Sunday, Jujly 23
2025-11-23
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkUbtZUnbIE

God is holy, bound to me. Oh, how strange and divine I can see. All is mine, yet not I, but through Christ in me.

The night is dark, but I am not forsaken. For by my side the Savior He will stay. I labor on in weakness and rejoicing. For in my need His power is displayed. As I hold, my shepherd will defend me. Through the deepest valley of me. Oh, the night has been won, and I shall overcome. Yet not I, but to Christ in me. Good morning. We are glad to be here this morning. Testing a couple of things. We switched out a computer in the sound room, so absolutely nothing can go wrong. I'm very certain. We will see. So I'm going to go ahead and have a word of prayer, and then we will begin our time together. Father in heaven, we thank you so much for your goodness. We thank you so much for your provision, especially for the provision of your Son.

We thank you that you have equipped us with your Spirit, and we ask that you will guide us and strengthen us this morning as we gather to worship together. To not take you for granted, to keep our eyes fixed on you. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Throughout my life, I've heard in a lot of ways, I think maybe starting in high school, that people learn differently. Like some people are auditory, some people are visual. I think, and I had never heard this category while in high school, but I think my category of learning is what is known as the hard way. I mean, I think universally, the best way that I learn is doing it the hard way. Now there are, I think, some things in life that we learn best when we learn them the hard way.

So today, as we gather, we are learning, and I think this is one of those things that we learn sometimes in a difficult way, that we are called to give thanks. And in Scripture, thankfulness is more than just sort of polite words or a seasonal feeling or some great fall-themed decor. It's a way of seeing the world. It's a way of walking with God, and it is a way of worship. And so when we give thanks, we step out of the shadows of sin and self-reliance and onto the path that God has laid before us. And when we give thanks, God strengthens our feet in the midst of the wilderness, in those places of life that feel uncertain or heavy. And when we give thanks, it lifts our eyes, not to the gifts themselves, but to the giver, the one who is faithful in all things.

So we want to begin this morning by letting God's Word shape our gratitude. So if you would stand with me, we're going to read the entirety of the 100th Psalm together. And so we're going to begin not with a psalm for giving thanks, but with make a joyful noise. So if you would read with me. Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come into His presence with singing. Know that the Lord, He is God. It is He who made us, and we are His. 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 steadfast love endures forever, and His faithfulness to all generations. This is God's Word. And we're going to start this morning by singing "10,000 Reasons, Bless the Lord." And that's not the right song. And you're dismissed!

Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh my soul, worship his holy name. Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship your holy name. The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning. It's time to sing your song again. Whatever may pass, and whatever lies before me, let me be singing when these days are coming. I'll be singing when the evening comes. Bless the Lord, O my soul, O my soul. Worship His holy name. Sin like never before, O my soul. I'll worship Your holy name. You're rich in love, and You're slow to anger. Your name is great, and Your heart is kind. For all Your goodness, I will keep on singing. Ten thousand reasons for my heart to find. Bless the Lord, O my soul. O my soul. Worship His holy name. Sin like never before. O my soul.

O my soul. I'll worship Your holy name. And on that day when my strength is failing, the end draws me and my time has come. Still my soul will sing Your praise. Sing Your praise unending. Ten thousand years and then forever more. Bless the Lord, O my soul. O my soul. Worship His holy name. Sin I've never before. O my soul. Yes, I will worship Your holy name. Lord, I'll worship Your holy name.

Lord, I'll worship Your holy name. Lord, I'll worship Your holy name. Lord, I will worship Your holy name. Come, Thou fount of every blessing. Tune my heart to see Thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing. Call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet of flaming tongues. The mountain fixed upon it, mount of the redeeming love.

Here I raise my Ebenezer, here by thy great help I've come. And I hope of thy good pleasure, safely to arrive at home. Jesus saw me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God. He too has kept me from a stranger, interposed his precious blood.

Oh, to grace how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to thee. That thy goodness, like a fatter, by my wandering heart to thee, prone to wonder what I'm feeling, prone to evil, but I've got a love. Here's my heart, Lord. Take and seal it. Seal it for thy courts above.

