Before we turn in our Bibles, let's come before God in prayer. Let's pray. Almighty God and most merciful Father, we humbly submit ourselves and fall down before your majesty, asking you from the bottom of our hearts that this seed of your word now sown among us may take such deep root that neither the burning heat of persecution cause it to wither nor the thorny cares of this life choke it out. but that as seed grown in good ground it may bring forth 30, 60, 100 fold as your heavenly wisdom has appointed. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Turn in your Bibles to 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians 5. 1 Thessalonians 5, we'll begin at verse 12. And we'll read to verse 28. 1 Thessalonians 5. You can find that on page 1174. We're gonna be looking at three verses, verses 16, 17, and 18, but we'll read verses 12 to 28. Page 1174. This is the word of God. We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves, and we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the spirit. Do not despise prophecies, but test everything. Hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil. Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. Brothers, pray for us. Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss. I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. This is the word of God. As I said, we'll be looking at verses 16, 17, and 18. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. So I want to look at a complete thanksgiving here in 1 Thessalonians. point out what we are thankful for on Thanksgiving, and maybe we're missing something as we just point out to what we are thankful for. But I wanna look at more of a full Thanksgiving, a more well-rounded Thanksgiving, not full of turkey and stuffing, but a fulsome view of Thanksgiving. The tradition of going around the table reciting what we are thankful for might miss something. And Paul gives us what would be a fulsome, a godly character of a man or of a woman, of rejoicing, of praying and thanksgiving. And I wanna read two excerpts of commands side by side, and you can tell me this Thanksgiving morning which one you would rather, right? I'm gonna read two excerpts, two sets of commands. Which one would you rather? You shall not steal, You shall not lie, you shall not covet, or rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances. What would you rather of those two? I think that's tough for me, looking at those. I think I would take the first. Don't do this, don't do that. It's a little easier than feel this. What we have here in 1 Thessalonians, if we are honest, is a bit latida maybe, isn't it? Dreaming in the clouds. Can we say that about scripture? I think that's how we feel, though. I mean, I feel that way sometimes. I'd rather be told, don't do this, than feel this. Right? Don't do this. rather than be joyful, be thankful. So oddly, I came to this passage this week bemoaning to my wife, right? All I have to do, right, a council meeting and a pre-confession class, which we ended up canceling, but Thanksgiving service and the two services, and then I got a wedding next week, so I'm having to write a whole bunch of sermons this week, bemoaning, right, complaining, not being thankful, not rejoicing, Coming to a text that says always rejoice, always be thankful, always pray, feels like a sermon that I need. I need to preach it to myself. And I don't think I'm unique in feeling this way though. I think many of us need this. We need to be lifted up. We need to be redirected. Sure, we can say that we are thankful for family in Turkey and no school and so and so and go around the table, and surely we will this afternoon. But what about tomorrow? What about the next week? What about the next month? What about the next year? What about when we get sick? What about when we lose our job? What about when someone close to us gets sick, someone close to us dies? Are we able to feel this? What about when we experience persecution, when we experience trials? Now, there's no doubt these commands are good. Rejoice, pray, be thankful. Obviously, that is what we aim for. To be a Christian means to have a heart of joy. It means to have a mentality of prayer. It means to be thankful. But I said, what about when I'm grumpy? I don't want to be joyful. I don't want to be happy. So the real question when we come to this is really how. So let's look at these commands from that perspective. How do we rejoice always? How do we pray without ceasing? How do we give thanks in all circumstances? Because we will be grumpy. We will be down. We'll have times when we're spiritually struggling. So how? Well, first, how do we rejoice always? And we'll spend more time here because this is really the foundation for the other ones. It's really the direction of our heart. This one sets our hearts in the right place, looking at the right place. The root word for rejoice is joy, of course. What is joy? Well, it's important to know the difference between joy and happiness. The world is directed to be happy always. You watch commercials and