But gratitude needs to be turned into an active element of thanksgiving. We need to do something with that gratitude. Just like Paul did. Just like other men of the Bible did. Just like the pilgrims did. They were grateful. They could have simply gotten together and given a prayer to God and said thank you. Thank you for delivering us. Thank you for the harvest that we had. Look at what they did. They put together a feast, invited the Indians there, and for three days they rejoiced before God because, perhaps, they saw in the Bible that's what they should do. They needed to do something with that gratitude. And yes, God hadn't opened their minds to understand all the holy days and everything that we understand, but what they knew, they took the time to do it, and it changed what they had done. It changed what they had done, and they said example. True gratitude needs to be turned into thanksgiving. There's a difference between gratitude and thanksgiving. That's why we see the action verb thanksgiving. Many times in the Bible we don't see just the word gratitude show up because it's something we do with it.

If we're truly grateful to God, it will change the way we do things just the way it did for Paul.

That's why he could write Philippians 4-6. With everything you do, all the prayers you give, let it be with thanksgiving in everything you do. Let it be with thanksgiving. Let that be one of the motivating forces that you have. You know, you can be turning to 1st Timothy, too.

Paul, if we look at his life, we can see the man he became from the words that he wrote, that attitude of thanksgiving that he had to God. His life was tough. None of us would change our lives for what he did. But you can see that he loved the brethren that he was able to work with.

In every single epistle, in every single epistle except Galatians, Paul said, I am thankful to you, God, for the people that are in that church. Those people knew that he loved them. It was his job to love them, and he wanted to love them, and he felt that love for them. That agape came, even though he might have been irritated with them from time to time, that agape came because he was thankful to God, and that turned into action and into love. 1st Timothy, 1st Timothy, too. Look what he wrote here. He says, therefore I exhort, I encourage you, therefore I exhort, first of all, the supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men.

Not just the people in the church, be thankful for all men, for kings, and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.

Paul said, I'm thankful for everyone. I love them all. They don't understand the will of God. They don't understand his truth now, but love them all. Be thankful for them all. Jesus Christ certainly lived that in agape. Paul learned that in agape. He was thankful to God, and he was thankful to God for everything he allowed him to do. And he did everything that came his way because he was thankful to God and recognized the gifts, the opportunities, that God gave him. You know, in Colossians, let's look at Colossians, one of his epistles here.

And this word, Thanksgiving, shows up several times in Colossians. Colossians 1. We'll just start here in verse 1, or chapter 1, verse 3. He says, we give thanks. Oh, that's the act of gratitude. We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you. He was thankful for those people. He wasn't found on them. He wasn't negative about them. He was thankful for them. Even with their faults, even with their shortcomings, he was thankful for them. And because he was thankful for them and always counted it a blessing that God allowed him to do the things he did, he loved them. We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all the saints. Because of the hope, because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel. We love you. I'm thankful for you. Let's drop down to verse 9.

For this reason also, he says, since the day we heard it, we do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Now we can ask ourselves, do we pray for each other in this way? If we're thankful to God for everything in our lives, if we're thankful that we're part of the congregation, the body that he placed us in, do we pray for each other in the same way that Paul did? Do we let that gratitude turn into thanksgiving in our prayers that it's not just, please heal me of this physical malady, or please heal them of this physical malady, but help them. Give them the understanding. We don't cease to pray for you that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will.

That supersedes our will, that we learn to do the things the way he once done, and not just the way our human reasoning would say, that you be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the Lord. Look at the depth of what he was praying, that you may walk worthy. He would pray for those people in Colossae, those people in Thessalonica, those people in Galatia, those people in Ephesus, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing him. Being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might according to his glorious power for all patience and long suffering with joy. Look at what he prayed. He really loved those people. He really was interested in their salvation and what God was doing with them. The same thing if we're really thankful to God for what he's done to us, we would feel that kinship and that oneness and those prayers and love for one another that transcend just shaking our hands, shaking hands and saying hi once a week.

It would be part of our lives, the concern that we have for one another.

Verse 11, strengthen with all might according to his glorious power for all patience and long suffering with joy. Verse 12, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.

Don't forget to be thankful. Don't forget what God has done. Chapter 2, verse 6, As you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him. Don't just know him, so walk in him. Order your life along that way. So walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith as you have been taught. Notice abounding in it with thanksgiving. As you live your life, let it be marked by thanksgiving. Don't forget it. Don't forget it. Don't let a day go by without it. Remember where salvation comes from. Remember what God has done for you. Be thankful for what he has done and let him do everything he wants in our lives because we're thankful to him, offering ourselves as a living sacrifice just like Paul said. Everything that God wanted him to do he did because he was thankful, grateful, yes, thankful and put it into action by the things that he did and how we allow God to orchestrate those things in his life. Keep your finger there in Colossians. Let's go back to Romans for a minute. Romans 7. You'll remember chapters 6 and 7 in Romans. Paul is very encouraging verses, you know, as he wrestles with his own body and his own mind to the things that he would do and as he wrestled with sin like you and I do and the sin that does so easily beset as it says in Hebrews 12 verse 1 and he would find himself discouraged as he would find himself going back to his old way to do this or going back to his old way to do that. And at the end of chapter 7 he remembers. He remembers this. He says, O wretched man, chapter 7 verse 24, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. Where I'm going is nowhere. My life is hopeless. Who will rescue me or who will save me from this deliver me from this body of death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

It's the only way. It's the only way. Remembering and thanking God and actively living our thanksgiving to him can motivate us to do good. Can motivate us to do good.