One of the things that Scripture makes very clear to us is that failing to give thanks is not a small thing, but it is the first step away from God. When our hearts begin to grow proud or entitled or forgetful of His mercy, we begin to move away from the goodness of God. And in Romans 1 verse 21, it says this, "For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened." One of the things that thankfulness does for us is it directs us for away from the darkness of worshiping all of these other things that vie for our attention, and it directs us to the goodness of God. And so at this part of our service, we want to come with honesty. We want to confess where we have relied upon ourselves, where we have complained instead of trusted, and where we have looked to our own strength and our own goodness instead of the goodness of God. So would you join me in prayer?

Father in heaven, we ask for forgiveness, for oftentimes, instead of being a thankful people, we are a complaining people. And so we ask that by your grace, you would restore our hearts, that you would help us to be able to see your blessings so clearly, and that they would be so unmistakable in our vision, that we would give thanks to you joyfully and gratefully and freely, because you are the giver of all good things. And so we ask for strength, we ask for forgiveness, and we ask for peace. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. If you would, read with me from 1 Thessalonians chapter 15. Let's read together. "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." We're going to move into our time of communion by singing "O Praise the Name." Amen. Amen. Amen.

Oh, praise the name of the Lord our God. Oh, praise His name forevermore. For endless days we will sing Your praise, O Lord, O Lord our God. You shall return in robes of white The blazing sun shall pierce the night And I will rise among the saints My gaze transfixed on Jesus' face

O praise the name of the Lord our God O praise His name forevermore For endless days we will sing Your praise O Lord, O Lord our God O praise the name of the Lord our God O praise His name forevermore For endless days we will sing Your praise O Lord, O Lord our God O Lord, O Lord our God One of the remarkable things as you begin to read through the ministry of Jesus, there is so much that is wonderful and good, and there is one thing that almost seems like it is too simple. And it's just simply this: Jesus was thankful. Not just once, not just in the good moments, but all through his ministry and in some places where it seems strange that Jesus would give thanks. In John chapter 6, surrounded by hungry crowds with only five loaves and a few fish, Jesus, it will say, gave thanks and broke bread.

Now we know how the story ends, is that a miracle happens and there is enough to feed 5,000 people. Baskets of leftovers are picked up. But I know my heart, looking at the amount of food and the amount of people, will go, "I don't know if I can give thanks for this because it doesn't seem like enough." But Jesus shows us in His giving thanks that thankfulness often shows us and is a promise of God's provision. Jesus also gave thanks in the midst of grief. In John chapter 11, before anything had changed, before Lazarus had been raised from the dead, right after that, the shortest verse in the New Testament, but also I think one of the most powerful, because in it we see Jesus' humanity followed almost immediately by a powerful demonstration of His deity.

Jesus weeps, and He comes to the tomb of His friend, and He prays, "Father, I thank You that You have heard me." And He trusts in His Father and gives thanks even in the midst of grief. And at the Last Supper, hours away from the cross, Luke 22 says, He took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it. And He'll take the cup again, and He will give thanks. And I want you to consider that for just a moment. Jesus gives thanks for this bread and this cup, knowing the suffering that was coming. He gives thanks knowing the cost He was about to pay for our salvation. He gave thanks knowing that He was about to drink the cup of God's wrath so that you and I could drink of the cup of God's mercy and grace and redemption.

And that means when you and I partake of this bread and this cup, we are remembering His sacrifice, but we are also in part following His example of thankfulness. You see, we come to this table and we look back on what He does, but it also shapes us into a people, a people who are transformed by the good news of the gospel, people who can say to our Father that I thank You in abundance, I thank You in grief, and I thank You in the shadow and the difficulty of the trials of life. One of the remarkable things that the cross shows us is that our thankfulness is not just sort of this good time, shallow optimism. It's trust in the goodness of God, even when the path is hard and difficult. And so as we take this bread and this cup, we ask that we will be led into a place of thankfulness.

