Rev. David Holwick ZL Thanksgiving
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
November 21, 2010
1 Thessalonians 5:18
THANKFUL IN WHATEVER
I. Some Thanksgivings are pretty rough.
A. You’ve probably never heard of him.
In 1620, 102 passengers endured 66 days at sea on a cargo ship
named the Mayflower.
Most of them were religious dissidents who opposed the Church
of England.
They were looking for a new home where they could worship the
way they saw fit.
They saw it as a religious quest and we have called them
Pilgrims ever since.
Writer Danny Sims notes that one of the passengers on the
Mayflower was a 14-year-old boy named John Hooke.
When John Hooke’s father had died in England, his mother made an
apprenticeship agreement with a tailor named Isaac Allerton.
This arrangement meant young Hooke would learn a trade and
Mr. Allerton would give him food and clothing, and teach him
about religion and faith.
After a harrowing voyage the Mayflower arrived off Cape Cod
in late autumn.
They spent months exploring the area until they finally
established a settlement near Plymouth, Massachusetts.
By the end of the first winter, only half of the people were
still alive.
The survivors held a thanksgiving feast the following autumn
to give thanks for God’s blessings.
Young John Hooke was not at the feast.
No Americans can trace their ancestory through him.
There are no Thanksgiving traditions about him.
He was among those already dead.
Yet of all the cherished stories from the original 102 people
aboard the Mayflower in 1620, maybe this is one we ought to
remember.
Abraham Lincoln wrote in his proclamation of Thanksgiving as a
National Holiday in 1863:
“We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven;
we have been preserved these many years in peace and
prosperity; we have grown in numbers, wealth and power
as no other nation has ever grown.”
Lincoln was right on target.
But perhaps we have had a little too much bounty.
We expect an easy life with lots of food and leisure.
It is easy for us to lose touch with the spirit of the original
Thanksgiving. #7128
B. Thanksgiving isn’t always easy.
1) Much of the world is in tough financial shape right now.
2) If you like to be pessimistic, you know that when recovery
finally does come, gasoline prices will go through the
roof again.
a) And your health insurance will be more expensive.
b) And taxes have nowhere to go but up.
C. You have plenty to fret about. But be thankful anyway.
1) The Thessalonians had it tough, too.
They were being persecuted.
The Roman government and the leaders of the major religions
were putting pressure on them.
Some of the Thessalonian Christians had abandoned the faith.
2) Paul’s advice to them is simple, yet profound: 5:18
“Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will
for you in Christ Jesus.”
a) Can you do this?
b) DO you do this?
II. Give thanks.
A. This can take place on several levels.
1) We can show gratitude to people or even pets.
2) Paul’s focus, of course, is on giving thanks to God.
a) Ultimately, all things come from him and we are
acknowledging that fact.
B. Thanking God is an act of faith.
1) Faith is learning to trust a heavenly Father who deserves
our total and complete confidence.
a) He can answer prayer, give us his best, and keep his
promises.
b) The faith part kicks in when those prayers aren’t
answered the way we expect, or as fast as we want,
and God’s best doesn’t seem as good as the stuff
our neighbors have.
2) Just as we ask him for stuff all the time, we should
also show gratitude to him.
a) There is a reason that the Bible usually associates
thanksgiving with prayer, as Paul does here.
III. Give thanks in all circumstances.
A. We prefer to show gratitude for good things, for prosperity.
1) Paul took a much wider view.
In Ephesians 5:20 he says, “always give thanks to God the
Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ.”
2) Paul had a special view of circumstances.
a) He believed that God will work out everything for the
good for those who believe in him.
b) So in Ephesians 4:1 he calls himself a “prisoner of
the Lord,” even though it was the Roman and Jewish
leaders who had thrown him into jail.
c) God could have prevented it, but he did not.
1> Paul has faith that it is all part of God’s plan.
2> He can’t see the end result yet, but he trusts
it will be good.
B. Our circumstances may not be that great.
1) Some of you are probably having the worst year of your life.
a) Paul is not arguing everything is rosy for Christians.
b) He is saying our attitude is different.
2) Same as Pollyanna in her “Glad Game”? [1]
a) Back in 1913, Eleanor Porter wrote a children’s novel
about a hyper-optimistic girl named Pollyanna.
Even today we call someone who is optimistic in a
naive kind of way a Pollyanna.
The girl got through life by practicing being glad in
any situation.
She didn’t exactly have the positive thinking of
Norman Vincent Peale, however.
Instead, she figured she should be positive because
there is always something worse that might have
happened instead.
At one point she says, “I can be glad even if I have a
broken leg because I might have had two broken legs.”
b) Christians don’t give thanks because things could be a
lot worse and we don’t have to be thankful for evil.
1> We are actually thanking God “in” our circumstances,
not “for” them.
2> Even bad circumstances will work out for our good.
C. There may be more to be thankful for in the bad stuff.
1) Tozer’s observation.
A.W. Tozer was a respected Christian devotional writer.
In his book titled The Pursuit of God, he made the following
observation:
“It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until
He has hurt him deeply.”
To put it another way, God cannot do much with people who
have not passed through any time of suffering, sickness,
sacrifice or struggle.
How can we be a blessing to people who are going through the
hardships of life if we ourselves have somehow been
exempted from such hardships?
Tozer continued:
“However, when we have been through these things ourselves
two things can happen.
First, we have a better testimony about what God has done
in our lives.
Second, we can be a real comfort and encouragement to others
who now are passing through what we already have faced.
We can tell them about a God who can sustain and preserve
them through whatever circumstances life throws at us.”
#62890
2) Mature faith is a tested faith.
