be grateful for the good things

1 Thessalonians 5:18. In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

HAPPY THANSKGIVING CANADA !

And once again we are gathered here to celebrate God’s Day, Sunday, the day He rested from His labours, after creating the world and all therein in the previous six. And on this Thanksgiving Sunday in our blessed country of Canada, we must remember that gathering in the Lord’s name is not simply a suggestion, but our bounden duty, as the author of Hebrews tells us: ‘Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.’ (Heb. 10:25)

And the scholars explain it thus. ‘The admonition “Not forsaking the assembling,” involves far more than erratic attendance. It involves the entire worship of Christ and is an outward indication of an inner condition. The assembling of God’s people provides opportunity for reciprocal encouragement, strengthening, and the stirring up that can be gained from one another (cf. Col. 3:12-16). It consists of participation in worship and fellowship. The church is a body interacting (1 Cor. 12:14-27); it is not merely a dispensary of spiritual food and medicine.’

And do I ever like that last line. The body of Christ is one that thrives on total interaction, and we gather not just for spiritual enlightenment but to exhort, to uplift each other in whatever aspect we might need it. So, having seen the many benefits of assembling, (smile) let’s get to giving thanks and praise on this Thanksgiving Sunday by opening with a most appropriate song. It’s fairly new, in comparison to some of our other hymns, and was written by one Johnson Oatman, Jr (1856-1922) an American ordained minster, a very prolific songwriter.

And the song is one we all know and LOVE, titled ‘Count Your Blessings.’ I chose it for today because I figured that we can never truly give thanks until we are fully aware of what we’re giving thanks for, and counting our blessings reminds us of all that we have to be thankful for. So, let’s open our harmonious voices, sending up sacrificial praise, in a rollicking rendition of ‘Count Your Blessings.

Singing: ‘When upon life’s billows you are tempest tossed, When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost, Count your many blessings, name them one by one, And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done. (Refrain: Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your blessings, see what God hath done; Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your many blessings, see what God hath done.) Are you ever burdened with a load of care? Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear? Count your many blessings, ev’ry doubt will fly, And you will be singing as the days go by. [Refrain]

When you look at others with their lands and gold, Think that Christ has promised you His wealth untold; Count your many blessings, money cannot buy Your reward in heaven, nor your home on high. [Refrain] So, amid the conflict, whether great or small, Do not be discouraged, God is over all; Count your many blessings, angels will attend, Help and comfort give you to your journey’s end. [Refrain] 2’

That was indeed a rollicking rendition my people! Heaven surely knows that we are sincerely grateful for the many blessings they have poured down on us. And what does ‘Count Your Blessings’ really mean eh? I have a note here, don’t remember where I got it from, (smile) but it defines counting your blessings as ‘to be grateful for the good things in your life, often to stop yourself becoming too unhappy about the bad things.’ And that’s all it is really: being thankful for the breath we breathe, for our friends and families, for our jobs, health, food, clothing and shelter, plus the ability and joy of sharing what we have with others.

Oh my friends, so much of our world right now is in such bad shape, they have nothing at all, that we should be awfully glad and thankful for whatever little we have. As one quote so rightly advises: ‘If you always find yourself numbering your troubles, you will never find time for counting your blessings. There is no use becoming frustrated in your difficulties while you have all opportunities hiding in them for a turnover.’ And that’s the gospel truth; there are always opportunities in our troubles to begin again, to turn over a new leaf, to find something useful, some blessing in those same troubles.

The problem though is that we pay more attention to our troubles than our blessings, when the fact is if we write both our blessings and troubles on a sheet of paper, we’ll most likely find that we have way more blessings than troubles. And it’s not like the scriptures doesn’t continually tell us to give thanks, to be grateful for all we have. So, let’s look at a couple of them.

And this advice from Bruh Paul the Thessalonians as he exhorts the brethren to good works, is one of the most all-encompassing, but very problematic to many of us. He says first of all: ‘Rejoice evermore.’ Then ‘Pray without ceasing.’ And finally: ‘In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.’ (1 Thess. 5:16-18)

Now those are certainly tough scriptures to continually enact, but with proper understanding and God’s help, we can certainly do them. It’s simply keeping a good attitude regardless of our circumstances, while being in touch with the Lord throughout the day talking to Him about whatever is going on with us and giving Him thanks through Christ for all His help, because that’s what He desires of us. Please remember that the Lord created us so that He could have good fellowship with us, that we should do His will and in so doing, glorify Him. So those three things that Bruh Paul asks of us, is what we were really created for.

And here is some more advice from Bruh Paul, this time to the Colossians, on the topic of Christian virtues. He writes: ‘And above all these things put on charity (LOVE), which is the bond of perfectness (the crowning grace of Christian virtues). And let the peace of God (harmony) rule in your hearts, to the which ye are called in one body, and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.’ (Col. 3:14-17)

Right there we have the basic virtues of our Christian faith, beginning with LOVE, the crowning glory, and ending with thanks, sincere appreciation for it all. Now, let’s go home this Thanksgiving Sunday with this beautiful and most useful recommendation from the website http://www.godtube. It says: ‘God truly gives us so many blessings each and every single day. Some may even be so small that we might overlook them. The classic hymn ‘Count Your Blessings’ truly reminds us to stop and give thanks for all God has done in our lives. This is definitely a pause we all need to take. Amen.’