As we give thanks for His body that was broken for us, as we give thanks for the cup that was poured out for the forgiveness of sins, our prayer is that our hearts will be shaped and transformed and strengthened by this meal, and our eyes will be lifted to the One who saved us. Let's pray. Father in heaven, our sin has been nailed to the cross, and we thank You that we no longer bear that weight because Your Son stood in our place and bore it for us. We thank You that in the midst, maybe seeming like things aren't enough, or in the midst of grief, or in the midst of those dark trials where You've called us to take up our cross and follow You, that we can have peace and hope and thankfulness because You

are with us and have provided for us and care for us. May the gospel not just simply be something that we think about in terms of facts, but may it be transformational. May we grab hold of Your goodness. May You surround us in Your love. May You show us the depth of Your grace. And as we break this bread and as we drink this cup, may we proclaim in thankfulness Your Son until He comes again. We ask that You bless this bread and this cup. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. If you would partake of the bread that Jesus blessed and gave for us. In the same way, we take the new covenant in the blood of Jesus with great thankfulness. Father, we thank You for all the things that You have done. All the things that You have promised. All the hope that we have in

Christ. All the power of the work of Your Spirit at work within us. And may You strengthen us for what lies ahead. May You direct us to Your mercy and grace. May we spread this wonderful message to the world. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. This time, the children can be dismissed to Children's Church. We pray that God blesses you as you learn and grow in God's Word. And also this time... you're welcome. You're welcome. Let's pray. Let's pray. Let's pray.

Before we spend a little bit of time taking a look at thankfulness, we want to sing a song. I think we've played the video in kind of our prelude a while back for probably four or five weeks, but we have not sung it. It's not a hard song to pick up, but it is a new song. And so we want to specifically direct your attention to the chorus, "I hold my hope is only Jesus." And so we're going to go ahead and listen and sing if you want as you pick it up. You're welcome to just join in.

The gift of grace is Jesus my Redeemer. There is no hope for you now to be saved. He is my joy, my righteousness and freedom, my steadfast love, my deep and boundless peace. To this I hold, my hope is only Jesus my Redeemer. For my life is wholly bound to peace. Oh, how strange and divine I can see. All is mine, yet not I, but through Christ in me. The night is dark, but I am not forsaken. For by my side the Savior He will save. I labor on in weakness and for joy. I need His power is displayed. To this I hold. My shepherd will defend me. Through the deepest valley He will lead. Oh, the night has been won, and I shall overcome. Yet not I, but through Christ in me.

No fate I dread, I know I am forgiven. The future's sure, the price it has been paid. For Jesus bled and suffered for my pardon. And He was raised to overthrow the grave. To this I hold, my sin has been defeated. Jesus, I'll end every day. All that chains are released, I can see. I am free, and not I, but through Christ in me.

Let's pray. With every breath, I want to follow Jesus. For He has said that He will bring me home. And day by day, I know He will renew me. Until I stand with you, He will bring me home. And day by day, I know He will renew me. Until I stand with joy before the throne. To this I hold. My hope is only Jesus. Lord and glory evermore to me. When the race is complete to my lips, shall it be yet my life goes to Christ in me. To this I hold. My hope is only Jesus. All the glory evermore to me. When the race is complete to my lips, shall it be yet my life goes to Christ in me. When the race is complete to my lips, shall it be yet my life goes to Christ in me. Yet not I, but through Christ in me. Yet not I, but through Christ in me. Amen. Amen. Amen.

How about now? There it goes. It may feel, when we think about thankfulness, that it is unimportant, right? I know this, you know this. Why do we need to talk about thankfulness? But the other struggle we come to with thankfulness beyond its simplicity or the fact that we overlook the importance is that when we come in those times in life where we are hurting or facing difficulty, thankfulness can feel, in some cases, a little bit unrealistic. What do I have to be thankful for? Some cases it might feel dishonest, like we are hiding our feelings by talking about how thankful we are rather than acknowledging our struggles. What we find about biblical thankfulness is that it's not the ordinary thank you for the mashed potatoes. It's not simply a sentimental response. It's not a seasonal attitude or decor. And biblically, it's not optional. Biblically, thankfulness is incredibly important.

It's an incredibly important, not just outward picture, but it is incredibly important spiritually. It'll transform our worship, our struggles, our direction. And as we come to the week before Thanksgiving and one Sunday before Advent, I want us to think about thankfulness not as something that's nice and polite, but rather as something that is necessary. Thankfulness transforms our life. And first of all, I want us to see this morning that thankfulness brings light into the darkness. Now, the interesting thing, if you take a look throughout the Word of God at the idea of darkness, darkness can symbolize a lot of things. In some cases, it can symbolize the chaos of the world before creation. The darkness was over the face of the deep. Sometimes darkness can picture sin and brokenness and rebellion. Sometimes it can picture struggle and difficulty. Sometimes it can picture a lack of hope. But what all of these have in common, darkness in the Bible, is that it exists when people are far from the presence of God. That God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. And one of the things that thankfulness

