Chapter 4, we're looking. at verses six through nine. And I'd like us to read this together, just as a matter of looking at this for a final time as far as the series is concerned. And reading this aloud and loudly as a congregation. And as I think we do, whenever a congregation, it's scriptural, you see it many times in the Old Testament, that whenever there was a public reading, a corporate reading of scripture, they stood together out of honor and reverence for the word. So let's stand together if we will tonight and let's read the word of God together. Some may ask, Pastor, why is it that you want, you're adamant about the King James Version, the particular version being used. I'm not going to go into that in great detail tonight, but one of the great reasons is what we're about to do, is so that an entire congregation, literally and figuratively, but literally is on the same page. And I think much is lost when a congregation is not all looking at the same thing together. And so this is a great encouragement, it's a great blessing to the Lord to hear his people reading his word back to him. And you'll see that in the Old Testament specifically. So let's read this together. Philippians chapter 4 and let's begin reading at verse 6 and we'll go down through verse 9 reading it aloud together. Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, If there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things. Those things which ye have both learned and received and heard and seen in me do. And the God of peace shall be with you. Father, I pray that tonight you bless the reading of your word. Lord, you bless the preaching of your word. And Lord, you bless the receiving of your word. Father, tonight we thank you for being a sovereign God. Thank you for being a singular God and thank you for being a saving God. In Jesus' name we ask it, amen. You can be seated. As you read through this passage of scripture, if you're not careful you'll miss it. Start saying, be careful for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made only to God. and the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatsoever things, and we go into that whole list of what we ought to be thinking about, and then he ends with that, and those things that you have both received and seen in me, those things you do, and the God of peace shall be with you. Well, we just went through that entire passage of scripture, but there was one small ingredient that is so easily overlooked. if you're going to have a thriving Christian life. And I think that this is really the secret ingredient. I think it's really the missing ingredient. You'll find many that will find themselves striving, if you will, to not worry. Okay, Lord, I'm not going to worry. And they know that that's a part of it. They know that a part of it is prayer. And so, Lord, I'm going to pray. They know that a big part of it is what we think about and what we allow to process through our mind and what we control as far as our thought life is concerned or give control to Christ. But then we went right through it, and we skipped right over two very important words that I think are a key to a thriving Christian life. Notice what he says now again in verse six. He says, be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication. Say the next two words with me, would you? With, with thanksgiving. He's saying, let your requests be made known with Thanksgiving. I'll tell you, in every believer's life, if you wanna see a believer that God is using in a big way, if you wanna see a believer that is having a thriving Christian life, that it's obvious God's hand of blessing is upon them, that God is working in them, you can see that their outlook on their life is something that is hopeful, it's purposeful, it's driving, it's something that gets them out of bed in the morning, it's something that causes them to sleep peacefully at night, It is this secret ingredient and it's the ingredient of thanksgiving. It is having the attitude of gratitude. Whenever you see a truly spiritual believer, you will see immediately associated with that believer a heart of humility and a heart of gratefulness. They're not always, you'll find a person always giving praise to the Lord. Not in a hyper-spiritual way, not in a way, well, you know, I praise the Lord, God's been, not in a way that causes even kind of a hyper-spiritual perspective upon themselves. And many times, people can even give over that mentality in even how they accept praise. I'm talking about a sincere and obvious, hey, listen, I want you to know, I thank you. Often, have you ever complimented people? And so often, when you compliment them, they say, oh, praise the Lord. Oh, don't praise me, praise the Lord. You know what's wrong with just saying thank you to somebody? Take the halo off for just a second and just simply say thank you. How about you do this? You know what, thank you. Thank you for your kind words and praise the Lord for Him and allowing you to use us. There needs to be a sense of gratefulness about our lives. But if you look at many Christians who simply survive in their Christian life, gratitude is a great part that is missing. You don't find them praising the Lord. You find them complaining to the Lord. You find them griping to the Lord. And I will tell you this about Thanksgiving. You can't complain and be thankful at the same time. When it comes to your Christian life, you can't have a thankful heart to God and having a complaining heart that lives side by side. You can't have a grumbling spirit and a grateful spirit that live together. It cannot happen. And