THURSDAY 25 November 2021 “Thanksgiving Day” Psalm 117

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Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends all around the world.

Today is a special day in America! It’s Thanksgiving Day. You perhaps know the story which has been passed down to us, generation after generation. They say the first settlers who had come from Europe to America, gathered at the time of the first harvest, with those who they had found already lived in America, often called “Native Americans”. As the harvest was brought in from the fields, these two very different groups of people joined together in a harvest meal and expressed thanks to God for His provision and protection. I wonder what your’ Thanksgiving Day’ will be today and how much of your day will be focused on thanking God for ALL He has done for your very existence this year? How will you thank God for all He has done to provide and nurture the relationship He offers you in Jesus Christ?

Today may not be “Thanksgiving Day” where you live in the world, but may I invite us all, all around the world, to focus our hearts and minds on thanking God this day…all day long? In fact, for some time my wife and I have tried to make EVERY Thursday, “Thankful Thursday”. It means from the moment of our awakening, to the time we are ready to fall asleep at night, throughout the entire day, we try to keep our hearts and minds in a place of gratitude to God for WHO He is and ALL He has done! Try it, it’s amazing! On ‘Thankful Thursdays’, as often as you can, express your thanks to God even in simple short statements like… “Thank you God for the beauty of this day”.

So on this “Thankful Thanksgiving Thursday” may I urge us to focus our attention on the shortest Psalm in the Bible, Psalm 117? It’s a call to thankfulness… “Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol Him, all you peoples. For great is His love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever. Praise the LORD.” That’s it, only two verses, so short it shouldn’t be difficult to memorize and repeat often today, and every ‘Thankful Thursday’!

Do you see the GLOBAL invitation? Yes, it is God’s desire and design for humanity that ALL nations, ALL peoples, everywhere, in every generation PRAISE the LORD! So, if it is not happening where you live, can you figure out why not? Of course ‘all peoples’ means the unity of every individual person in that place. So if ALL peoples were going to PRAISE the LORD, that would require EVERY individual to praise the LORD, right? So that’s where it starts… individual, your heart and mine! And that makes it easier, for I don’t have to burden myself to figure out why ALL people aren’t praising God, I just have to focus on MY heart and MY mind and figure out what’s preventing ME from Praising the LORD!

This short call to praise gives us a good place to start, did you notice? “For great is God’s love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever.” We are surrounded by the evidence of God’s great, boundless love for us. Every breath you breathe is a gift of love from God. Any moment of reasonably good health is a gift of love from God. Every friendship you and I have is a gift of love from God. Of course His greatest expression of love is JESUS, God the Son, sent to show us God’s love by giving His life so we could be forgiven of our sin and enter into a love relationship with Holy God both now and forever!

And finally, oh my, can you join me in thanking God for His FAITHFULNESS on this Thanksgiving Day? It’s not difficult for you and me to look around and find people who are NOT faithful, people who break their promises and seem to forget their obligations. But God is always FAITHFUL… faithful to what you ask? I’ll start the list and you keep it going all day, OK?

* Faithful to HIS character. God never does anything contrary to His holy nature.

* Faithful to His promises. God never breaks a promise and His word is full of great promises from God to us.

* Faithful to His integrity, His truth. God is always truthful, never distorting truth. His truth is the foundation of all truth.

* Faithful to LOVE His people!! I live in that assurance everyday, do you?

Ok my friends, go ahead… you continue the list, and keep repeating these two verses all day long this Thanksgiving Day 2021… and then do it! Praise the LORD!!

“Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol Him all you people.

For great is His love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever.” (Ps. 117)

Now you have a great “Thankful THANKSGIVING Thursday”!

Today’s Scripture is Psalm 117.

Choose below to read or listen.

Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.

Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.

Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)

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