does, whether it's the darkness of sin or the darkness of struggle, it directs us to the light of God. And darkness can be scary, right? It seems to make everything worse. It makes everything seem bigger, more difficult. I was thinking about it this week because I left the church one night at like one in the morning. It makes you look suspicious. If I'm fiddling around with the church doors at 10 in the morning, right, nobody's thinking anything about that, but the guy driving by at one and I'm over here with the door and the keys, right? That looks very, very different. And so thankfulness, and one of the wonderful things that it does is that it lights up our path. And I want to see how it lights up our path in two different ways. First of all, thankfulness shows us a path away from the brokenness of sin. And we referenced this verse earlier from Romans chapter one, "For although they knew God,

they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened." And so notice the picture and the process that happens in this verse. And if you read the larger surrounding context, you see the glory and the power of God through the creation that He has made, that He has revealed Himself, and that mankind knows God who reveals Himself, but rather than honoring Him, and giving thanks to Him, they became futile, and we became futile in our thinking, and our foolish hearts were darkened. You see, thankfulness has an impact that I think so often we frequently overlook. It's the thing that guards us from idolatry, and when we say idolatry, we mean worshiping anything other than God. And in doing so, by guarding us, thankfulness keeps us from darkened hearts, in part because it directs us

to God. And one of the reasons that we find ourselves so often in the darkness of sin, Paul will say in Romans 1:21, is because we stopped being thankful. If you want to run from sin, if you want to fight sin, if you want the path through sin, that path is lit by thankfulness. Now, it would be simple and very easy here to simply say, "Be thankful," and you won't struggle with sin in the same way, but I'd rather just sort of show you in three ways how this practically works. So we'll start here. In our selfishness, thankfulness directs us to generosity as we see God's generosity. Think about what selfishness says to our heart. And if you've ever seen Finding Nemo and you've got the seagulls, perhaps the realist portrayal of a seagull in any movie, right, they're just going, "Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine." And if you've ever eaten french fries at the beach, right, you know exactly

how that works. There's a flock of seagulls, and they're all going, "I want that. Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine." And our hearts frequently and selfishly do the same thing. I deserve this. I've worked for it. It's mine. And in that struggle of selfishness, look what happens when we become thankful. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. Coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. What thankfulness does, as we begin to see the giver and the maker of gifts, but that God is, that every gift that is good and perfect comes from Him, it begins to loosen the grip of our heart on that word, "mine." And we begin to say, "His." And I realize that the things that I'm so selfishly holding on to

are not mine, but they're the gifts of God. And what you begin to see is it begins to reverse that picture in Romans 1, where that darkness of selfishness and chasing my own desires and my own wants, in the light of thankfulness, begins to direct me to God. Very closely related in our desires and cravings, thankfulness directs us to contentment as we see God's goodness. We think about how we need more or what we have isn't enough. And in fact, isn't this the lie that has been very much since the beginning? To Adam and Eve in the garden, as the serpent speaks to Eve, it's like, yeah, God's given you a lot of things, but he hasn't given you this tree. That God hasn't given you enough. Look how good it looks. Look how bad. I bet it tastes great. It's going to make you wise. And this lie since the very beginning is that here's something

You want it. You don't have it. You should go get it. And thankfulness cuts through that lie of the desire of sin. And it does so like this. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. In that moment of desire, and instead of giving into the worship of something else, which is what happens when we chase our desires, that this is what's going to make me happy. This is what's going to make me whole. We trust God's timing. We trust God's generosity. And we forget not all of his benefits. You see, pride shines a path through our selfishness, through our sinful desires. And in our pride, thankfulness directs us to humility as we see God's greatness. Thankfulness begins to change that pride. Look at how great I am to humility. Paul says this to the Corinthian church who was struggling, "I'm better than you because of who taught me about Jesus. I'm better than you because of my spiritual gifts. I'm better than you because I believe this about this other thing. For who sees anything different in you? What do you have that you did not receive? If then you have received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?" You see, what thankfulness does is it takes us away from the false worship of self and it directs

us to God. It lights the way to realign our path with the God who gives and provides and sustains. It brings light into the darkness. It brings us to worship and away from sin. What you see is that as thankfulness shows us a path away from sin, it also shows us a path that goes through darkness and despair. And it does so by directing us to God's goodness. So in the same way that thankfulness takes us away from pride by showing us God's goodness, thankfulness brings us through those dark valleys by showing us God's goodness as well. Listen to these words in Habakkuk chapter 3. "Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail, and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord.