that's what they're seeking to make you. Buy this and be happy, right? Rejoice always does not mean always have a smile on your face. Does not always mean that you are laughing and bubbly and giddy personality. If this was the case, we'd have a problem with our savior Jesus, wouldn't we? How often does Jesus have a smile on his face? We're not told, I don't think ever, but we do know other verses. What is the shortest verse in the Bible? He wept, Jesus wept. So that's actually the shortest verse in the English Bible. The shortest verse in the Greek Bible is actually 1 Thessalonians 5 verse 16. Rejoice always. That's the shortest verse in the Greek Bible. But the shortest verse in the English Bible is Jesus wept, right? He's not happy. Now, Speaking about a verse reference, we're not saying that, verse references didn't actually come in until the 1500s. So, I mean, it doesn't say anything that that's the shortest verse, because that didn't, it's not inspired, we would say, right? But Jesus wept. Verse references help us to remember passages, help us to remember verses like Jesus wept, so that we know that Jesus is human, so that we know that Jesus wept, that he cried, that he was sorrowful. Jesus wept when his friend died, when he saw his friends mourning the loss of his friend, Lazarus. If someone were to ask him how he was feeling when he was standing there, he would have not been happy. He would have been sad. Likewise, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Luke 22, verse 44, Jesus was not happy. What happened there? Jesus was sweating blood because of the stress that he knew that he was going to go through, bearing the sin of the world on himself and dying on a cross, being forsaken by God the Father. So rejoicing is not happiness. Rejoicing Or joy is something much deeper than happiness. Joy is a lasting state of being. Eating turkey and stuffing makes you feel good, makes you happy, puts a smile on your face, but it will fade. Later in the day you're gonna have to eat, well, depending on when you have Thanksgiving, but tomorrow morning you're gonna be hungry. You're gonna wake up and be hangry, right? That's the phrase. But, then again, you can look at the presence of family and friends around the table as you eat turkey and stuffing. That brings more joy, right? Because your friends, your family, they're always with you. If we had to be happy always, that would be very hard. But rejoice always, a deep set inward reality. Romans 14 verse 17 points us to joy, a joy better even than family, more lasting than family, because family will not be with us always either. It points us to the kingdom of God, for the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in this Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is key for rejoicing here. How can we rejoice always? Well, the Holy Spirit's presence among us. We can go through difficulties, we can go through trials and severe distress, and we can, at that same time, be joyful. Why? Because of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Because of the kingdom of God, our eyes are fixed on Christ, on the here and now, but also on the future, what is to come. The Spirit of God gives you eyes to see right now, but also into the future. And you have the Spirit right now dwelling in you. That is how you can understand the Bible. If you read the Bible and you understand that Jesus Christ is your Savior, you have the Spirit of God. And Paul, who wrote this command under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, lived like this with joy. 2 Corinthians 6, Paul tells us of all the troubles that he has gone through for the sake of Christ. Second Corinthians six verse four, Paul says, but as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way by great endurance in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger. Verse nine, he continues, unknown and yet well known as dying, and behold, we live as punished and yet not killed, as sorrowful, he says, yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing everything. Paul himself acknowledges joy and sorrow at the same time. Joy and sorrow. Sorrowful yet always rejoicing. How? Because he's looking to the future through the eyes of faith. The future where he says, possessing everything, right? Saying all this poor and sorrowful yet rejoicing, yet we possess everything. Paul doesn't literally mean that he owns everything, that he's going to own everything, but that he has everything that matters, and he has that right now because he has Jesus. Like David confesses in Psalm 17, verse 15, I shall behold your face in righteousness when I awake. I shall be satisfied with your likeness. Beholding God is everything. That is where joy is, in beholding God. And we behold God through his son, Jesus Christ. image of the invisible God. So how do we rejoice always? Well, friends, look to Christ. Because he is everything that matters. Whatever you go through here, fix your eyes on what is promised, Jesus. This doesn't mean no troubles and a life of ease. In fact, you know what, the sufferings in this world are no accident. The sufferings we experience are the path itself leading to Jesus. We are called to suffering. Life is not rainbows and gumdrops, happiness, but it is joy because of what we look forward to. And what we experience in this world, suffering, is part of that. is God's plan even, 1 Peter 2 verse 21. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. Christian, you are called to suffer. For to this you have been called, because Christ suffered, leaving you an example. You're called to suffer. So we will go through suffering in this life. But as we go through that, we are like Christ. And if we go through that with our eyes fixed on Christ, then we can endure. Paul is speaking to people who have already experienced joy while suffering. 1 Thessalonians is written to a church that is suffering. You can look back a few pages. In chapter one, verse six, Paul says, with the joy of the Holy Spirit. These believers suffered like Paul, right? That's what Paul's saying. If you know Paul's suffering, they suffered like Paul. For Paul to say much affliction, that says something, right? Paul had a life of suffering, a life of affliction. For him to say that is not in light. But also in chapter two, verse 14, you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews. Paul is saying the Thessalonians suffered at the hands of their own countrymen, the people around them, as the same as the Jews did in Jerusalem. That was beatings, that was imprisonment, that was death. These Thessalonians suffered. This church has been persecuted, afflicted. I mean, Paul was torn away from them, physically torn away from them. In chapter 2, verse 17, Thessalonica was not friendly to the church. And Paul is telling them, Paul is commanding them in the Lord Jesus to rejoice, and to rejoice always. He's telling them, look to what matters. Look to Christ. Rejoice in Him. Rejoice that you are like Him. Likewise, you friends, rejoice always. How? Well, lift your eyes to Christ. Lift your eyes to eternity. Your future is secure. When you hold Jesus Christ as your Savior, your future is secure. Nobody can take that away from you. That is the foundation of rejoicing. And even more than that, you can rejoice in your actions when they are like Christ's. When you suffer, you can even rejoice in them, that you're experiencing what Christ experienced, that you're being formed and shaped like Him. The second command is pray without ceasing. Maybe you've heard this verse many times, quoted it many times. We often do quote this verse many times as we pray, maybe sarcastically. How does this mean, or what does this mean, or more so how? So how can we fulfill this? How can we pray without ceasing? It cannot mean to be in a constant prayer to God, can it? This word. that is used here without ceasing is used four times in the New Testament. Three of those times are in Thessalonians here. The other time is in Romans 1. Paul's writing to the church in Rome, and he says, he's talking about how much he wants to go there, how much he wants to go to Rome, and he says, without ceasing, I mention you. Well, we know Paul mentioned other things besides going to Rome, right? like teaching Timothy and Titus and writing a lot of letters, visiting a lot of churches, preaching in a lot of synagogues and in town squares and in homes. Paul did sleep as well, so he wasn't praying without ceasing, literally. Paul was not always mentioning his desire to go to Rome, as we read in Romans 1, verse 9, right? He really wanted to go to Rome. And he said, without ceasing, I mention you. He has the idea that he's going around. Everywhere he's going, he's talking about going to Rome. I really want to go to Rome. But Paul must not mean literally, right? And same with this verse here. Pray without ceasing. We wouldn't say that it's literally pray without ceasing. Literally move your lips to God without ceasing. Otherwise, you're all failing right now because none of you are moving your lips, right? So what does this mean? Well, just as rejoicement, a heart directive, to look to Christ in all things, so to pray without ceasing, means to have a constant heart directive, a heart directive towards God, towards dependence on God. That's what prayer is, right? It's a dependence, realizing we need God, realizing we cannot do this on our own. Do you pray? How much do you pray? Well, that shows how much you depend upon God. shows how independent you think you are as well. So we can take how Paul uses this word in Romans 1, and I would like to take it from two other circumstances in Greek literature that this word is used, and I think we can use it to help us direct our prayer life. So Paul uses this in Romans 1, and then he uses this to mention how much he wants to go to Rome. And then this is also used in other Greek literature. It's used in reference to a cough, like a hacking cough, right? You cough without ceasing. It just comes again and again and again. It's also used in Greek literature. referring to a city under siege, an unceasing siege. It's a lot of