After Jesus’ resurrection, the Lord told Peter that his death
would involve persecution.
Looking at John, Peter pouted, “Lord, what about him?”
In other words, “If I have to suffer, shouldn’t he, too?”
Jesus answered him bluntly: “If I want him to remain alive
until I return, what is that to you?
You must follow me.” John 21:22
Harry Lee painfully re-lived that truth.
Born into a well-to-do, well-educated Chinese family, Harry
seemed to have a comfortable future assured.
Then his father died when Harry was still a boy.
As the family’s wealth evaporated, Harry, the oldest son, was
left with the responsibility for his mother and siblings.
From his teenage years Harry had loved and served the Lord.
He felt called to the ministry just at the time that Communists
took over China.
For 12 frustrating years Harry tried to leave China to attend
seminary.
His close friends got out and established themselves in free
lands.
The woman he wanted to marry also left China.
But Harry stayed while the government brought increasing
pressure to close the church he led.
Then his brother, whom he’d led to Christ, died in prison.
Harry was arrested while trying to escape China and was given
11 years imprisonment on trumped-up charges.
Finally on his way to seminary at the age of 56, he wondered,
“Did I require chastisement?
Why did I have to suffer all that?”
Then, considering the faithfulness and trustworthiness of God,
he concluded:
“Maybe God wanted me in another school first, before seminary.
Maybe because I began as such a sheltered, privileged person,
he had to get me ready for something more...
to teach me faith, trust, peace, unaffected by circumstances.”
#2858
IV. Give thanks because it is God’s will.
A. God intends for us to do it, and he makes it possible for us.
1) This expression repeats what Paul said in 1 Thess. 4:3.
a) There, it is somewhat negative - God wants you to run
from sexual sin.
b) Here, it is positive - and it probably applies to the
two preceding verses as well.
2) God wants Christians to live a life of joyfulness and
thankfulness, expressed in prayer.
B. There can be blessings where you least expect them.
In 1914 Thomas Edison’s laboratory in West Orange caught on fire.
Thirteen buildings were destroyed.
When he realized how big the blaze was, Edison sent word to his
family and friends, “Get down here quick.
You may never again see anything like this!”
Edison lost 2 million dollars in equipment and the record of a
life’s work.
Walking through the rubble with his son Charles, he said,
“There’s a great value in disaster.
All our mistakes are burned up.
Thank God we can start anew.”
How many would be able to respond with gratitude after such
loss?
Giving thanks to God, Edison started anew.
Many great inventions came after his laboratory burned.
#21949
V. Give thanks in Christ Jesus.
A. A relationship with Jesus is what makes the difference.
1) God can work out anything for good for you - if you are a
Christian.
2) A few days ago I watched a DVD about Mussolini’s first
mistress.
I had to watch it when Celeste was visiting her sister
because all the dialog was in Italian and I had to read
subtitles. Celeste hates that.
But the movie pointed out a little-known historical fact.
Before he became dictator, Mussolini had an affair with
another political agitator named Ida Dalser.
She was so smitten with him she sold all her possessions
so he could start a newspaper.
In time she got pregnant and bore him a son.
He acknowledged the child was his.
She married him in a small ceremony.
Then Mussolini went off to serve in World War I, became a
big hero, and soon became the dictator of Italy.
The next time Ida ran into him, he had a new wife and
family.
He ignored Ida and her son.
Ida wrote letters to Mussolini and politicians and
newspapers and the Pope.
Mussolini tried to silence her by putting her in a big
house - surrounded by soldiers and police.
But she could not give up her obsession with being recognized
by Mussolini as the mother of his first-born child.
He put both of them in an insane asylum.
She wrote even more letters and threw them over the asylum’s
walls.
At one point, a nun tells her to commit herself to God and
accept her suffering silently.
Ida hisses at her.
She was never acknowledged by Mussolini and died in the
asylum. #63454
3) We are a lot like Ida Dalser.
We know what we want and we don’t want to be sidetracked
or delayed.
If religion can get that for us, fine - but we want the
results to match our expectations.
The fact that God may not want us to have it in that form,
right now, is unacceptable to us.
If you don’t have a relationship with God through Christ,
God’s way of blessing will never make sense to you.
Perhaps you need to think about it in reverse as well.
If you are uptight about your circumstances and filled with
bitterness rather than gratitude, are you really saved?
Does your relationship with Christ define your life, or
is your faith just a meager scrap that has been passed
down through your family?
B. Don’t just believe, but follow.
Remember John Hooke?
Danny Sims notes that the Biblical word most like the old
English concept of apprentice is “disciple.”
Like John, we must attach ourselves to a master teacher, learn
his ways, go where he tells us to go, and do what he tells
us to do.
Are you willing to do that?
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
[1] I cannot locate the exact source of this material but much of it can
be found in the “Pollyanna” article in Wikipedia.org.
# 7128 “A Thanksgiving Hooke,” by Danny Sims, <http://www.altamesa.org/
plain/article/archive>, October 24, 1999.
#21949 “An Abundant Harvest,” by David Jeremiah, Baptist Press,
<http://www.baptistpress.org>, November 25, 2005.
#62890 “God Can’t Bless You Until He Has Hurt You,” by Marvin McMickle,
Preaching Now, <http://www.preaching.com>, November 16, 2010.
From the November-December 2010 Issue of Preaching.
#63454 “She Never Got What She Demanded,” by David Holwick, derived from
the movie “Vincere,” directed by Marco Bellocchio, 2009.
Italian with English subtitles.
<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1156173/>
These and 35,000 others are part of the Kerux database that can be
downloaded, absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
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