joy in the God of my salvation. God the Lord is my strength. He makes my feet like the deer. He makes me tread on the high places." And I want you to hear what is happening in these verses. First of all, what we see in verse 17 is that everything is falling apart. Ancient Israel is an agricultural or agrarian society, and things are not going well. If you reference back to verse 17, what you find is those sort of permanent, every year type crops, the trees and the vines, the olives and the grapes, they're not blossoming, they're not producing fruit, and they're failing. And then the annual crops, they get planted every year, the essentials. They're yielding no food, which means, in this case, grain, which was the primary survival food of the ancient world. If you had bread, you would stay alive.

As he goes to the widow, and he says, "Hey, can I stay with you?" And she says, "I've got enough bread for one last meal, then we're gonna die." And then God miraculously keeps the flour and keeps the oil going. They're annual crops, the ones they depend on for survival. The trees and the vines are luxuries. This is survival. They don't have that. But then verse 17 goes even a little further, that livestock, there's no flocks in the field, there's no herds in the stall. The trees and vines can be replanted. They may take some time to regrow, but they can be replanted. Your fields can be restarted. But what happens when you lose all your livestock? And your neighbor loses all his livestock. And throughout the land, all of the livestock are dead. You have to buy more, but you've lost all your livestock. And you've lost all your fields, and you've lost all your trees.

The reality in this text, in verse 17, is not just hard times, but devastating times. And if you consider how often we respond in those times, it's right bitterness and blame. Maybe we give up. And what we find is, I don't think this is ultimately about food, although it is a picture of famine in that time, but it is a picture of those times in life for us where life has been devastated. And look at how Habakkuk responds. He responds by praising God specifically for his salvation and goodness not after the devastation, but in the midst of it. And then he has a deliberate declaration of hope. He says, "God is the one who gives strength and stability, and he leads his people." You say, "Well, what does all this have to do with thankfulness?"

Right, what Habakkuk is saying is, "Look at what God has done so far, and he is going to continue to lead me, and continue to guide me, and continue to give me strength." Much like when we sing Amazing Grace, and we sing that line, "Grace has brought me safe this far. Grace will bring me home." Right, thankfulness is the light that shows us a path through the darkness of despair. The path of hope that God has promised, and that he has done it, and that he will continue to do it. And our path, directed by God, is not always away from suffering, but it is through it. One of the things that thankfulness does in our life is it shines a light and shows us how to avoid sin, how to bring us through trials by directing our attention in both of those situations on the greatness of God.

Next, I want you to see how thankfulness strengthens our feet. And I want to do so by taking a look at Exodus 15, 16, and 17. And I want you to see how God is in control of all things. God has done some amazing things for Israel. He's brought them out. He's raised up a leader. He's heard their prayers. He's raised up a leader. He's brought plagues upon the Egyptians. They've been released. They're carrying with them the riches of Egypt. He has split the Dead Sea or the Red Sea in half. And Moses and the people are going to sing this song, "I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously. The horse and his rider has been thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. This is my God, and I will praise him. My Father's God, and I will exalt him."

And at the end of this song, you bring them in, speaking of God's people, and plant them on your own mountain. The place, O Lord, which you have made for your abode. The sanctuary, O Lord, which your hands have established. The Lord will reign forever and ever. This wonderful song of praise, which ends in verse 18. So exactly six verses later, you find this: The people grumbled against Moses, saying, "What shall we drink?" A few verses after this: The whole congregation of people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the people of Israel said, "Would that we have died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full, for you have brought us out into the wilderness

to kill this whole assembly with hunger?" And then in chapter 17, we're back to that picture of water. But the people have thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?" Consider what God has done for the people. At every turn, He has answered their prayer. He hears their cries in Egypt. He raises up a deliverer. Pharaoh says, "I won't let you go." So God, in essentially a spiritual battle against Pharaoh and his picture as the God of all of Egypt and the gods they worship. Ten plagues come. People are released. The sea is split in half. They sing praises, and almost immediately they begin to grumble about water, and God gives them water.

