Thankful for Fellowship
Thankful • Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 60 viewsNotes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Introduction
Introduction
Officially in the month of November, this year has been going by way too fast if you ask me, (You’re probably like, nooo it couldn’t be any slower!!!)
thanksgiving is right around the corner
Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. The food is obviously amazing, turkey… mashed potaters, mom makes a killer green bean caserole (You guys are probably like, ew, what’s that, no Green bean casarole is the bomb) but besides the food and the people, there’s really not all that much going on. I’m not going to get any candy baskets like I would on easter, and I’m not going to get any presents like I would get on my birthday or on Christmas, there’s no decorated Christmas tree, nothing all that glamorous.
But I’ll tell you what usually happens in my heart as Thanksgiving starts to roll around.
First off, I usually realize that I haven’t been as thankful as I should have been for the rest of the year.
But then I start counting all the things that I do have to be thankful for. And I realize that I have more than I could ever need. I have a loving family, I live in a free nation, I have a roof over my head, and most importantly, I have a God that loves me and I know is going to take care of me, I have every reason in the world to be thankful.
So this month, Nick and I are going to be starting a new series on thankfulness. And it’s going to be called, “I’m thankful for...”
So we’re going to look into four things that we have as Christian’s to be thankful for, and we’re going to fill in that blank with something new. And trust me, there are way more than four things that you have to be thankful for, but we’re going to focus on four things that we thought would be really good to look at.
Now before we get into our first “I’m thankful for...” topic, I want to start out with a simple question for you guys to think about.
“Why is it important to be thankful?”
“Why does it matter if I am a thankful person?”
Anyone have any ideas?
“Why should we be thankful?”
Stephen, Malachi, Mary…?
First off, God told us that we need to be thankful
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
It’s the will of God that Christians are thankful people.
If anything, Christians should be the most thankful people in the entire world because of what Jesus has done for us. And unfortunately, too many of us are walking around with our heads down all the time.
Do you think God is trying to be mean to us in telling us to be thankful?
I mean, I don’t know about you. But have you ever had a really bad day, and someone comes up to you and is like, “Hey, cheer up!” Come on, why are you looking so blue? And that was probably the worst thing that person could have said to you? It felt like nails were being scratched on a chalk board. And you think to yourself, dude that was literally the worst thing you could have said to me right now.
, dude that was literally the worst thing you could have said to me right now.
That’s not what God is doing here. God isn’t trying to bring us down by telling us to be thankful. He’s trying to help us see all of the blessings there are that we have to be thankful for, even when we are having really bad days.
He wants us to see that we have a hope in Jesus Christ that is so incredible, that we can still be thankful for that, even when life around us is falling to pieces.
And if anything, those are probably the days when we need to be thankful the most.
I know there have been times of my life where, if I didn’t choose to be thankful, and it might have been the hardest thing for me to do, but if I didn’t, I would have gotten myself into a really deep pit of bitterness.
So thankfulness is a powerful, powerful tool that God has given us to live life to the fullest.
Secondly, being a thankful person really affects the way that you look at life.
Do you guys like being around someone who is complaining all the time?
I’m sure you all know somebody who is like that, maybe you can even be like that sometimes. I know I can.
But you know, those people who always seem to see something wrong with what’s going on. It could be a perfect day out, the weather is nice, nothing is going wrong whatsoever, and still that person has something to complain about.
Those people just aren’t that fun to be around, right?
No, they bring you down.
On the other end, those people who are always thankful and uplifting, and seeing the positive things in life, those people are much more enjoyable to be around.
Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.
So on that note, we are going to jump into our first, “I’m thankful for...” topic.
If you
And the first one will be, “I’m thankful for Fellowship.” “I’m thankful for Fellowship”
And specifically the fellowship that I want to talk to you guys about today is the fellowship that we have with God.
Did any of you guys hear the study that I did last week on the glory of God?
Well if any of you remember, I finished off the study by talking about how God has called us into his own glory, God has called us to share in his glory, and kind of the peak of the experience of his glory is that we as believers are able to join into this amazing fellowship that has been going on between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, for all of eternity.
Like, there is this incredible loving relationship going on within the Trinity that has been going on forever, and ever, and ever, and it’s going to continue to go on forever and ever and ever.
And through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we now get to join in.
And guys, this is an absolutely amazing thing.
But although this it totally true and it sound really good, let me just say something to you guys.
We still live on earth, we aren’t in heaven yet. We don’t actually see Jesus, we aren’t face to face with God yet. We don’t see this fellowship that’s going on in heaven. We live in a fallen planet. So how can I experience this today?
One word: prayer
God has given us an incredible gift of prayer so that we can start to experience that fellowship now, here on earth.
God’s given us this gift so we don’t have to wait until heaven to start hanging out with him. God’s like, I want you to hang out with me right now. All you need to do is pray, to talk to me.
And that is definitely something that we can be thankful for.
Turn with me to
And here Jesus is going to show us a few things about what prayer is all about, and why we can be so thankful for this.
Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” And he said to them, “When you pray, say:
“Father, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread,
and forgive us our sins,
for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation.”
Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”
Let’s just stop there for a second.
Jesus prayed all the time you guys.
Let me just give you guys a few verses that talk about how often Jesus prayed.
And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed.
And after he had taken leave of them, he went up on the mountain to pray.