so in your life, ask yourself, am I one that complains or am I one that expresses gratefulness? Am I one that gripes or am I one that expresses thankfulness to the Lord? It's very important because I'll tell you, you will never get to a place of thriving. You can have your thought life in a place where, Lord, I've surrendered this part. You can have personal prayer life and you're lifting your petitions up and you're speaking to God in a great way. You can find yourself giving your worries, casting all your cares upon Him. But I will tell you, gratefulness has got to be a huge part of your life. And it's not simple just gratefulness to God. Let me tell you something about gratefulness. An attitude of gratefulness transcends every area of our life. It is not just spiritual. When you run into someone who is truly grateful, you're going to find a person who is grateful to every other relationship in their life. You'll find, if it's a young person, they'll not only be grateful to God for what God's doing in their life, they'll also be grateful to their parents. If you find a wife, she's not only going to be grateful to God, she's also going to be grateful to her children. When's the last time you thanked God for your children? When's the last time you thanked your children? That you were grateful to them? If you're a husband who's walking with God, I will tell you this. You're not gonna be looking at your wife, and you say, well, I have a grateful spirit. Well, a grateful spirit is going to also, it's gonna transcend, it's gonna find itself bleeding right over into your marriage relationship. Men, can I tell you something a woman can pick up on unspoken signals that you and I, as cavemen, cannot even possibly perceive? Did you know that? They can sense it. When you do a lot of marriage counseling, as I do, you'll find that the women are much more discerning about the spirit of a message. The men tend to find themselves, they know the state of the marriage, but the women know the spirit of that marriage. And they can pick it up, they can sense it very soon when all of a sudden the husband is no longer thankful for the wife that he has. She can sense when he's looking at her and not grateful. for the woman that she is, or the woman that she looks like, or the woman that she carries herself around in the home or at the business. She can just pick it up. He doesn't have to say he's not grateful for it. He can just put off very clearly the vibe. Now let me tell you, you can be spiritual, you can read your Bible, you can pray, you can play the game all you want to. But if a truly grateful spirit is present in your life, and it must be for you to thrive, then part of that is going to be gratefulness for the wife that he's given you. And all God's men said, wow, you guys just blew it. Van, what's something you can be thankful for tonight? That is neat, having grandchildren coming and asking spiritual questions. I want you to pray for Van, he's going to be having his knee looked at this coming Thursday. Yeah, this Thursday he's going to be having his knee looked at, so pray for Van Houser if you would write that down. Ms. Lorraine, what's something that God has blessed you with? Amen, and he'll keep you until the end. Absolutely. That is wonderful. Let me tell you something about gratefulness Gratefulness Thanksgiving you ought to write this down somewhere if you're truly walking with Christ Then gratefulness is going to be a key mark of your life Not just with God but also with those around you young mothers if you're truly walking with Christ and When you want to kill them, you also are going to be thanking God for them all in the same breath. It's just a mark of a truly spiritual walk with Christ. Three things I want to give to you tonight about Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is really an acknowledging of God's power that's working in our lives. So, it's going to do several things for us. Number one, Thanksgiving causes our faith to flourish. A spirit of thanksgiving in our life is gonna cause our faith in God to flourish. How do we know this? Well, he tells us, right here, when you pray, pray with supplication prayer, but also with thanksgiving. He tells us in 1 Thessalonians chapter five and verse 17. You remember chapter five gives you one little short quip command after another. He says in verse 17, three words, pray without thanksgiving. Ceasing he tells you to pray that's verse 17 But it's amazing to me when you look at Philippians chapter 4 and then you turn over to first Thessalonians chapter 5 The two go right together again because he says in first Thessalonians or Philippians 4 But be careful for nothing but in everything with prayer and supplications with Thanksgiving then first Thessalonians 5 17 pray without ceasing immediately in verse 18, you know what he says and In everything give thanks. In everything give thanks. This is the will of God concerning the believer in Jesus Christ. Yes, you ought to be praying without ceasing, but on the tip of that prayer tongue ought to be a thanksgiving to God. Lord, I thank you. What are the ways we're thanking him? By recalling his blessings in our life. Recalling the way, many of us in here don't have a grateful spirit because we have both short term and long term, a blessing memory loss. We forget what God's done. Isn't it amazing how we can remember how we've been wronged by God, but we so quickly forget how we've been blessed by him? And God has been, and by the way, that's when you know that you're starting to walk in the flesh. Because when a person is starting to walk in the