into this. Heavenly Father, God, I pray for your help tonight. With my speech, help to make it clear, as we look into your word and study this concept of gratitude, I pray that our minds would learn, but God, I also pray that tonight would not be about me and what I say or how I say something, that our minds would be focused on your truth, and what your spirit is speaking to our heart about that truth, and what we need to do about it. God, help us to grow here tonight, in Jesus' name, amen. Okay, so, what we've seen so far is, we'll summarize it this way. Our knowledge of truth makes us think. Okay? The more we don't know about God and understand about God and He's gracious and His loving kindness and His sovereignty and all of His grace and blessings, that's knowledge. That if we wrap our minds around that knowledge, impels us to thank, okay, to be grateful to God in that spiritual sense. But we've also seen, too, that if we look at everything in our lives that's going on, okay, the good, the bad, and the ugly, it's all from God. And God would not allow it happen to his children unless it was good, even though we can't stand it. So with that knowledge, it should cause us to thank, even for the bad stuff. So definitely, knowledge makes us thank, but thankers, that would be people of gratitude, thankers also feel. Okay, we're gonna look at both concepts here tonight. Imagine this. We know the truth that God is all loving and good and we deserve nothing. Would we agree with that? Okay, even if it's just a Sunday school assent to that truth, yes, we understand that's true. But when we really know and tap into that truth, I mean, think about it, you deserve nothing. I deserve to have that passing lane open when I'm driving, okay? I deserve for everyone in my house to speak to me a certain way. I deserve for my boss to show some respect for my hard work. We deserve nothing. It doesn't matter what our relationship is with somebody, okay? I'm their father, they're my child. It doesn't matter what the contract at work says. We deserve nothing. So that's why I'm kind of emphasizing this. When we really know and tap into that truth, it does something for us. We feel it at that point. We've moved beyond saying thank you because that's what we're supposed to do. But then we begin to feel that thankfulness. And as our feeling lines up with that truth that we deserve nothing, wow, I really don't deserve anything. That alignment seeks a way to be expressed. And at that point, you no longer are forcing yourself to be thankful, because that's what a thankful Christian does, and so I want to do these things. It's just coming from your soul. You're feeling it as well. Because those feelings, they don't want to be corked up. You've just got to let them out, okay? So let's look at our first point. Feelings matter and so does doing We're gonna look at both sides of that coin. Now this may go without saying, but thanksgiving is an act of giving, okay? And that's the two words right there. We are giving thanks. It is an action. If we're going to practice thanksgiving, we don't just feel something, we do something. Luke chapter 17. Verse 12, I'll begin reading there. ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off. And they lifted up their voices and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. And when he saw them, he said unto them, Go, show yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass that as they went, they were cleansed. Let me just stop there. He didn't rub clay on them. He didn't say, do you believe? If you believe, your faith will make you whole. He didn't wave his hand. He didn't throw a stick at him, nothing. They said, have mercy on us. He said, okay, go show yourself to the priest, which is what a leper was supposed to do to be examined to see if they'd been cured of leprosy. That was all he did. He said, go, just go show the priest. Now, They started walking away, they realized they were cleansed. Then verse 15, and one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back and with a loud voice glorified God and fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks. And he was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering said, were there not ten cleansed, but where are the nine? Verse 18, they are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger. And he said unto him, arise, go thy way, thy faith hath made thee whole. Now, a lot of times we look at the one leper, okay, and I've already brought him out, how he showed gratitude, okay? But let's just consider the other nine for a moment here. Or in fact, all 10 of them. They said, Master, have mercy on us. If we could make sure all those lights are up, we're getting flickers here and people are gonna think they're strobe lights and start dancing in the aisles. Whoa, okay, thanks. Have mercy on us, he said, go show the priest. And they turn around and realize their leprosy's gone. What's going through their minds right then? What do you suppose they're feeling right at that moment? Excitement. Yes. What else? I'm going to go tell my family. Yeah, which they probably haven't seen for a very, very long time. What else? Amazement. Yes. Okay. Okay. All right. True. What else? They were what? In shock, yes, they