While we're in Romans, let's go back to chapter 1.

Chapter 1. In chapter 1 we find, you know, what the Gentiles were like, the people of that day that lived their lives apart from God. And as you read through chapter 1, you see that God lays a lot of things at the feet of the Gentiles, horrendous sins that they committed. Let's look at verse 21. Romans 1.21. Let's go ahead and pick it up in verse 18. Romans 1.18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness. Kind of want to hold it back. We want to live our lives this way and in unrighteousness we will just forget. We'll hold down the truth of God because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. God is all around if we open our eyes. If we don't want to reject Him and just ignore Him, God is there.

All we have to do is look at the universe and look at the miracles that are going on around us every day in the earth where we live. Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead. So they are without excuse. They have chosen to ignore God because although they knew God, they didn't glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened. They didn't appreciate God. They weren't thankful in an active way. They kind of forgot Him. Let me read what Kaufman's commentary is on the Bible. I remember the first sermon that I ever gave around Thanksgiving. I remember reading this verse, and it kind of is one that has stuck in my mind forever because I looked at the commentaries.

And what it said was basically Paul is saying that because the world is not thankful, they don't recognize God and they've never held Him in esteem, because they forget what He does, all these things we read about in the rest of chapter 21 or chapter 1 come about. Let me read what Kaufman's commentary says on this. He says, it's a frightening and sober thought that all of the carnal debaucheries and gross vulgar conduct revealed a little later in this chapter as marking the wickedness of those ancient Gentiles should have begun with so mild and inherently innocuous a thing as neglect and failure to give thanks to God. What a powerful warning this speaks to countless Christians of the present generation who regard neglect of giving thanks as a very casual and minor omission of duty. All people should take this to heart because forsaking worship or neglecting the giving of thanks might be compared to the pebble cast loose from the top of a mountain that becomes a roaring avalanche to crush a city or a civilization beneath it.

If that happened to the Gentiles because they just didn't thank God, the same thing can happen to us.

If we just begin to take God for granted, if we just go through our lives and say, you know what, yeah, I'm thankful to God, but we don't do something with it, if we don't express our thanks by the way we live our lives and how we sacrifice those to God that His will be done, we're missing something big. We're missing something big because thanksgiving is an important part, an important part of our calling. And all of us know someone who used to be among us, whether it's, you know, recently, years ago, somewhere along the line, they stopped being actively thankful to God.

And as they did that, God allowed their minds to just become darkened, as it says here.

We have to guard that our minds don't become darkened, but that we are always keeping what God said in our hearts. And that's what Paul is saying here in these verses. Don't forget.

Don't forget. Let's go back to, let's go back to Colossians.

Colossians 3. So we see Paul, you know, when he turned his gratitude into active thanksgiving, what he became, how he lived his life, how it developed the love in him. Of course, it's the fruit of the Holy Spirit, but his gratitude and his consistent thanksgiving to God helped him see that. In Colossians 3 verse, Colossians 3 verse 15. Remember the sacrifice, the peace offerings in Leviticus 7. Peace offerings when you offer your sacrifice of thanksgiving is part of those peace offerings. Verse 15. Let the peace of God rule in your hearts to which you also were called in one body.

And be thankful. Be thankful. Do it. The peace to which you were called in one body.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you, richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.

Let it happen in your life, but remember God also puts you in a body, and he works with us individually, yes, but collectively, too. The pride of Christ isn't 144,000 individuals that Christ will be dealing with, but one bride. One bride, comprised of that many people who are one in spirit. One and who love each other and through the course of this life have learned to work with one another, appreciate it, and as they're thankful to God and allow his Holy Spirit to dwell in them, that they become one. One in perfect accord with God and Jesus Christ.

It may just well start with the thanksgiving that we have. As you go down through chapter 3, you see, well, let's look at verse 17. Whatever you do in word or deed, again, whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Let your life be with thanksgiving and all those things we've read about. And then he talks about these relationships in life, marriage relationships, employer-employee relationships, all these things that he talks about here because God is interested in the relationships that we have and how we learn to work with one another in marriage, with each other in church, with each other in the employer-employee relationships, whether they're in the church or not, because remember Paul said, be thankful for all men regardless of who you work for. Chapter 4, he goes into the re-employee and employee relationship and in verse 2 he says, continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving. Be vigilant in it with thanksgiving. We have to be committed to God. We have to be committed to where he's placed us. We have to be committed to what he has called us to do.