flesh, they start finding themselves taking things given to them by God for granted. And you'll see a grateful spirit starting to leave. I've got to tell you man, things like this past Friday morning when our kids were all in the car and Grace was with them and Joy, I'm just coming out of the shower in the bathroom and Joy, and as I'm opening the door, walking out into the bedroom, Joy's on the other side with the phone, she goes, Shane, they've been in a wreck, you gotta get over there. She was explaining, and let me tell you, when you get over there, you're not quite sure what's happened. You get over there and you see a car that's off in the ditch and you see that it's pretty much done for and you realize, now you see your kids, you can hear one of them crying and you think about all of those children being put together in one and what, I've been so good all week. And what could have happened, just any little difference of what could have happened, let me tell you something what that does for you. That causes you to kind of recalibrate a little bit on how you've been living your life. It makes you think, you know, Michael's here tonight. Man, I praise God, Michael, you're able to be here. Mike has been trying and trying and trying. He's been working for the transportation, what do they call it? TSA, he's been working for TSA up at Huntsville Airport for a few years now. He has been trying to get off on Sundays. I mean trying. They'll let every other kind of person in almost every other kind of religion have their religious beliefs accommodated for, but they've not been willing to do that with him. He finally got some respite on that, a little relief. Now it's got to be fully finalized, but I thank God that he's here. Let me tell you what happened to Michael three years ago now. It was three years ago now, Michael was just going about his day, and a stroke hit him. Out of nowhere, young man, stroke hit him. Let me tell you something, that makes you thankful. When something like that hits you so suddenly, it makes you thankful that on any given moment, your life can change from that drive over from my house over to where Thompson Road tees off there and takes a sharp left. Let me tell you something, you're thinking about how your life is about to change. When you think about that, what am I going to drive up to? What am I going to see? It puts a lot of things in perspective. I was talking to Jessica and Connie this morning when they had the hold up there at the pharmacy there in Decatur. When you have that and you see a person waving a gun around in a store and you realize at any given time that you could be at the wrong end of that weapon, that puts a lot of things into perspective about life. Ricky Blackwood, man I love you Ricky. Ricky's gone through one of the worst weeks of his life. His nephew, his life was taken this week. He was a volunteer firefighter up in Oden Ridge, great veteran by the way. Are we really gonna have to bring ourselves to a place in life where something has to be lost before we're ever grateful for it? Is that really our pattern that's gonna be in our kind of roller coaster of gratefulness? Lord, I didn't appreciate her until now I'm a widower. I didn't appreciate her until now I'm a widow. Lord, I didn't appreciate those children. I griped and complained until they were gone. And Lord, no longer the pitter patter of feet. Could I encourage you with something? If you're gonna live a life that thrives, you're gonna have a faith that flourishes, then allow your life to be grateful. Hey, listen, young people, listen to me very closely. You're here tonight because somebody loves you very much. Your pastor certainly loves you. But I gotta tell you, you got a parent that loves you very much, grandparents that have prayed for you very much, you wouldn't be here if that wasn't true. Somebody has loved and reached out to you in a great way. Be grateful now for that. You know, there's all kinds of things we can be grateful for. I was reading a story just this afternoon about a guy, his pastor challenged him to be grateful. He was newlywed, just got married, and his wife was gonna iron the brand new pair of pants. And he had just bought them, spent a pretty good penny on it, and she was gonna surprise him. So she ironed these brand new pair of pants and burnt a whole slap in the seat of it. I mean, right through it. Ruined the iron and the pants all at the same time. He walked in, because he smelled it. He thought the house was on fire. And she's just over there crying. And she goes, I'm so sorry, honey. I was just trying to please you. And he could hear his pastor reminding him, be thankful in everything, and everything give thanks. And he said, honey, honey, it's OK. I'm grateful. Well, how can you be grateful for me burning a hole in your pants? He says, honey, I'm just grateful that I did not have a leg in those pants as a hole was being burned in them. Look, we can find something to be grateful for in any circumstance of life. Matthew Henry, famous Bible commentator, has really a classic. He says these words. What a great perspective. Let me be thankful first, because I was never robbed before. Second, because although they took my wallet, they did not take my life. Third, let me be thankful that although they took my all, it was not much. And fourth, Because it was I who was robbed and not I who robbed. Isn't that a great statement? Thankfulness, thanksgiving causes our faith to flourish. It is a vital part of our Christian life. It is a necessary part of our Christian life. Well, I just forget to be grateful. Look, quit forgetting