This Thanks Giving

In two days I will be preaching at a Thanks Giving service in Bunceton.  My sermon will not be some random sermon about being thankful from some text like Luke 17:11-19 and the parable of the ten lepers.  That text really isn’t about thanksgiving but rather about the salvation of the one man who came back.  But instead, I am preaching from Ephesians 2:4-5.  The name of the sermon is “But God, By Grace.”  The first two words of Ephesians 2:4 is “But God.”  The last phrase of 2:5 is “by grace you have been saved.”  Something I have noticed is that many people at Thanksgiving will put the truth of the gospel, the very thing that saves us, at the end of the prayer.  And that end is very cavalier and taking it for granted.  People just want to pray about the food, the house, the family and all of that.  Those things are extremely important and we must be thankful for that (cf. Ephesians 5:20, 1 Thessalonians 5:18).  However the greatest thing we need to be thankful for is the gospel.  Our thankfulness should be a broken and humble thanksgiving, desperate to thank God for that gracious gift.  It should be the first thing in our prayer of thanks and it could be the only thing in that prayer.  I am speaking to my fellow redeemed brothers and sisters in the Kingdom of Christ.  We must be grieved by our sin and completely shattered by God’s grace.  We therefore must be utterly overwhelmed by our status of righteous.  We should be thankful for this most of all on Thursday.  That’s what I ask for this Thankgiving, before you start thanking God for all of those things he gave you in your family, friends, home, food, job, and other possessions and blessings, get your mind around the gospel and be broken by it and be grateful for it.