might have been feeling shock, they might have been feeling relief, actually, joy, extreme joy. Have you ever been so excited and so happy about some unexpected news, you totally forget everything that's going on around you? Yeah, that could happen and maybe that's what happened with them. God doesn't focus on the reason the nine didn't thank God or thank Jesus for what he did. And perhaps they were even feeling hope at that moment. I'm not going to die in a leper colony. But nine of them did nothing with the feelings. Ellen's right, they might have been feeling thankful, but only one of them had the action to go with it, okay? So they go together. You can't have just the feeling, there has to be the action to go with it. It's not just an act, and it's not just a feeling. We can do acts of thankfulness, can't we? Okay, don't raise your hands, but have you ever wrote a thank you card to someone and you weren't really feeling thankful? Okay, or said thank you to someone and you weren't really feeling thankful to them? And I'm not even talking about, thanks a lot. I'm not talking about that kind of a thank you. Someone holds a door for you, you walk through, you say thank you. And you don't even realize you're saying it, maybe. You're definitely not feeling it. So, feelings matter, and so does the doing. Let's go on to number two. It's enhanced by expression, okay? Being blessed is passive. Are we blessed people? Yes, okay, but being blessed, that's a passive thing versus an active thing, and here's what I mean by that. A person can sit and do nothing and be blessed, and make no response at all to being blessed, all right? Actually, the whole world is blessed. Saved, unsaved, it doesn't matter. The whole world is blessed. Can you think of some ways the whole world is blessed? We have freedoms in America, yes, yep. Our needs are provided, okay, what else? Regular four seasons, yep. Sun come up this morning, yep, on the whole world. Oxygen, we're all breathing it, okay? Gravity, yes. Oh yes, yep. So the whole world is blessed by things such as sunrises and rain and all kinds of blessings. But the whole world doesn't respond with thankfulness because thanking is an active thing, all right? Have you ever seen the movie Anne of Green Gables? Go ahead, guys, admit it if you've seen it. All right, there's a few manly men that are not afraid to admit it. There's a scene in there where Matthew, do you remember who Matthew is? He's the old farmer that adopts Anne. There's a scene in there where, and if you remember, Matthew's the really soft one with Anne. He's the one that Anne has wrapped around her finger. And then there was Matthew's sister, do you remember her name? Oh, now I gotta fill it, what's that? close to Martilla, Marilla, okay? Do you remember what Marilla was like? Attila the Hun, okay? That's how I remember it. She was the stern one, the disciplinarian, can't have any fun, Ann, stop being a child, okay? It's time to grow up, and none of this nonsense. So Matthew gets a dress for Anne, a dress that she just wanted because she had to have this dress. In order for her life to be fulfilled, she had to have a dress with fluffy sleeves, okay? It was so important, her life would end if she didn't get a dress with fluffy sleeves. And so he bought her this dress with fluffy sleeves. And she absolutely loves it. She puts it on, she models it for Marilla in this scene, and Marilla, Attila, okay, who's always the stern and sensible, no-nonsense one, she wants Anne to immediately go take off that dress before she gets it dirty and ruins it. Anne can't even think of doing that. She has to right then run out to the barn, okay, uh-oh, where Matthew's doing chores. Why? Yes, she said to Marilla, I have to thank Matthew. She had been blessed. Her feeling was there and that feeling was bubbling up. She was risking getting cow manure all over her pretty dress because she had to thank Matthew for what he did. Grateful hearts have to say so. They have to say so. Now think about that. There's a difference between being grateful and being grateful to where we have to say something. Grateful hearts, as I said, they have to say so. Not when they think of it, not when they get around to it, not because they have to, it just comes forth from that feeling in their heart. If we are not saying thank you, That is saying something about our thankless hearts. Because thankfulness in the heart just bubbles out. Like Anne, you have to say something. When we're thankful, it's because we're enjoying something, right? Okay, buy me a caseload of frozen spinach. I am not saying thank you, okay? I might thank you on behalf of the food pantry, which is where it would go, but I am not saying thank you. I cannot envision any amount of beneficialness coming out of that caseload of frozen spinach that when you cook it, it's just a glob on your plate, okay? It just doesn't work with me. When we enjoy something, that's the beginning point. That's what we're thankful for. I have never thanked my dad for a spanking, okay? I certainly didn't enjoy it. And by the way, I've heard of some parents say, okay, when they're done disciplining, okay, now thank me for teaching you that lesson. Oh yeah, right, that is not happening. When we express that