to be grateful. Because I can tell you, you'll remember when it's gone. Don't be reminded in such a tragic way. Past answers to faith, to prayer, they build our faith. He says pray, but pray with thanksgiving, remembering the way that God has answered. But I want to take it further. If you look at Philippians chapter four and verse six, there's something very important to remember here. He's saying not just praying for past answers. Don't just pray for answers to prayer in the past. Pray in faith. You know what that means? He says, be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication. What's the next word? What's the very next word? With thanksgiving. It is present. All that he's speaking of is coinciding with one another. He doesn't say, pray with all prayer and supplication, and then after God has answered, give him thanksgiving. That is not what he's saying here. You know what he's saying? You pray, and when you pray for that item, when you pray for that need, you pray and immediately with that prayer, presently with that prayer, you are thanking God already for his answer. In faith, you're saying, Lord, I'm praying for this, and I know that you're going to answer. I know that you're going to answer. I'll tell you a cool story this morning. This morning, Beth Finley came to me, and she goes, Pastor, I'll tell you something neat that happened to me Friday. Friday, we were, Stan and Gary Chandler and Steve Chevron went fishing Friday morning, which we'll have to talk about later. They went fishing Friday morning, And he goes, and she said, my shoulder really hurt. I've been taking, I had some arthritis and really it was just killing my day. And she goes, you know what? Before they started fishing, they prayed for my shoulder. I suppose this is gonna be your out when I ask you why you're fishing. All right. They started praying for my shoulder. And pastor, I'm telling you, I didn't know they were praying for it, but I know that Friday morning, about the time they were praying, the Lord took the pain out of my shoulder. And when Stan got home, he was telling me about it, and I explained to him. And he said, well, honey, we were praying for your shoulder. The guy would take that pain away exactly at the time. We were praying all right together in the boat. Let me tell you, God is a prayer-answering God. But you know so often why we don't see it? Because we're not expecting it. We're not anticipating. We're not getting, Lord, I'm praying for this, and I'm thanking you already that the prayer is already being answered. Already it's being answered. Lord, in faith, I believe that. Faith, our Thanksgiving causes our faith to flourish. Secondly, if you're gonna thrive in your Christian life, Thanksgiving's gotta be a part of it. Thanksgiving causes our outlook to improve. We'll move quickly now. A.W. Tozer says this, the great author, Thanksgiving has great curative powers. You oughta see what gratefulness will do for you. Pastor, I'm going through a difficult time of depression. I'm just really down. Can I encourage you with something? Change your heart to a thanksgiving heart. Quit looking at how depressed your circumstances are and start thanking him for how God has blessed your life. Richard, what's something you can thank God for? He says he can thank God for the grace that he gives when a loved one dies and Richard's gone through that with his mom very recently. Nathan, what's something you thank God for? Amen. And we love you too, Nathan. We love you very much. All of you. We feel sorry for Javon, but we love you very much. C.H. Spurgeon said it this way, giving thanks is good ethically, for it is right. It's also good emotionally, for it thrills the heart. He goes right after this into the area of thinking, but this has much to do with it. When you look at situations, you find yourself saying, well, in this particular situation, what should be my response? What should be my reaction? First and foremost, it should be thanksgiving. Well, pastor, how could that possibly be true? Proverbs 17 and verse 22 says that a merry heart doeth good like a medicine. Can I tell you, look at the end of verse six, or verse seven, When you pray, be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God. So often we say, well, God will give peace that passes all understanding. Yes, he will give it, but he tells you who he's going to give it to. He says very plainly who he's going to give it to, to those who cast their cares upon him. I'm going to be careful for nothing, but in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, in anticipation of God answering, I'm going to let my request be made known unto God. Then, the word pros there, as a result of, then and the peace of God. which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds in God through Christ Jesus. What is he saying here? He's saying it's a cause and effect. You want to have the peace that passes all, oh God gives peace that passes all understanding. Well I can tell you, he only gives peace that passes all understanding to those with a grateful heart. To those with a heart of thanksgiving to the Lord. Why do we say this? Because Thanksgiving is the great missing ingredient to peace that passes all understanding. It's seeing difficulties in our life as part of God's design. Lord, I'm trusting you that what you're bringing me through is a part of your design for my life. That Lord, what you're causing to happen in my life is something that you ordained to happen in my life. You know, George Mueller always referred to trials that a person went through as food for faith. He says, this is just