Psalm 147:1 Gratitude
Elderly Care Ministry - Gracepoint
Psalm 147:1
1 Thessalonians 5:18
1 Corinthians 4:7
Romans 1:21
As it’s November and the Thanksgiving holiday is coming up, we want to pause, take a moment
to think about gratitude. Before we start our message I have this pitcher here. We will just
imagine it is a big glass.
[visual: big pitcher of water colored with red food coloring, filled halfway]
Is this half empty or half-full? What do you think?
So they often say, based on your response to this question - half-full or half-empty - you can tell
a lot about a person. We will come back to this pitcher.
So for now let’s look at our verses. I will read our first two verses. Psalm 147:1 – “Praise the
LORD. How good it is to sing praises to our God, how pleasant and fitting to praise him!”
And our second one is 1 Thess 5:18 – “give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for
you in Christ Jesus.”
Now both of these verses talks about giving praise to God or giving thanks to God. Why do they
say that? Is it because God is a demanding God or maybe God is feeling kind of insecure so he
always needs to hear wonderful praises from us about him. No. Psalm 147:1 talks about how it
is fitting for us to praise God. And when we say something is fitting, we are saying something is
right, proper. In other words, it is looking at something and being able to recognize it for what it
is. So, if we look again at this pitcher, the truth is, it is not full but it is not empty either. But if
we are only look at a part of this we are not seeing the whole picture. We don’t have an
accurate view of reality. And one way we can better understand our reality is to recognize what
we do have and be grateful for it. So there is one great fundamental fact for all of us and that is
that we have life and that this life is a gift.
So with that I would like to read our third verse together. 1 Cor 4:7 – “For who makes you
different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive?
What do you have that you did not receive? Isn’t it true, when we stop to think about it,
everything that we do have, including our lives, is something that we have received. We didn’t
earn it or do something to make it happen. We were just born. And if we would stop and take a
moment to think about it, what are some of these things that we have received that we can be
grateful for? When I stop to think about it I have so many things. My parents, the fact that I am
here in America, our health care, fresh water, abundance of food—too much food - and even
having the opportunity to come here week after week. Taking time to pause and think about
what we have and acknowledge it and be grateful, that is one way that we properly relate to
reality. And the more that we recognize our reality and what’s around us the more appreciative
we become.
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Psalm 147:1 Gratitude
Elderly Care Ministry - Gracepoint
I have talked a lot about reality. So what is our reality? We are all here today. We are alive and
free. That is something to be grateful for, but at the same time it is true that in our reality there
could be a lot of pain and difficulties. It could be physical pain or emotional pain. Maybe we are
mourning the loss of someone we loved or we have hurts or regrets in our lives that we carry.
And that’s not to say, that God doesn’t recognize this part of our lives. He is sad for us and he
mourns with us as well for all that is broken. But while we may never receive healing for these
things or see things reconciled while we are here, what if we were to change our focus from
these things and look to what we do have? Maybe our health is not the way we wish it would
be, but what if we stop and think about the nurses who help us each day, the medicine that
make us feel better? Even today we are here in this nice warm room while it is cold and rainy
outside. It is something we often take for granted, but it is something that we ought to be
grateful for.
But again there is a problem with all this. One of the problems is that often times we are people
who don’t want to feel grateful or don’t want to feel indebtedness towards other people.
One example is: I am having some financial difficulties these days and it has been hard and
different people have been helping me out, buying me lunch and taking care of me. And, at that
point, when they offer to help me, I have two choices. I can say, “Wow, thank you! That is so
nice of you.” Or, I can say, “Hello, I don’t need your help! I don’t need you to patronize me! I am
okay.” I can choose one of two ways to respond.
So often it is our pride that makes us want to say, “I don’t need that help from you.” When we
fail to be grateful or we acknowledge these things that are happening in our lives, something
happens to us. Something happens in our minds and in our hearts. I will read our last verse for
us, Romans 1:21 – “For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave
thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.”
What happens when we focus on what is not there, when we focus on things we wish we could
have, is that our minds start getting twisted. And then we just get upset, grumpy, grouchy,
discontent.
Going back to this pitcher, for me, growing up for me all my life, this pitcher, or this glass, was
half-empty. I felt that I got jipped in life! I used to always think that the person next to me
always received more. But if you know my life story: born here in America, my parents love me,
I have a great family, I went to good schools, I have wonderful foods to eat. But here I am
complaining about the fact I wish that I could have more money. I wish that I were prettier. I
wish that I were funnier.
I know in my life I am guilty of being ungrateful for so many things. Taking for granted my very
life. Focusing on all the things that I don’t have. It is utter foolishness. And we all do it. We
think about how our life could be to make it better, but we forget our family, our grandchildren,
our health care, the fact that I live in America, all the wonderful things that we enjoy. And as we
have also talked about before, God has sent Jesus to die for us on the cross. We might wonder,
why is that something that I need to be grateful for? The fact is, even though we try and live our
lives the best we can to be good people, sometimes we do things that we really regret. We
make mistakes, bad decisions, we hurt other people. We have jealousy towards our neighbors.
These things in our heart are called sin. It is because we are sinners that God sent Jesus to come
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Psalm 147:1 Gratitude
Elderly Care Ministry - Gracepoint
and die for us when we didn’t deserve it. He died to pay for our sins so that we could be
forgiven. And when we truly see that this forgiveness is something that we didn’t deserve, our
natural response to this ought to be gratitude. But again, sometimes we are so stuck on
focusing on what we don’t have that we don’t appreciate this wonderful gift of forgiveness and
freedom from sin.
It is true that our lives are filled with difficulties. Sometimes we are sick, sometimes we are
fearful of losing somebody that we love. But perhaps we need to lift our eyes from that and
think about what we do have. And ultimately, through Jesus’ death on the cross we can actually
have a full pitcher of full blessed life. So let’s take this time of thanksgiving, these next couple
weeks, to really think about all the different ways that we have been blessed.
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