You know, one of the things about the pilgrims, when you read through the history there, it said, when it came back, when the Mayflower was going back to England the next spring, and all those pilgrims that the hard, hard time that they had had during that winter, so many of them died of starvation, but when they went back, they were given the opportunity, do you want to give up? It's been hard. Do you want to go back with us to England? Not one, not one, chose to leave.

They all decided to stay. They were committed to what they had come there for. They committed to the purpose that they had been for. Not one of them was mindful of the country they came out of, but they were there for the duration, even though they had enormous losses in the process.

It should remind us of Hebrews 11, right? The verse in Hebrews 11 that says, all those people who died, who had, who suffered horrendous deaths, and it said, they all died not having received the promises, and if they had been mindful of the country from which they came out of, they would have had opportunity to return. But they didn't. They were committed to God. They were committed to the calling that He gave them. They were committed to finishing the course, and they knew that Jesus Christ, we should know that Jesus Christ, who began this work in us, will complete it, regardless of whatever trial, problems, things that happen along our way, that we have to commit to Him. We have to have that purpose and that thankfulness and that remembering of what God has called us to should be a motivator to stay the course, no matter, no matter what befalls us.

You know, Christ said in Luke 9, remember Luke 9 verse 62, when He's calling people and one says, oh, let me go back and bury my father. Another one says, I've got people at my house. I'll follow you later. And Christ said, no one having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. Once we start, our job, no matter what, and our calling is, no matter what, to stay the course. To ever be thankful, to ever let that be a motivator for us when we get down or when we think things are bad and too hard, we remember what God has promised us and He is faithful to promise what He has told us He would. Turning our gratitude into action, into action will lead us to all the things that God wants us to be. Well, sometimes it's helpful to look at what happened, as we did in Romans 1, with people who weren't thankful because the same thing that happened in Romans 1 to those people could happen. Let's look at one more before we conclude here in Luke 17. An example here of something where Christ literally saved people's lives. They had no deliverance, had no hope, apart from Him. And we see what their response of is responses. It's in the parable, or not the parable, actually. It's the actual account of the 10 lepers. Luke 17, verse 11.

It happened, it says, Luke 17, 11, it happened as He went to Jerusalem that He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as He entered a sabbath village, there met Him ten men who were lepers who stood afar off. Leprosy was a death sentence. There was no cure. There was no way out. There was only if God healed. Other than that, you were dead. So He finds these 10 men who were lepers who stood afar off, and they lifted up their voices and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.

So when He saw them, He said to them, Go show yourselves to the priests. And so it was, as they went, they were cleansed. They followed what He said. They began to go toward what they said to do because they had to do what He had to say in order to be healed. They were cleansed in one of them. One of the ten, when He saw that He was healed, returned, and with a loud voice glorified God, came back and loudly praised God and thanked Him for what He had done for Him, and fell down on His face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And He was a Samaritan. So Jesus answered and said, weren't there ten cleansed? But where are the nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner? And He said to Him, Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well. Ten people who Jesus Christ removed the death sentence from them. Ten. They were dead men walking. Only one. Only one gave Him thanks in an active way. Perhaps the other nine were grateful and thought, boy, we were really thankful for Jesus Christ who did this. They didn't come back. They didn't do anything active with that gratitude. One did. 90% didn't.

And we have no record of what happened to those 90% that were healed.

You know, someone told me, an elder, many, many years ago, that of all the people that have been baptized into the church over the years, 80 to 90% have left. 80 to 90% have left the church.

Jesus Christ lifted a death sentence from 10. 90% didn't even bother to come back and turn that gratitude into active thanksgiving. Of the 80 or 90% who were baptized who said, this is the way who God opened their minds, who took the death sentence off of them when they claimed the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, 90%, perhaps the percentage is, failed to keep giving thanks to God.

Somewhere along the line, they let down, and thanksgiving no longer was the thing that motivated them. And somewhere along the line, their hearts and their minds were darkened. It's a sobering thought, isn't it? A sobering thought. And if we aren't aware, and if we're not cognizant of what we're doing, we could be one of those that it could happen to. But we have to keep our hearts alive. We have to continually be thankful to God, continually remembering what it is that He has given us. We don't want to be one of the 90% who somehow began to take things for granted and didn't continue to do the things that thanksgiving produces us in us. You know, the pilgrims, how long they did that, I don't know. But as we keep thanksgiving this year, let's be people who don't, you know, let's enjoy the turkey, let's enjoy our families, let's even enjoy football if that's part of what your day is. But don't let, don't let thanksgiving be a day that we forget or minimize God. You know, the pilgrims, when they did that first Thanksgiving, God was the center of it, and they rejoiced. Let's not only make thanksgiving a day we recognize God, but a day that motive, but that a day, every day, will be a day that's motivated by the thanks that we give to Him actively.