food for faith. So I thank God for the trials because it's gonna cause me in my life to have a renewed outlook. Thirdly, Thanksgiving causes our life to model Jesus Christ. Let me tell you about Thanksgiving, what it'll do for you as far as your outlook. It's gonna give you renewed strength. Lillian, can you come up here for just a second? It's pretty interesting. Let me tell you what it has in my notes. It says renewed strength through Thanksgiving, Psalm 103. Take your Bibles and turn to Psalm 103, would you? Lillian, would you do me a favor? Can I pick you up for just a second? Would that be all right, all right? Goodness, you're getting to be a big girl. I'm going to turn this microphone. I get mad when other guys do it, but I'm going to do it for you, okay? You want to do me a favor? All these people sitting here are looking at Psalm 103, but I heard you earlier tonight quote the very verses that I was going to read in my message. Isn't that cool? That's pretty neat, isn't it? So guess what, tonight you're going to help me with this message. Who knows, one day you'll be a woman preacher. No, no, that's not true. All right, you ready? Now, don't read it. You're gonna quote it, because you already know it, don't you? You know it. Now, I want you to say it real loud in that microphone, and everybody's gonna be reading it with you. Would you do that? Psalm 103. You go ahead. Psalm 103. 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. He forgiveth all thy iniquities. He healeth all thy diseases. Forgiveth all thy iniquities, healeth all thy diseases, who redeemeth thy life from destruction, who counteth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies, who satisfies thy mouth with good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagles. The Lord executed righteousness and judgment for all thy own press. He may know the way through Moses and his action to the way of the children of Israel. Good job. Good job. Thank you. Imagine what we'd have if he had a whole church full of people as excited to put the word of God in their hearts as that one. Listen to what he says here. He's telling you what gratefulness will do. He just said, bless the Lord oh my soul. What is he doing? He's expressing gratitude to God. He's thanking him for all the things that the Lord has brought them through. Who forgiveth all thy iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases. By the way, if he had to be healed from the disease, what does that mean? It means he first had to have the disease. It was all part of God's plan. who redeemeth thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee with loving kindness and tender mercies, who satisfieth thy mouth with good things. Now watch, he's just said all these things all the way up through verse five so that he could get to the end of that verse. So that thy strength, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagles. Pastor, I have to tell you, I'm just, now let me tell you, I'm confessing now. I'm just so tired all the time and just so life is just I look at the next thing to do. And when I look at that next thing to do, I mean, immediately, I'm just I can see where I'm going to be at the end of that thing. It just wipes me out. I don't even want to go forward anymore. Just everything is just it's just so exhausting. Everything about life. What can I possibly do? Give thanks. Give thanks, no, no, no, I need some help here. I need you to give me some insight of how to get over this, some trick to be able to bring my spirit back where it needs to be. Give thanks. Give thanks. How could that possibly be true? Because so often, when a person is going through a time of depression and even to despair, they are remembering very freshly the trial, but they are forgetting the great blessings that God has brought them through. They're forgetting, when you think about, look, I look back at a time in my life, I had three little ones, the two younger ones weren't even born yet. And when I was going through a very dark valley of my life, I had three little ones that were running around that house in Texas. I couldn't even see them. I had a wife who was very faithful that we'd just moved from being a senior pastor in Michigan to going to be an assistant pastor in a church in Texas and it was way out of her comfort zone and we didn't know anybody there and the church was not really at a stable point as far as even transitionally. Then it was a rough time and now here her husband and yet she stayed right there beside me. She would spend hours listening to just my blathering. I couldn't even see it. I can tell you when the Lord finally started bringing me out of that dark abysmal pit. It is when finally I started to see not how he had been supposedly cursing me, but how he has been so obviously blessing me. And I forced my mind to say, thank you. Thank you, Lord, for a godly, beautiful wife. Thank you, Lord, for three precious children that, quite frankly, they're not even gonna hardly remember this part of my life. They're not gonna remember their dad in this dark time. Thank you, Lord, in the time that I was doubting you, that you never doubted yourself working in me. Thank you for that, Lord. And then finally, you start coming out of this pit of despair. Why? because of a grateful heart to how God has blessed your life. It improves your outlook. There's a story about a boy who wanted his mother to pay him for all the services he was rendering at home. He left her a note that read this. For washing the dishes, you owe me a dollar. For cleaning my room, you owe me a dollar. For hanging up my clothes, you