Thanksgiving Time

Thanksgiving is a time of remembrance of the past year. To the pilgrims of old it was a celebration of a great harvest. Their meal itself reflected the abundant crops they had harvested. After surviving a horrible winter and working hard through spring and summer they were now able to enjoy the fruits of their labor. It truly was a time of THANKSGIVING.

Being thankful is not just an act of gratitude but is also a move of faith. When I begin to thank God for those things I ask in prayer I demonstrate that I already believe that He will provide.

(Mark 11:24 NASB) "Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted you.

Many of us have had a difficult year. The world, time and the devil have come at us from all directions.  Some things we didn't even see coming.  But our lives are not defined by what we are going through.  Our lives are defined by what God says.  Life is, after all, 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to situations and circumstances.   

Philippians 4:6-7 NLT  Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done.  (7)  Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.

Paul says to pray about everything, tell God what you need and then be THANKFUL. It is through a thankful heart that we experience God's peace in our lives.  Make a list of all the good things that God has done for you over the past year.  We do that by thinking on the good that has happened not just thinking about all our troubles.

Philippians 4:8-9 NLT  And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.  (9)  Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.

This Thanksgiving, let us be grateful for what God has done for us and excited about the future.  He has great plans for all of us.  Happy Thanksgiving!

A Psalm for Thanksgiving. Shout joyfully to the LORD, all the earth. Serve the LORD with gladness; Come before Him with joyful singing. Know that the LORD Himself is God; It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves; We are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Enter His gates with thanksgiving And His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him, bless His name. For the LORD is good; His lovingkindness is everlasting And His faithfulness to all generations. Psalms 100:1-5

Never give up , Never Surrender.

I know that many of us have been through a lot this year. We have endured things that we never thought would happen to us. Death, sickness, unemployment, and the list goes on. Things come at us and seem at times to not stop.

I am, like many of you, a person of faith. Faith in God, faith in Jesus Christ as my savior, faith in God's Word. So when I go to God's word I read verses that promise deliverance from life's challenges. Challenge: that's a Christian word for troubles, problems and the miserable things that happen in life. Somehow we think if we use a word that seems milder than the event that we are attempting to survive it will be less difficult. I don't know, maybe it does work like that. But I find that is not always the case.

Faith is how you get through the rough moments in life. 

Have faith in God because it is this faith that is based on the unmovable, unchangeable, all powerful standard. Faith in man will fail, faith in money will fail, faith in the USA will fail. 

Only faith in God can bring victory in the face of defeat. 

The face of defeat looks different at times. Sometimes it looks like sickness or unemployment or a car wreck or unpaid bills or just fear in the middle of the night.. Yes, defeat can look very different but the face of victory is always the same: GOD, the Almighty. He never changes.

Heb 13:8 NASB Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
Someone once said, "Within you lies the power to seize the hour and live your dreams. Faith is the oil that takes the friction out of living. Faith will enable you to turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones. When you begin to have faith, your load will get heavy but your knees won't buckle, you'll get knocked down but you won't get knocked out."

Great advice. God says this. Jer 29:11 NKJV For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.
Isa 55:8-12 NKJV "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," says the LORD. (9) "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. (10) "For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, And do not return there, But water the earth, And make it bring forth and bud, That it may give seed to the sower And bread to the eater, (11) So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it. (12) "For you shall go out with joy, And be led out with peace; The mountains and the hills shall break forth into singing before you, And all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.