In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.
So today I want to share with you a couple of things about this gift of prayer, because prayer teaches us to be thankful for God, for who God is.
And I believe very deeply that the most thankful Christians in the world, are Christians who pray.
So I want to share with you three main points about prayer.
But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray.
In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.
And check this one out
In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.
If Jesus thought it was important to pray, how much more do you think we need to be praying?
Jesus’ disciples clearly knew how important prayer was to him, that’s why they say here in verse one of our text today, “Lord, teach us to pray.”
And I just love this, his disciples didn’t ask Jesus how to preach, how to teach, how to heal the sick, how to cast out demons, they asked him to teach them how to pray!
Prayer is the lifeline for our Christian life, if we aren’t praying, there’s no way we can survive.
But thank God we have a great teacher who can show us how to pray, so long as we are willing to ask him, “Lord, teach us to pray.”
So Jesus responds to this request from his disciples, and gives us what we commonly call “The Lord’s Prayer.”
Personally, I wouldn’t call it the Lord’s Prayer, because Jesus never had to ask for forgiveness, like he tells the disciples to.
If anything, I would call it “The Disciple’s Prayer.” But let’s take a look at what Jesus says here.
He begins in verse 2 by saying,
And he said to them, “When you pray, say:
“Father, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread,
and forgive us our sins,
for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation.”
Luke 11:2-
So let’s break this down, because there is so much here that we can learn about prayer through these verses.
Notice the first thing that Jesus says we are to say in prayer.
“Father.”
I just love this you guys.
The relationship we have with God is like that of a Father.
Not everybody has had a perfect Father. But we have a Father in Heaven who absolutely loves us, and before we get into anything else, it’s so important that we realize who we are coming to. It’s not like we have to beg him like a slave. He’s a good father!
He goes on and says, “Hallowed be your name.”
On top of being our Father. He is also a Holy God.
And I want to stop there for a second too because I think this is so important for us to realize when we come to God in prayer.
So often we come to God and the first thing we say is, “God, I need this.” or “God, will you help me with this situation…?” And I’m not saying that it’s bad to say these things. Those things are going to be a part of this prayer that Jesus lays before us. But before we get to all of our needs, it’s so important that we see God for who he is.
Once we see just how great and awesome our God is, our needs and trials seem to get way smaller. If God is so great and loving, of course he’s going to meet our needs! It boosts our faith to see God for who he is!
Let’s move on.
Jesus goes on to say, “Your Kingdom Come.” And if you look at the book of Matthew, Jesus goes on to say, “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
Our desires in prayer should never be to accomplish my will. It’s not about me having my way and trying to persuade God to do what I want him to do.
Prayer is about getting on God’s side.
And I find this to be really true. The more time I spend in prayer, the more I see my desires start to line up with God’s desires. And God is really good at leading our lives.
I love how David writes it in
Delight yourself in the Lord,
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
I’ve also heard it this way, and I really like it.
“Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will make his desires your desires.”
And I think that’s so true. When we spend time with us, He gives us his heart for the world around us.
And that’s how you can really start to do something amazing for God.
I’m sure some of you really want to serve the Lord. And let me just tell you a secret. The best way you can learn to serve the Lord is by praying.
Jesus goes on to say, “Give us this day our daily bread.”
So like I said earlier, God is concerned with our daily needs.
God knows that you need food. God knows that you need clothes, and families, and so on. But I love how this prayer comes after the first couple of things that Jesus has said.
Once we are starting to grasp what God’s will is for our lives, we also start to see what we really need in life.
There was a man by the name of George Muller. I doubt any of you know who he is, but let me share with you a little bit about this man’s life.
George Muller was a total prayer warrior. I mean, if you want to learn about the power of prayer, just look at this guy.
George Muller believed that he could get everything he needed simply by praying to God. He never asked for money, even though at times he was very poor. But he prayed, and prayed, and prayed. And there would literally be times when he was on his last dime, and God would send someone to his front door to drop off the money that he needed, without him ever telling anyone.
And that’s just the way he lived.
As his life continued, God provided the funds he needed to start an orphanage, and support over a thousand orphan with food every single day, and he never asked for money. He just prayed.
I don’t know about you, but that kind of faith convicts me.
Like, how much do I trust that God would provide for my every need through prayer?
Jesus goes on to say,
“And forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who have sinned against us, and lead us not into temptation.”
This is another very important part of prayer that I want to point out to you guys.
If you guys have ever looked at the Armor of God, Paul actually gives us an entire
Really applicable for our lives today.
Do you instantly get angry at them, or do you pray for them?
Prayer brings us victory over sin, and helps us to forgive the sins of other people.
So with
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
So the main thing that I want you guys to see about prayer is that we can find everything we could possibly need by just praying.
And since God has given us this awesome gift, we have every reason to be thankful.
There really is no room for complaining when we see how much God cares about our every need.
Simple message today, but I hope this reminds you all how awesome it is that we can have fellowship with God whenever we want through this awesome gift of prayer.
We have so much to be thankful for
So on that note, I’m going to give you guys a little challenge for the week.
I brought some I’m thankful for papers...
fill them out and stick them in your bibles
Go home tonight and make a list of the top ten things that you are thankful for, stick them in your bibles and bring them next Sunday.
ADVERTISEMENT