owe me a dollar. For mowing the lawn, you owe me a dollar. Mama, you owe me pay up. signed the son's name. He printed up a bill for totaling $4 and he gave it to her. The mother came and put $4 on the kitchen table and it had a note of her own sitting beside it. The note simply said this, for carrying you nine months and being sick as a dog, no charge. For staying up all night with you, night after night when you were sick, no charge. For working overtime so that I could get you those special shoes, no charge. For entertaining your friends when you wanted to bring them over without notice, no charge. Signed, your mother who loves you. Total, zero. After reading the note, the young man realized he'd lost sight of the goodness of a godly mother. He had turned a love relationship into a business deal. He said to his mother what a lot of God's children say to him, pay up what's in it for me. Thanksgiving lastly causes our life to model Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ throughout his life He was the creator. He was the designer of the universe. And yet Jesus Christ, it's kind of like to me, Jesus Christ going through baptism. Why did he do that? Did Jesus Christ, was he ever saved? Then why did he go through baptism? Did he have to repent of his sins? No. Do you know why Jesus Christ went through baptism? As a model for you and me. As a picture for you and me. That if he was obedient in that picture of baptism, then you and I ought also to be obedient. Did you know he was the same way when it came to gratefulness? Who is he gonna be grateful to? His Heavenly Father. Yeah, but why? Wasn't he a part? Yes, but he's doing it to show you and I how you and I ought to be living our life with gratefulness. Over and over. In Matthew 11, verse 25, he expressed thankfulness to his Heavenly Father for God revealing his will to him. In John 6, in verse 11, he thanked God for the provision of food. In Matthew 26 and verse 27, he gave thanks at the first Lord's Supper. In John 11 and verse 41, he thanked God for answered prayer. In 1 John chapter 2 and verse 6, it says that if we're gonna follow the model of Jesus Christ, that we ought to ourselves be thankful. He says this, 1 John chapter 2 and verse 6, as far as gratefulness is concerned, He that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked." So if you're abiding in Christ, you're going to have a life of gratefulness. Why? Because Jesus exhibited gratefulness at every turn. Pastor, you've gone through this whole message, and I've got to tell you, I know Christ is my Savior, but I'm struggling with gratefulness. I finished. Tony Evans gives the story and I'm done. There's a story of a dog that loved its master. The master was just a little teenage boy, but this dog was full of joy. His tail wagging all the time. When the boy went to bed, the dog jumped up on the bed and lay right beside him. When the boy got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, the dog would jump out of the bed, walk to the door, and sit at the bathroom door until the boy got out and then jump back in the bed. When it was time for breakfast, the boy would get up and get ready to go to school. The dog would jump up, follow the boy to the table, and then sit at the boy's feet until the boy finished eating and was on his way to school. He would walk outside with the boy until the boy went to the bus stop. Then the dog would sit down and wait for the bus with the boy. When the bus came, the boy would get on the bus. The bus would drive off. The dog would run behind the bus as far as it could before the bus outpaced it. When the boy came home from school, the dog would be sitting right there at the bus stop where it had been sitting all day waiting for the boy to come home. The boy would then go to his home. The dog would walk with him and sit at his feet while he ate dinner. He would then follow him around until it was time to turn in for the night. At this point, he would jump back on the bed and go through the whole process the next day and the next day and the next day and day in and day out, always wagging his tail. How can a dog do that day in and day out for his little teenage master? This is why. Because when the boy found the dog, It was wandering the street. It was a mangy, unkempt mutt. It was headed for sure disaster by the dog catcher. If that dog had ever been caught, it surely would have not been adopted, but instead eradicated. However, this boy found that wandering mangy dog, took it home, washed it, bathed it, resuscitated it, fed it, and best of all, loved it. It became apparent from the dog's tail that the dog never forgot it. Wherever that boy was, that dog was going to be because it was evident that that dog never forgot where it'd been when that boy found him. Evans now writes this. Some of us were wandering on a street called sin. We're just mangy sinners. Some of us sinned and did not even think about it. Some sinned and didn't care. Other of us were secret sinners. We didn't sin so folk could see, but if it got close enough and was ever revealed, it'd be clear that we were just as mangy as the folks who were doing it in public. Others of us were white collar, sophisticated sinners who never did anything outright, but just kept it all in our minds. No matter what kind of sinner you were, he found you. The grace of God discovered you where you were. You heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and he saved you. And my only question is this, where would you be had he not found you? Is your gratefulness evident in the way that you respond to your master? Let's stand together.