So please my fellow saints, let’s pause today and count our many blessings, then give God our grateful and sincere thanks for them nuh. It will go so much better with us. Much LOVE!

…to God the Father be all the thanks and the glory…through Jesus Christ…the Son…

Hear our podcast at https://open.spotify.com/show/3aVfqIC1CqwGybISs9dZJ8

Psalm 40:5. Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to us-ward they cannot be reckoned (recounted) up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.

Well my people, on this Sunday morning in mid-March, when the clock has just gone forward an hour in the controversial Daylight Savings Time situation, there is some news leaning towards the good side, but whether it is sensible to enact it, that’s something else. (smile)

And the good news is that physical in church worship has been eased, but still under the last protocol; masks, cleaning, physical distancing, no actual choir singing, etc. etc. Now it’s debatable whether all the effort need to do that for the small crowd that might come is worth it. Then we would still have to do some virtual worship for those who won’t come. That puts a great strain on the priest and the few people who usually do all the hard and dirty work. And with the many variants prevalent these days, my recommendation would be to leave it as it is; just do the virtual worship.

But since no decision has been made on that as yet, let’s get on with our virtual worship. (smile) And today we’re opening with a marvelous semi-old song written by New Jersey born Johnson Oatman Jr. (1856-1922) And it’s such a realistic and providential song, that if we had been singing and doing what it says all along, feasting on thanksgiving and praise, we might not be ensnared in the Corona pandemic right now. So let’s open our hearts and give voice to the wonderful hymn, ‘Count Your Blessings!’Raise those voices to heaven in a sweet, scintillating, harmonious, up tempo version as the beautiful music leads us in worship!

‘When upon life’s billows you are tempest tossed, When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost, Count your many blessings, name them one by one, And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done. (Refrain: Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your blessings, see what God hath done; Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your many blessings, see what God hath done.) Are you ever burdened with a load of care? Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear? Count your many blessings, ev’ry doubt will fly, And you will be singing as the days go by. [Refrain]

So Count your blessings, see what God hath done; Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. (Now let’s sing that chorus again so we’ll remember it.) Count your blessings, see what God hath done; Count your blessings, name them one by one; Count your many blessings, see what God hath done.’

Oh my faithful saints in Christ, that message is ever so important to all of us! Why, you ask? First of all, let’s check out what counting your blessings means. It basically means to be grateful for the good things in our lives, as well as to stop ourselves from becoming too unhappy about the bad things we must all go through at some times in this earthly life.

And the website www.godtube gives us this interesting explanation. ‘God truly gives us so many blessings each and every single day. Some may even be so small that we might overlook them. The classic hymn ‘Count Your Blessings’ truly reminds us to stop and give thanks for all God has done in our lives. This is definitely a pause we all need to take. Amen.’ And if that isn’t the indisputable truth, I don’t know what is!

Yes friends, in this busy world, where we’re so busy going nowhere fast, we all need to take time every so often and count the good things we have, instead of labouring on and bewailing the bad things, or the things we don’t have. That’s the only way to keep our stress, greed and envy level down. Let’s stop looking at what we don’t have and concentrate on what we do have, especially since many of us are living better than most of our fellow human beings.

As www.godtube continues to tell us: ‘‘If you always find yourself numbering your troubles, you will never find time counting your blessings. There is no use becoming frustrated in your difficulties while you have all opportunities hiding in them for a turnover.’ That’s wisdom in spades my brethren! If you concentrate on counting your troubles, you’ll never find the time to count your blessings and the many opportunities that are hiding in those troubles.

And Bruh David puts it ever so nicely for us in Psalm 40 – Praise for answered prayer. ‘Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to us-ward they cannot be reckoned (recounted) up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.’ (Ps. 40:5)

That’s more indisputable truth my people. We can never count the many blessings that God has given to us during our lifetime…and is still giving to us every day! The problem is that we consider blessings as big, bright baubles and bangles, whereas God takes pleasure in meeting our smallest needs when we least expect it. It’s time for us to stop looking for big blessings, and check out the small stuff. We’d all be amazed at the number of small but wonderful blessings that the Lord has bestowed on us down through the years. So many, that we would be unable to count them.

As Job said when he acknowledged God’s justice: ‘I know it’s so of a truth: but how should a man be just with God (how can a man be righteous with God)?…Which doeth great things past finding out; yea, and wonders without number.’ (Job 9:1,10) And yes, Job and Bruh David are two men who ought to know of God’s goodness and faithfulness, because they experienced hardship but never gave up on Him. That’s why Hebrews declares: ‘But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.’ (Heb. 11:6) Now, I think that’s a very fitting note to end on. (smile)

So let’s go forth and start counting our blessings nuh, instead of our troubles. It will make our lives so much more interesting and fulfilling. Much LOVE!

…in every thing give thanks…for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus…concerning you… (1 Thess. 5:18)

SCRIP-BITS

Today’s Scrip-Bit 14 March 2021 Psalm 40:5.

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