Dr. Rick Mandl - November 27, 2020
Transforming Power Of Thanksgiving
Devotional Manuscript: The Transforming Power of Thanksgiving
Message By Dr Rick Mandl, November 27, 2020
Recorded in Los Angeles, CA.
Hey church family, I know it’s BLACK FRIDAY and Thanksgiving is officially behind us . . . But for the Christian, it ought not to be, and so for that reason I wanted to conclude this week by once more talking about THANKSGIVING. Specifically about Giving thanks “in” and “for” all things. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 we’re told that we are to “give thanks in all circumstances.” In Ephesians 5:20 (NCV) we’re told to “always give thanks to God the Father for everything.” You put those two together and you realize that God calls us to give thanks “in” and “for” all that we experience.
The problem is that in hard places and in hard times, this is hard to do. We can pretend that all is well, but God sees our hearts. We can claim that things will inevitably get better, but biblical examples of innocent suffering prove that it’s not necessarily so.
Last weekend I shared with you a familiar story of ten lepers who were healed by Jesus. You’ll remember that all ten were healed, but only one - - only the one who returned to give thanks was told by His Lord. . . “Your faith has made you well.” In Luke 17, we’re introduced to these 10. We’re told that Jesus met these suffering men as “he was passing along between Samaria and Galilee” (vv. 11–12). In response to their cry for mercy, he told them to “go and show yourselves to the priests” (v. 14a), this was necessary on the part of anyone who wanted to be pronounced clean of leprosy so he can reenter society. And the ten obeyed him, they were “cleansed” (v. 14b). However, only one returned to thank Jesus for his cleansing (v. 16a).
Luke makes clear the astonishment he expects his readers to feel when he adds, “Now he was a Samaritan” (v. 16b). As the gospel writer John notes, “Jews have no dealings with Samaritans” (John 4:9). Jews considered Samaritans to be a race of half-breeds resulting from intermarriage between Gentiles imported into the region by the Assyrians (2 Kings 17:24) and Jews who remained there after the Assyrian conquest. Consequently, the Samaritans and the Jews lived in enmity for centuries. The Samaritans because they were not allowed by the Jews to worship at the temple in Jerusalem, built a rival temple on Mount Gerizim. They accepted only the first five books of the Old Testament and rejected all Jewish traditions. So the idea that the only person returning to give thanks to Jesus was a Samaritan must have shocked Luke’s Jewish readers.
We know also because this Samaritan was the only one who returned to say “Thank You” that he was also the only one who received Jesus’ word of blessing: “Your faith has made you well” (Luke 17:19). That word translate “Well” means “to be delivered” or “to be saved.” The other nine were healed physically; only this man was healed spiritually. And it’s from that Samaritan leper, one of the unlikeliest of all faith heroes, we learn an important spiritual lesson: and it’s simply this. . . Thanking God for his material gifts puts us in a position us to receive even greater spiritual gifts. The reality is . . . No matter how hard things are, we can always find a reason to give thanks. And when we do, we experience what God can only give to those who are willing to so.
Let me share with you one example: A Scottish pastor was famous for beginning his invocation each Sunday with a word of thanksgiving. He could find something positive in even the most negative of times. Then came a Sunday when the weather was atrocious: icy streets, frigid temperatures, howling winds. When the pastor rose to pray, those in the congregation thought, “Certainly there is no way that he’ll begin his prayer with thanksgiving on such a terrible day.” But they were wrong: the pastor opened his prayer with the words, “Lord, we thank you that it is not always like this.”
If there’s nothing else in your circumstances for which you feel like you can thank God today, you can offer that same prayer of thanks - - - “Lord, we thank you that it is not always like this.” If this has been a Thanksgiving when gratitude has been hard for you, I encourage you to look for ways and reasons to give thanks. God’s Word encourages us to “enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise” (Psalm 100:4), knowing that when we do, we encounter the Lord himself. And that’s what makes it a Thanksgiving to remember.
Recorded in Los Angeles, CA.
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