And they grumble about food, and God gives them food, and they grumble again about water. And God gives them water, and in every place where they stop and they grumble, their progress stops. And in part, I think it's because they cease to be thankful. Because if they are approaching this as thankful people, God has brought us out of Egypt, and we're thankful, and I'm thirsty. And the God who brought me through the sea can certainly provide me water. And the God who provided me water can certainly provide me food. And the God who's already provided me deliverance, water, and food can certainly provide me water again. You see, thankfulness changes how you see things, and it moves you from grumbling to faith in God, which allows you to keep walking in the midst of the wilderness.

But also, notice this. When we stop being thankful, when we become ungrateful, we start to rewrite the past. In that passage in Exodus chapter 16 that we just read, as the people are hungry, and they go, "You know, back in Egypt we sat by pots filled with meat, and we had all the bread we wanted." Absolutely not true. You are a slave, and you're getting the bare minimum of sustenance, and you're going out and working from dawn to dusk, eating just enough to stay alive, falling asleep, and waking up and doing it all over again. But in your ungratefulness, you begin to look back to that slavery and say, "Wasn't it wonderful?" You see, when we become ungrateful, we begin to long for a past that, interestingly enough, in most places did not exist. And what happens is the lack of thankfulness brings them to a stop, and it will for you.

And in part, the reason it brings us to a stop is because now all the burden falls on our shoulders. How will I do this? How will I get water? How will I get food? But in thankfulness, we see the God who provides their water and provides their food. And what you find is that thankfulness ultimately sends us forward with joy. Think about their situation and what God has done. You said instead of being stopped by complaints and grumbling, we should be propelled forward in joy. Just one quick example from Acts chapter 16. And I love this beginning of the church in Philippi because you see God calling to himself. People from every social walk. You have rich, very poor, somewhere in the middle. You have men, you have women, you have slave, you have free. And Paul has run afoul of the authorities.

He and Silas have been beaten. They've been thrown into the stocks, and they are in the darkest, worst part of the prison. And they were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. And maybe they're singing with tears in their eyes, but you find that in their knowledge of God, their joy goes deeper than superficial happiness. And what happens when God gives them an opportunity in just a verse later. They not only respond by doing the right thing, but they respond in a way that brings the gospel not just to the guy who runs the jail, but to his entire household. And as we get ready next week to step into the season of Advent, part of Advent is a season of waiting. And one of the things that keeps us moving is this gratitude and this praise and this worship, even through the tears and the difficult situations that God is in control, right?

Thankfulness gives us a path away from sin, through difficulty. It keeps us moving in the desert. And I think most importantly of all, it lifts us, lifts our eyes to the one who gives us all things. Paul says this in 2 Corinthians 9, this passage of generosity. He says, "Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift." At the end of his exposition of both the gospel and the defense of the resurrection, he says this, "But thanks be to God who gives us the victory for our Lord Jesus Christ." And as we referenced this morning, when he took bread and he had given thanks, he broke it, this is Jesus, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And Jesus, as he does this, it's thankfulness before his suffering.

Thankfulness before the deliverance. Thankfulness where joy, we will see, will be found on the other side. And I want to just zoom in on this picture of Jesus being thankful in this moment for the bread and for the cup. The Passover meal is celebrating the remembrance of the promises of God. Four big promises. The first is, "I will bring you out from under the burden of the Egyptians." The second is, "I will deliver you from slavery to them." The third is this, "I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment." And the fourth promise is, "I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God." And as Jesus institutes the Lord's Supper, He does so in remembrance, in that point in the Passover meal, of this third promise out of four.

"I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment." And God says to His people in the wilderness, "I am coming, and I am going to stretch out my arm in power." And in judgment, I will defeat your enemies." And then here comes Jesus. And He's going to fulfill this promise in a different way. He's going to redeem us with His arms stretched out upon the cross. And the great act of judgment will be our sin upon His shoulders. And because of that, we can be taken to be the people of God. And so when Jesus institutes the Lord's Supper, and He says, "I'm thankful for this bread, which is my body. I'm thankful for this cup, which is the new covenant." He's pointing us toward something more wonderful, that there is deliverance, there is joy, but it is found in the goodness of God.

