Thanksgiving

On Sunday 16^th November, the Anglia Youth Chorus led the worship at Wisbech Corps. Below are the sermon notes I used.

In that day you will sing:

“I will praise you, O Lord!

You were angry with me, but not any more.

Now you comfort me.

See, God has come to save me.

I will trust in him and not be afraid.

The Lord God is my strength and my song;

he has given me victory.”

With joy you will drink deeply

from the fountain of salvation!

In that wonderful day you will sing:

“Thank the Lord! Praise his name!

Tell the nations what he has done.

Let them know how mighty he is!

Sing to the Lord, for he has done wonderful things.

Make known his praise around the world.

Let all the people of Jerusalem[a] shout his praise with joy!

For great is the Holy One of Israel who lives among you.”

(Isaiah 12, NLT)

Every year in America, on the fourth Thursday in November, families and friends gather to celebrate thanksgiving with one another; a day to give thanks for all that has happened in the preceding year and the harvest that has been gathered in. It’s a time to share the joys and celebrate God’s goodness. People from all backgrounds and religions spend the day thinking about what they have to be thankful for, whether they are the wealthiest or the poorest, whether there is lots to be thankful for or little, whether they’re giving thanks for food, shelter, good things that have happened, or just the fact they’re still living.

While today we think of thanksgiving as a very American concept, throughout church history there have been ‘Days of Thanksgiving’ celebrated whenever there was a reason for national celebration. In fact, we’ve just recently celebrated one of them – Guy Fawkes Day began as a ‘Day of Thanksgiving’ for the failure of the Gunpowder Plot – giving thanks for the salvation of the King’s life and of parliament. And while we may not think of it as such, Remembrance Day is also a day of thanksgiving as well as remembrance; we’re giving thanks to those who gave their lives so we could be free.

Being thankful is still a major part of today’s culture. I’m sure we all know of the Roses advert, ‘Thank you very much for…’, and recently on social media there was a ‘thankfulness challenge’. People would have to share for five days 3 things they were grateful for on that day, and then challenge a number of friends to take part. While the movement began mainly amongst Christian people, it was not limited to them. Many people of other faiths and no faith also took part in the challenge. The challenge was supposed to reveal to people that there are many things to be thankful for; trying to create a thanksgiving mind set within themselves that would last beyond those five days.

Thanksgiving

But with everyone being thankful for things, who are we thanking? Being thankful suggests there is a person or reason giving us these things. If things come our way by chance, our thankfulness is hollow; it is more of an appreciation for what we have received than being thankful; we are happy to have it, but no one is receiving our thanks. When non-Christians are thankful for the things they experience in life, they are more focussed on the fact these things have been received by them and how good it makes them feel.

As Christians, our thankfulness is different, because we believe God has given us all these things. Our thanksgiving is part of our worship; he receives it as an act of worship from us. We should have a thanksgiving mind set towards him at all times, most importantly because there is one thing we have received from him that should cause us to be more thankful than anything else we receive.

What is it?

It’s forgiveness for our sins and salvation through his son, Jesus. By his death and resurrection, thereby paying the price for our sin, we are saved and can enter into a relationship with God.

From our reading, we can see that before we came to Jesus, God was angry, because of our sin.

Experiencing God’s Anger

Our passage from Isaiah 12 is a song of thanksgiving for salvation. At the time of writing, the people of Israel were experiencing trouble for their sins. They had not turned from their wicked ways, and so could not experience salvation. Just two chapters earlier, in Isaiah 10, the Lord is expressing his anger at the way the Israelites have behaved, but this is not the only time God gets angry with the sinful. He has always been angry with those who do not follow his laws as Paul writes in Romans 1:18 – 21:

“God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God. Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks.” (NLT)

And Paul warns that we too experience God’s anger in Romans 2:3:

“Since you judge others for doing these things, why do you think you can avoid God’s judgment when you do the same things?” (NLT)

When we sin, we experience God’s anger. His anger brings death, and is painful to experience. In Isaiah, God was going to send the Assyrians to punish them for their wicked ways. But for us, we experience God’s anger as a broken relationship. We can never truly have a relationship with God while his anger burns against us. 

But Isaiah 12 is not focussed on God’s anger. By the end of verse 1, God has come to bring comfort. But what has changed? What changes this anger into comfort? And how?

Experiencing God’s Power & Comfort

Verse 2 says ‘God has come to save me’. It’s Jesus. While God is angry about our sin, he loves us enough to get involved in the mess of our lives to come and rescue us himself through the death of his son Jesus.

In Isaiah 40:9-11, we read that God is coming in power to rule with a powerful arm, but he will feed his flock and hold them close. Isaiah was prophesying the coming of Jesus. When Jesus came, he came with the power to forgive sins so that we could be comforted. Our comfort cannot come before the punishment, but Jesus took that for us on the cross so that he could then be the one to offer us comfort, knowing he was the one who saves us.

Experiencing Joy

We are dependent on this grace; this gift of salvation we haven’t earned. This salvation and forgiveness are just some of the gifts we have undeservedly received from God. And in return for these things, we should live in recognition that they belong to God. When we do, we experience joy – because we know we owe God EVERYTHING.

 

When we experience the joy of salvation, we want to thank the Lord because we know we don’t deserve the rescue, but we also want to tell of his great name to those who haven’t experienced God’s salvation, and tell them what he has done. When someone becomes a Christian for the first time, they’re so joyful and thankful; they can’t help but spread the news, which is what we see described in Isaiah 12:4-6.  

Testimony of God’s presence

Isaiah knew what it was to receive forgiveness and salvation from God. He had known the salvation in his life in chapter 6; God made him clean to be his messenger. And since then, he shared God’s message with the nation. He wanted them to turn from their sin so they too could experience the joy he had found.

Those who regularly spend time with God and receive his forgiveness know what they have been saved from, the mess they make of their live; the cost of their forgiveness, the death of Jesus; and that the news must be shared with others, because it is just too good to keep to themselves. They are joyful, because they are rooted in the relationship with God that is the result of salvation.

But we can too easily loose this sense of joy and thanksgiving. When we’ve been saved a while, we can forget what it was like to be in the mess. We can forget what we have been saved from. And without recalling that experience, we forget the joy it brought into our hearts. If we don’t experience the salvation in our lives, how can we tell of it to others?

When did you last experience the power of salvation in your life? When did you last drink from the fountain of salvation? Have you ever even tasted the waters?

We need to keep coming back to the fountain. A fountain at the time Isaiah wrote would not be a fountain as we picture one, but what we may call a spring – the source of a river. A spring appears to come from nowhere, but keeps flowing. That is what salvation is like. It appears from nowhere but keeps coming. There will always be enough if you are truly sorry for your sin and want to be saved.

Jesus died so we could be saved. It is his death we should give thanks for.