Being Thankful
We are humbly to thank and praise God when He answers our prayers.
Here's Gene to explain:
We beautifully see this illustrated in
Genesis 24:15 to 17 and following:
"Before he had finished speaking,
there was Rebekah--daughter of Bethuel
son of Milcah, the wife of Abraham's brother
Nahor--coming with a jug on her shoulder[s]. ..."
God is now answering, in this case,
in a very specific way.
"...Now the girl was very beautiful,
[a] young woman who had not known a
man intimately. She went down to the spring,
filled her jug, [and] came up.
Then the servant ran to meet her and said,
"Please let me have a little water from your jug."
And so he's really looking to God to
unveil the specifics here.
"[And] then the man bowed down,
worshiped the LORD, and said,
"Praise the LORD, the God of my master
Abraham, who has not withheld His
kindness and faithfulness from my master."
He worshiped God because of answered prayer.
"As for me, the LORD has led me on the
journey to the house of my master's relatives."
Here is the prayer of praise.
We see this in verse 48 when he returns.
When he's relating the story he says,
"Then I bowed down, worshiped the LORD,
and praised the LORD, the God of my
master Abraham, who guided me on
the right way to take the daughter of my
master's brother for his son."
And so we have here a very important biblical principle.
And that is: to praise God.
To thank Him for what He does for us.
1 Thessalonians 5:17 and 18.
Again, restating this verse 17
along with verse 18 where it says,
"Pray constantly..."
We looked at that in the last principle.
"...[But] give thanks in everything,
for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."
Give thanks in everything.
Now just a little qualifier there that some
Christians misinterpret. God is not saying:
give thanks for everything that happens to
you that is bad. That would really contradict God's will.
What it is saying, I think to us is:
we can give God thanks in everything
because even in the midst of some of the
worst situations, God has promised to
never leave us or forsake us. He is there.
And we can thank Him for being there in our lives.
But we're to thank Him particularly when it
comes to answered prayer.
I love Ephesians 3:20 and following:
"Now to Him who is able to do above and
beyond all that we ask or think ..."
Talking about prayer.
And by the way, I believe that when we're walking in God's will,
the very thoughts of our hearts are prayer.
The Holy Spirit is literally praying through us,
sometimes with, as Paul said,
groanings that we can't even utter [Rm 8:26].
And so God is hearing us even in the depths of
our soul when we're walking in the will of God. So,
"Now to Him who is able to do above and
beyond all that we ask or think--
according to the power that works in you--
to Him be glory in the church and in
Christ Jesus to all generations,
forever and ever. Amen."
Never forgetting to thank God.
And so the question is:
Why is it so easy to forget to thank and praise God for answers to prayer,
as well as His daily care and provision[s]?
Well I think first of all, it's a human tendency.
And we have to be very careful of that human tendency.
But I think one reason is
because of the blessings that we have in our
own cultural situation. Think about it.
Think about all the things that we have.
And isn't it easy to say: I did this myself.
I did this. That's easy isn't it?
Particularly when you live with the blessings
that we have in our culture.
It's easy to forget that without Him we can do nothing.
That these are the blessings from God.
And so we can fail to thank Him.
What was Israel's problem when they got into the land?
What did Moses warn them about
there in the book of Deuteronomy,
which was the review of the law?
There they are perched on the edge of the
promised land.
Ready to cross Jordan into this land.
And Moses warned them.
He said: when you go into that land
and you inherit wells you didn't dig,
houses you didn't build, vineyards you didn't plant.
Be careful that you don't say in your hearts:
we did this ourselves.
The sad story is that when
they got in and God blessed them with all
those things, they did say: we did this ourselves.
And they forgot God.
And so that's a natural tendency.
And I think that especially in the land of plenty
with all the blessings we have,
we must be incredibly careful that we always
thank God for our daily bread.
Thank God for the blessings that He's given us in this life.