You see, we've talked about thankfulness in the darkness of sin and in hopelessness and in the wilderness. And here we come to Jesus, the One who comes to sinners in darkness with light, and He comes to the hopeless with hope, and He comes to the thirsty, and to the hungry, and to the fearful people in the wilderness. And thankfulness ultimately isn't about the stuff. It's the One who comes close, and who loves, and who saves, and who is one day coming again. We give thanks, not because our circumstances are easy, but because God is faithful. Not because the wilderness is comfortable, but because God walks with us through it. Not because all of those things that we want are fulfilled, but because of Christ, the indescribable gift has come. And so as we celebrate Thanksgiving on a day, the prayer is that it would not simply be a day, but a life for us.

And as we prepare to enter the season of Advent, my prayer is that thankfulness would light our way, not just with the candles, but our thanksgiving for the gift of Christ would show us the way away from sin, that it would show us the way through the darkness and give us hopeful vision, that it will strengthen our feet to help us walk in the wilderness without stopping, and that it will most of all lift our eyes to the Son of God, fixing our hearts and our minds on Christ our Savior. So it's my prayer this morning that God prepares us to see Jesus, whether in the longing or the waiting or in the wilderness of our lives. Let's pray. Father in heaven, turn our eyes away from the frivolous and the perishing, and the brokenness and the hopelessness of this world, and may you fix them on your glory.

And that we might live for your glory. We may sing and pray and read your Scriptures to glorify you in the midst of a dark world. May we be little lights that reflect your great light into this world. Help us to be thankful. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. And if you would go ahead and be standing. We're going to sing "Turn Your Eyes."

Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of Jesus. And the light of His glory and grace. Turn your eyes to that hillside where justice and mercy embrace. There the Son of God gave His life for us. And our measureless death was erased. Jesus, to You we lift our eyes. Jesus, our glory and our Christ. We adore You, behold You, our Savior ever true. O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. Turn your eyes to the morning and see Christ the light in us. What a glorious dawn. Fear of death is gone, for we carry His life in our veins. To You we lift our rise. Jesus, our glory and our prize. We adore You. We hold You. We are true. Oh, Jesus, we turn our eyes to You.

Jesus, we lift our eyes. Jesus, our glory and our God. We adore You, behold You, our Savior ever true. Oh, Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. We adore You, behold You, our Savior ever true. Oh, Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. Oh, Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. We are so thankful that you are here with us this morning. A couple of announcements. There will be no Wednesday evening Bible study. This week, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, also if you need an address or details for George's service, we can pass those along to you. You can either see me or mom and dad after church. Next Sunday, we are beginning the first Sunday of Advent. We're doing something a little different with our devotions. We will have some devotional booklets. You can also get those as a PDF on our website later this week. But we have some blocks that I've been laser engraving downstairs. Thankfully, we have not set very many

fires yet in the church, but they match up with a little bit of a symbol to give us a visual representation that symbolizes sort of the theme for that day and a devotion that goes along with that. So you can sort of set them down, sort of counting up to Christmas and sort of walk through that. That way, if you don't want to use that, I know sometimes the kids like to sort of do that. You can also just use the devotions. So those will be available next week, or next Sunday as well. We'll also have some done later this week, and I might have one set of blocks in addition to our demonstration ones already made. So that's what's happening next week. So we'll have some candles next week, some children with fire, which they look forward to every year as we walk toward Advent. There's also a little bit of a summary of where we're going and what we're doing over the next several weeks as well.

we'll read from this psalm, Psalm 33, and then we will be dismissed. Father in heaven, thank you for your goodness and for your grace and for how you have watched over us and how you have saved us. Be with us as we walk through this week. May you give us strength. May you help us in the midst of temptation to lift our eyes to you, and in the midst of darkness lift our eyes to you, that in those times when we're tempted to complain, in those times when we struggle, that we would see your goodness in that we would be thankful. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Our soul waits for the Lord. He is our help and our shield, for our heart is glad in Him, because we trust in His holy name. Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you. And so as we go, may the Lord be your help and be your shield. May He fill your heart with gladness, and hopefully some pumpkin pie as

as well. May you trust in His holy name. May His steadfast love rest upon you. May He strengthen your steps, lift your eyes, and fill you with a living hope in Jesus Christ our Lord. We're trying. Let's pray. Let's pray. Let's pray.