thankfulness to someone, okay, The joy that we had received from the initial blessing, that joy gets enhanced. Because we're able to not just give them a thank you card, but express that gratefulness that's just bubbling out of our hearts. Our own joy is enhanced. Try to think of it this way. To be grateful and not express it is like learning a new song, and never singing it. It's like getting an engagement ring but she never wears it. It's like buying an ice cream cone and just letting it melt and drip all over the floor. Or getting a Harley and never taking it out of the garage. Yeah, that you can understand, right? Okay, that just would not compute. So, gratefulness is completed and consummated in the expression of it. True gratefulness, that feeling in our heart, it hasn't consummated until it's been expressed. You've not quite maximized your pleasure from the blessing until you express your appreciation. Here's another way that we can do thankfulness, and that is serving others. How does your thankfulness serve others? Well, When we express that gratitude from the blessing, our hearts are truly overwhelmed with gratitude, it's bubbling up, we can't keep it corked in, it spills out, and when we do that, we've just enhanced our joy that we received from the original blessing. But when we express gratitude, it enhances, it serves others by enhancing their joy. Those of you that are grandparents, Okay, maybe not so with your own children, but when you buy your grandson, it doesn't matter what it is, a little $1 bottle of bubbles to blow, and he blows bubbles all over the yard, and his face just lights up. I'm getting back to the dollar tree and buying a case of those things right now, okay? That just made my day. You know what I'm talking about? Now, that's just on a very obvious connection there, but the same principle holds true. We get the blessing. We're truly grateful in our hearts. It bubbles forth and we're serving others by enhancing their joy for having given us that blessing in the first place. So now it's come full circle. It is an act of love to them, in fact. It can even create a snowball effect. Let me throw it out to you this way. Someone does something for you, okay? You express gratitude to that someone. It just enhanced their joy. It's heartfelt, it's real, it's genuine, and that gratitude just enhances their joy, which in turn motivates them to continue that act of service that you have enjoyed. Now, they may bless you again. They may just go on and bless other people. How many of you have experienced the joy of giving to other people? Man, it's great. And once you do it, you're like, I want to do that again. I want to do that. Let's find someone else. Let's just find someone we don't even know and do it. It happens all the time at Christmas time with different people. So a person A person can get to a point when they just say, forget it. That person didn't appreciate it. And you're like, I'm not buying anything for them again. I'm done. But many times, this is what I just described in reverse, okay? Many times, while it is I'm done doing anything for them, they don't appreciate it. Many times, it grows to no one ever appreciates what I do. I am done all across the board now. And we start shutting them down. All because we weren't grateful. and we didn't express that gratefulness. So in that way, we can serve other people, enhancing their joy and encouraging them to continue to bless people with whatever it was they had done. Let's look at number four, the cost of giving thanks. What is the cost, do you think, of giving thanks? Anyone want to venture a guess? Time, okay, Jackie? You gave me sign language, she shook her head no. Nothing, okay? But I understand what you're thinking of too. Almost nothing is the cost of giving thanks. It takes two things, okay? The giving of thanks requires two things, grace and obedience. Grace and obedience. And in a practical sense, Armand was right. It can take time. Ask the newlywed bride after the wedding. Okay, hours and hours and hours of writing thank yous. Listen, we are fallen, sinful humans, are we not? To be genuinely grateful requires a work of God, doesn't it? If we don't think it does, we're fooling ourselves. We're thinking too highly of ourselves. It takes a work of God, and that work of God is called grace. Another aspect of amazing grace. That grace brings about a heart transformation. Do you remember, to be truly grateful, okay, it starts with that knowledge, I don't deserve anything. But the problem is most of us think we do deserve something, don't we? Whether it's to be treated a certain way, spoken to a certain way, things done the way we want them done, or whatever it is. And it takes grace to put self down. And so grace is that needed ingredient that brings about the heart transformation. And it starts then with our obedience. Okay? How do we initiate that type of grace transforming our heart? Obedience. By saying to God, yes, God, I will thank. Okay? Just start with that, and when we start with that, here's what God does. 2 Corinthians 9.8, and God is able to make all grace abound toward you that ye always, having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work, and in that word every, we could put the word