siezes. Wave after wave comes against the city, right? Barrage after barrage until the city falls. So how do we pray without ceasing? And we'll use these three ideas from Romans and then from Greek literature as well. Well, first from Romans, Paul says he really wanted to go to Rome. It means he thought of it constantly, right? It dominated his thinking. If you want to think of a word in regard to this, you can think fixation. He was fixated on going to Rome. Pray without ceasing is like a fixation. Maybe ideas for Christmas presents are forming and you really want something for Christmas, it dominates your thinking. You don't think about it all the time, but very often. You don't have to consciously think about it either, it just comes up, right? You're fixated on a gift. Or maybe you have your eye on a guy or a gal, and you message him or her. Well, maybe you aren't literally talking to this boy or girl all the time, but your mind is fixated on her. Your mind is fixated on him. And you check back again and again if you have a message. You have no trouble remembering him or her because you're fixated on him or her. Pray without ceasing means prayer is on your mind like an addiction, a fixation, like a strong passion, no matter what you think about it. In other words, it's not forgot because you love it. You don't even need reminders set for you because it's just going through your mind all the time. It's a fixation. It's prayer on your mind. Like the love of your life. Like the thing that you desire the most. That it just arises in thought over and over and over again. Through all times of the day. Well, praying without ceasing is also like a lingering cough. As I said, Greek literature uses this phrase to refer to a hacking cough or a lingering cough. It just never leaves you, right? It arises spontaneously. If Romans 1's word is fixation, then this lingering cough word would be spontaneous. You cannot help it. Like when there's a tickle in your throat, suddenly coughs just come out, right? You can't help it. No other option. Prayer just suddenly bursts out of you. Do you have times like this? Where prayer just suddenly bursts out from you? Maybe when you drive, right? A deer flashes in front of you, just narrowly missing your vehicle, and prayer, right? Thank you, Lord, that I missed it. Or on the other hand, a deer bursts out in front of you, flashes before you, and then thud. You hit it. And then your prayer, please help me not to be too bad. And maybe the deer is okay. Probably not. Prayer is spontaneous, right? So pray without ceasing is a fixation. It is spontaneous. It's also like a battle siege. Back in the day, cities would fortify themselves by barring their gates. There would be cities, there's walls around cities, and they would be hiding behind their walls with their gates locked, and an enemy would come and siege the city. So they block off the whole city so that the city can't go anywhere, and they attack the city, right? And they would not just attack once, but they would attack again and again and again, right? Plan, attack, regroup, plan, attack, regroup. Weakening their defenses over and over and over and over again. Attack after attack after attack. Burning the gates and attacking the gates with battering rams, scaling the walls and trebuchets, those big things where they fling fireballs or rocks or whatever over the walls to attack. Weakening the city over and over and over again. Well, these attacks, these siege that took place were planned. Each attack was thought through and executed. The word to remember here in regard to prayer is planning. Fixation, spontaneous planning. Pray without ceasing takes planning. We are considering how. Well, praying without ceasing takes planning. Brothers and sisters, Do you have a plan for prayer? Do you have a place for prayer? Do you have a time for prayer? To have your mind fixated on prayer, to have your mind that is just spontaneously outbursts in prayer, you have to have a plan. And you have to execute. You have to form a habit. Are you praying without ceasing? I have to tell you that I have never heard of a Christian that does not pray. It'd be like being married and never talking to your spouse. That's not a marriage. Are you fixated on prayer? Does it come up spontaneously? The answer, no, well, it's likely because you do not plan to pray. Friends, prayer is showing our dependence on God. It is coming to him and acknowledging, I can't handle this. I can't handle so-and-so in my life. I need you. Friend, you need prayer. Because you will suffer in this world and you will need someone to turn to. Someone that will not turn away from you. Someone that will be there and knows exactly what you are going through. And that is God. So have a mind fixated on God that spontaneously calls out to him and plan this. Make a habit. So we have rejoice always, we have pray without ceasing, finally we come to give thanks in all circumstances. And how do we do this? Again, we have this idea of constantly, always, without ceasing. Give thanks constantly. Can you give