Thursday, December 29, 2011

A Heart of Thanksgiving, Part 1

Worship requires that we establish and maintain a heart and an attitude of thanksgiving. And oftentimes, for some folks, this requires discipline in their lives; it demands that they change something in order to establish and maintain an attitude and a heart of thanksgiving. Failure to do so robs us of many of God’s blessings.

One of the reasons so many are not walking in the fullness of God’s blessings is because of a failure to establish and maintain an attitude of thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is not just eating turkey once a year! I thank God for Thanksgiving and a nation that seeks to honor the Lord because of His faithfulness and His blessings in our lives. From a biblical point of view, this is not something that we are instructed to do just once a year or only on special occasions. A life of thanksgiving is essential if we are to experience an overcoming lifestyle.

I listen to some Christians grumble, mumble, and complain. I want to remind you that complaining was one of the five sins that kept the children of Israel out of the Promised Land. God does not like murmuring and complaining, so STOP IT! It’s not good for you. God does not like it. He sees your situation. He’s waiting for you to get your heart and mouth in alignment with His Word so He can do something good for you.

Read 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, verse 16. For many years, I’ve regarded the whole first portion of Thessalonians as basic instructions for Christian living. As Paul writes, at least the way that it was translated for us in English, he gives us some very direct instructions in how to live a life pleasing to God.

Notice how succinctly he makes each statement, there’s not a whole lot of explanation. For example, in verse 16, there’s a two-word directive: “Rejoice always.” What does that mean? It means, “always rejoice”! What does it mean to always rejoice? It’s easy to interpret that there should never be a time when you’re not rejoicing! What does the word, “always,” mean? ALWAYS! Now if someone instructs you to do something and he or she says, “Always do it this way,” what does that mean? It means that every time you do it, do it this way. There is never to be a time that you do it any other way. Am I right? So hear the Word of the Lord: “REJOICE ALWAYS!”

How do you do that? I am always to be in an attitude and a mind-set of rejoicing. It doesn’t matter what’s going on around me; it doesn’t matter what people say about me; it doesn’t matter what the situation looks like. Now this can only happen if I have learned to establish and maintain a heart of thanksgiving. You will not be able to rejoice always unless, and until, you have established and worked to maintain a thankful heart. I said work to maintain an attitude of thanksgiving. Sometimes it is work. Do you remember the definition of “work” from MTS or from 7th grade Physical Science? Work literally means, “force against resistance.” 

This tells us that there are forces that are resisting our attitude of thankfulness. Just stop and selah for a moment. It’s amazing how thankful we can be and then someone might say one cross word, and it flips a switch that changes our whole attitude. Come on! Am I the only one? I see it in relationships all the time. You can be around someone having the greatest time, and then one person says one thing, huh? And bam, what happened to the attitude of thanksgiving? Then it’s like, “Well, I’d be awfully thankful if . . . mumble, mumble, mumble.”

Where did it go? Remember the definition of “work”: force against resistance. By definition, there’s going to be some pressure, there’s going to be some push back from time to time. Think it not strange. Even so, we are instructed to rejoice always! 

~ pg

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