"Therefore will I give thanks unto thee, O LORD, among the heathen, and sing praises unto thy name," Psalms 18:49. Before David became king, reigning King Saul tried multiple times to eliminate the competition. More than once, Saul had David trapped and there was no way out, but God delivered David every time. After one such occasion, David wrote Psalm 18 to praise the Lord for delivering him out of the hand of all his enemies. Later on in life, David pens a variation of this same Psalm after the Lord delivered Israel from a three-year famine, and he avenged the Gibeonites, and won another war against the Philistines (2 Samuel 22). David praised the Lord in thanksgiving his whole life.
Thanksgiving is expressing gratitude to one who has shown you kindness, and so it must have an object. To be thankful, you need to recognize kindness and the grace you received from somewhere. You can be thankful for the kindness of others, and you ought to express that to those people while you can. But are you thankful for the people in your life? To whom do you direct that gratitude? To be truly thankful, you have to give expression to the Lord because it's, "the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy." David was thankful for his mighty men, but he recognized the first cause and thanked God for his deliverance.
The dilemma of society is the difficult task of nursing an embittered grievance while expressing a spirit of gratitude. It’s impossible to be thankful for what you have, while resentful about what you don’t have. You cannot be thankful for the life God gave you while covetous of the things he didn’t give you. Even if God did provide you more of the things you want, you would not be grateful for them and start looking for more things not to be thankful for. Without gratitude to God, you can't enjoy the things you have now.
In the Old Testament, God chose Israel from among all the nations of the Earth to pour out his covenant mercy and grace. Therefore, every other nation was a heathen nation, founded on pagan principles and directed by their idolatrous worship. The Israelites were a people of privilege, blessed by God. There were two types of people in the Old Testament, if you were not an Israelite, then you were a heathen. Paul quotes David in Romans 15:9. While preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, lost sinners will come to saving faith in Christ, and praise the Lord. These "heathen" people moved from being outside the camp to the inside and they were thankful to participate in the praise of the Lord God. David testified of God's mercy unto the lost and publically thanked God and Paul wanted to see the lost repent and join in the thanksgiving. Make your expression of gratitude to the Lord public and give God glory for the great things he has done.
Happy Thanksgiving!
No comments:
Post a Comment