thanks for everything that you go through? Before you answer, think of the context here. Paul is writing this. We know the Apostle Paul. If you do not know the Apostle Paul, he is the one in 2 Corinthians 11 verse 24 that says that he had the 40 lashes minus one. And they say minus one because it was thought that 40 lashes would kill you, whereas 39 didn't. And he had that five times in his life. He was beaten with rods three times. He was shipwrecked night and day adrift on the sea We know that he was stoned, left for dead. He says danger, wherever he went, from robbers, night and day, Jews, Gentiles persecuted him in cities, in wilderness, false brothers, people in the church persecuted him. He was not safe even in the church. Hunger and thirst, cold and exposure, Paul suffered, just like Ananias said that he would. Paul suffered, Paul is saying give thanks in every circumstances, every circumstance. And who is Paul writing to? Well, this church in Thessalonica, which is undergoing no small persecution, no small affliction themselves. Brothers and sisters, you can give thanks in all circumstances. That does not mean that you're giving thanks that you are diagnosed with cancer. That does not mean that you are giving thanks that your family is hurting. It does not mean that you give thanks that you've lost your job or lost your life savings or those kind of things. Paul didn't give thanks for being beaten with rods or 40 lashes minus one. Paul didn't give thanks when he was kicked out of cities and left for dead. But Paul did give thanks to God because there was always something to be thankful for. He was thankful to suffer for Christ. So when he was beaten with rods, he was thankful that he could suffer and be like Christ, that he could suffer for the gospel. People of God, there is always something to be thankful for in your life. Always. Without fail. You can be thankful for sunshine. You can be thankful for cushioned seats right now. You can be thankful that the person beside you wore deodorant. Or you can be thankful that You can be thankful for anything. You can be thankful for family that you have. You can be thankful for food, for shelter. I mean, I would challenge you to go through what you are thankful for. Each day, go through what you are thankful for. Start with small things that you woke up, that you're alive, that Not every part of your body hurts. Maybe a lot of it does. Giving thanks in all circumstances is having a mind frame of thankfulness. It's to acknowledge that God always gives. God is the giver. It's making a habit of being thankful. Paul was able to look at all of his trials from the persecution that that God was with him, right? As Paul went through all of these things, he was able to say that God was with me, that God was using those trials to make him stronger. You can remember when Paul prayed to have his thorn in the flesh removed, and God said no. And Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12 verse 10, for the sake of Christ then I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. He's basically saying, That he's thankful to God for reminding him to depend on God. He's saying all those hard things in his life, he's thankful for them because they point him back to Christ. That he is dependent. Really points him back to prayer, I guess, right? These three things are a cycle that depend on one another. What is it in your life this Thanksgiving that you find hard to deal with? What is it that maybe you feel separates you from God? Maybe it feels like it's a barrier before God, hindering your spiritual life. First of all, you have to ask you, is it separating you from God? Is it God calling you to himself? Is it God making sure that you know that you depend upon him? That is something to be thankful for, that God won't let you go. Now, that doesn't make your circumstances better, does it? You still live in hard times. You still live with difficulties around you. But what it does is change your perspective. God cares about your soul, brothers and sisters, about your character. He's forming, shaping you into who you will one day be in glory. And for that, you can be thankful to God for. Along with many other things, Small things. But that is the point. Have a heart. Have a heart to see that God is for you. That God is not against you. This Thanksgiving, have a full Thanksgiving. Not only being thankful, but rounded off with rejoicing, with prayer, and with thanksgiving. Direct your heart to the Savior who cares for you and who will never leave you. I'll leave you with a passage from 1 Peter 5, verse 7. A passage, as I said again, 1 Peter's written to a church that is suffering. It's undergoing severe persecution. And Peter says, cast all your anxieties on him because he cares for you. Because he cares for you. Because Jesus cares for you. Rejoice in his care for you. Prayer. Be in prayer, thanking him for his care for you. Asking for his care to be ever before you. Be thankful for his care for you. Because Jesus does care for you. Brothers and sisters, amen. Let's pray.