gratefulness. thinking, okay? Let's just consider that verse for a moment. Does God's grace have limits? Does it ever run low? Does it ever run out? Does he ever withhold it from anyone? It's not possible to have a day when his grace is running low, because he's got it spread out so thin, right? So those days when we're having a bad day and we are unusually ungrateful, it's not God's fault. Massive amount of grace, he says, to make all grace abound toward you so that you may abound to every good work. Lamentations 3 in verse 23, it said, it is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. Okay, his mercies. His grace, they're never-ending. But now that's just one side of the coin. Let's flip that coin over. Gratefulness doesn't just happen. God's grace is poured out to us, but that doesn't make us grateful. Why not? Because we, by nature, are are self-preoccupied, demanding our rights, what's in it for me, kind of people that we are. God's grace enables us, enables us to be thankful people. But it takes our cultivation. to bring that about. Now, the first way we do that is mind transformation. We have to change the way we think, okay? You've seen the bratty child, perhaps, either in a movie or in the grocery store having a temper tantrum because they think they deserve to have this thing. Or They deserve to have their cell phone. Take that cell phone away, you'll find out how much they think they deserve to have a cell phone, okay? Take that cell phone away from an adult, and you'll see how much they think they deserve to have it. That's what we are. We have to change the way we think. We really do think we deserve certain things in our life. Listen to this verse in Psalm 119. Verse seven, I will praise thee with the uprightness of heart. I will praise thee with the uprightness of heart. Now, you'll notice the three dots at the end of that, it's because the verse goes on. And I did it that way because I want you to just let that part sink in. I will praise thee, okay? That's giving thanks, gratefulness coming from our heart, But now look at the rest of the verse. When I shall have learned thy righteous judgments. Mind transformation. We start thinking differently about who we are and what we deserve. And back to the first part of that verse please. What happens? I will praise thee. When I start thinking differently. Thanksgiving, it costs almost nothing, but preparing the heart will cost something, like looking for opportunities to express gratitude to God or other people. Imagine that being your challenge tomorrow morning when you wake up. Okay, I am going to look for somebody to thank, to be grateful for something they did for me. That's what my goal today. Three people. I'm going to find three people that have done something for me and I'm just going to thank them for it. Even God, you know, we could throw God into that too. Now that will cost something, time, okay? It's going to require us to focus our mind on something other than what we normally focus on. It's gonna be more intentional to do that. It costs us choosing to be intentional. It costs changing our heart. It costs maybe a stack of cards, some envelopes, some postage, and some time to fill out a card and send it to someone. It starts with being thankful to God. Folks, if we don't know what God has done for us, we won't thank Him. So thankfulness hinges on us being people of the Bible. We've got to know about God and what he has done for us. Number five, and then we'll be done. Gratitude is not a chore. In spite of the costs of gratitude, it's not a chore, it is really just Feedback we're giving to someone that's prompted by some level of satisfaction we have received, something of benefit. It's reached a certain level of satisfaction and so we're prompted to give feedback. It's a reaction to an action that we determined to be beneficial to us. Now we can see this with God and the things that he does for us. Our soul should respond with gratitude. But also, our soul should respond with gratitude to each other and the things that we do for each other. This is what happens in a grateful heart. It recognizes that it has received a benefit. It wasn't an obligation, it wasn't something that was owed to me. It was grace, it was unearned, it was undeserved. The grateful heart sees itself as a have not who has just received from a have, and they're grateful. When it comes to God, He's not looking for our offerings that give back what he gave us in the first place. God is looking inwardly. He's looking for grateful hearts. Those hearts recognize we have nothing. except God give it to us. So let's bow our heads and just pray real quick about this. Heavenly Father, God help us please, with our hearts, our mind transformation that we need, help us to put this into practice this week. And it may not even feel normal or natural to us at times, but that should tell us something there in and of itself, the fact that it doesn't feel natural. God, help us to be grateful for what you have done for us, your multitudes of blessings, and help us to look for other people that we can serve by sharing gratefulness with them. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, folks, we're gonna break up and have some prayer time right now, thank you.