Skip to main content

Give Thanks, by Pastor Kevin Feder

By
Give Thanks

Bless the LORD, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name! Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s. Psalm 103:1-5

Psalm 103 is a psalm of thanksgiving. The reason why giving thanks and being thankful is so important is because it might be the single most distinctive characteristic of being a Christian. This is most plausible when we look at the way the atheist is described in Romans 1:21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him. Thus, if the refusal to give thanks to God marks the atheist, giving thanks ought to mark the believer.
And for good reason. The believer, afterall, has good reason to give thanks to God. The believer has good reason and many reasons to give thanks to God. This seems simple enough, doesn’t it? Believers should be thankful. Not too much resistance there. Yet, most believers would admit that grumbling, complaining, worry, anger, doubt, anxiety, bitterness, apathy, to name a few, creep in and choke out thankfulness. What should a believer do to be more characterized by thankfulness and less like this list? Here are two responses:
First, being thankful means giving thanks, which means it is up to you to be thankful. You are not a passive recipient of thankfulness. Rather, you are active in pursuing it by faith. If you are a Christian, you have the Holy Spirit empowering you to walk by faith, you have God’s Word to speak truth to you, and you have God’s Son that gave his life for you so that you can be a child of God. You have everything you need to be a thankful person.
Second, being thankful means you must preach the truth to your soul. In Psalm 103 David preaches to his soul (Bless the LORD, O my soul). He doesn’t wait until he feels thankful. By faith, he presses the truth into his mind. Living by faith and being thankful is primarily not a feeling but the will to live in accordance with what is true. David models what this looks like. He preaches to his own heart. He rouses his emotions to the memory of God’s work. He refuses to be controlled by what he feels, he insists on living according to God’s love.

That we would be thankful people, Pastor Kevin




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

To Have My Soul Happy in the Lord, by George Muller

By Anonymous
To Have My Soul Happy in the Lord By George Muller “It has pleased the Lord to teach me a truth, the benefit of which I have not lost for more than fourteen years. The point is this: I saw more clearly than ever that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not how much I might serve the Lord, or how I might glorify the Lord, but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man might be nourished. “I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God—not prayer, but the Word of God. And here again, not the simple reading of the Word of God so that it only passes through my mind just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what I read, pondering over it, and applying it to my heart. To meditate on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed. And that thus,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Billy Graham, Holiness, and Leadership

By
A few years ago, I was listening to a radio program on which Marshall Shelley was being interviewed about his new book, The Leadership Secrets of Billy Graham (Zondervan, 2005). They were giving away a few copies of the book to those who called in, and something inside me felt compelled to call. But I didn’t have a good question to ask, so I prayed to the Lord and said, “If you want me to have a copy of this book, please give me a good question to ask and I’ll call.” I’m not sure if the Lord gave me this question or if it just popped into my head, but one way or the other, I thought to ask about the connection in Billy’s life between his private pursuit of holiness and integrity, and his public effectiveness and longevity. So, I made the call and was given the last copy of the book they had to give. A couple of years earlier, I had breakfast with some friends and the subject of Billy Graham’s life and ministry came up. We talked mostly about his commitment to integrity in the area...
Post a Comment
Read more

Catechisms: Building a Heritage of Sound Faith - By Pastor Kevin Feder

By
This is an article I (Pastor Kevin) wrote in 2005 and updated in 2017. It is featured in a new resource available through Children’s Desiring God called Discipleship through Doctrinal Teaching and Catechism by Sally Michael.  It is our desire to encourage parents to use a children’s catechism as a tool in building and strengthening faith in children. A simple definition of a catechism is “organized teaching.” Catechisms are not the only things that can or should be used to instruct the next generation, yet they have useful purposes. Listed here are ten specific benefits a catechism can uniquely offer. Hopefully these ten points will help parents understand how a catechism can be effectively used in their families. 1.  A catechism is a very clear and complete gospel message. A catechism is, among other things, a very clear and concise gospel message to children. Everything a child needs to know for salvation is embodied within a catechism. The gospel is truly ama...
Post a Comment
Read more