Deo Gloria
November 27+28, 2019
Sermon for Thanksgiving
Pastor Martin Bentz
Text: Psalm 100
Theme: Give Thanks to the LORD!
I’d like you to take a moment this morning and think of three things you are especially thankful for. All right, now I want you to share those things with the person sitting next to you. Share with them the three things you are thankful for.
There are, of course, many things we can and should be thankful for, many reasons we have to worship God and give him thanks. And that’s the point of the verses we have before us this morning. The author of this psalm urges us to worship the LORD and to give him thanks.
Psalm 100 is a psalm of thanksgiving. It says so right at the beginning. The heading of the psalm reads, “A psalm. For giving thanks.” The psalm consists of two invitations to worship and give thanks to God, each followed by a number of reasons to do so. The first invitation comes in the first two verses: “Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth. Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.”
The first set of reasons follows in v. 3: “Know that the LORD is God,” he says. Know that the LORD is God. That’s reason enough, isn’t it? I mean, let’s be honest, do we really need a reason to worship God? I mean, do we really? The LORD is God. He alone is God. There is no other. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the eternal God of heaven, the great I Am, the God who always is. He is the God who never changes, who is always the same yesterday and today and forever. He is the God who is true to his Word and always keeps his promises. He is the God who not only promised to send a Savior to rescue us from sin and death, but sent his own Son to be that Savior. As such, he deserves our worship and praise. He doesn’t have to earn it. I mean, it’s sort of like asking if LeBron James really deserves to be in the Basketball Hall of Fame some day or if the astronauts who landed on the moon really deserved to receive a Congressional Medal of Honor. Even raising the question is an insult. The LORD is God. That’s really all the reason we need to worship him and give him thanks; but there is more.
The psalmist continues: “It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture”(v. 3). Yes, the LORD is the one who made us. We did not descend from monkeys. We did not evolve by accident from some primordial soup. God made us—uniquely, carefully, wonderfully. As it says in Psalm 139, God made us in a fearful and wonderful way. We owe our very existence to God.
And yet, God did more than just make us. As the author states, God also made us his. He has made us his people. “But aren’t we all his people?” we might ask. “Aren’t all people in the world God’s people since he made them all?” At first we might be inclined to answer that question “Yes,” but the Bible’s answer is “No.” No, they aren’t all God’s people, because sadly many people around the world have chosen to follow some other god.
Millions of people around the world have chosen to follow a god named Allah. They are devoted to him. They worship him and will even give their lives for him. Millions more have chosen to follow a god named Buddha. Others have chosen to follow the god of money and material things. Still others have chosen to deny the existence of God all together. They don’t even believe God is real. Those who do so are not God’s people. As the Bible so clearly teaches, there is only one God, the LORD. Those who have chosen to follow some other god in reality belong to the devil. They may not realize it, but he is the one they are following and he is their lord.
So what about us? What about those who are privileged to know the LORD and claim to be his followers—are we any better? If we’re honest with ourselves, we have to admit that we’re
not, because at times we have done the very same thing. We have not been faithful to the Lord our God as we promised to be. Our hearts have not been loyal to him. At times our hearts have longed for and sought after other things. At times we have selfishly put ourselves and what we wanted ahead of God. Often we have gone our own way and done our own thing and completely ignored what God said in his Word. With Isaiah we have to confess, “We all, like sheep, have gone astray; each of us has turned to his own way”(53:6).
In fact, if there’s one sin that more than any other poses a threat to God’s people here in America, if there’s one sin that more than any other poses a threat to God’s people here at Trinity in Belle Plaine, it’s the sin of having other priorities. We’re so busy. We’ve got so many other things to do. We’ve got so many other things taking up our time and attention, that we don’t have time to worship God and give him the praise and thanks he deserves. In fact, even though today is Thanksgiving Day, most people in our country won’t even bother to take the time to worship God and give him thanks. Oh, they’ll have time to eat a delicious Thanksgiving dinner—no problem with that. They’ll have time to watch football—no problem with that. They might even have time to go shopping later today or tomorrow and get in on some of those special Black Friday deals, but they will make no special effort to worship God and give him thanks. When it comes right down to it, we aren’t any better. We don’t deserve to be God’s people either.
But by the grace of God that is what we are. In his grace and mercy God has taken our sins away, all our sins, including our sins of misplaced priorities. Yes, we, like sheep, have gone astray, but instead of laying those sins on us and having us suffer the punishment, God laid them on his Son Jesus. He punished him so that we might be spared. Give thanks to the LORD for his grace and mercy!
Besides that, besides forgiving all our sins, God also has made us his people. In the sacrament of Holy Baptism he put his name on us and adopted us into his family as his very own children. We are his. We belong to him. We are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
And that isn’t a temporary arrangement either. It’s not like we are God’s people in this life, but once this life is over, then our status as God’s people comes to an end too. Remember what Jesus, our Good Shepherd, said in John ch. 10? “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand”(vv. 27+28). The fact that we belong to Jesus now will be good for the rest of eternity. We are his people and will be his forever. What a reason, what a wonderful reason to give thanks to the LORD!
The second invitation to worship God and give him thanks is found in v. 4: “Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.” Like the first invitation, this one too is followed by a set of reasons to do so. The psalmist mentions them in v. 5.
First of all, because the LORD is good. The LORD is good. We see his goodness all around us. We see it in the beauties of creation: in the birds and the flowers, in the majestic mountains and winding rivers. We see it in the corn we pick from the field and the tomatoes we pick from our garden and the apples we pick from the trees. We see it in our families and our friends. We see it in our homes and our cars and our clothes and our cell phones and video games. We see it in our jobs and our paychecks and our refrigerators full of food. And of course, the greatest way God has demonstrated his goodness is by sending his Son to be our Savior and rescue us from sin and death. Indeed, the LORD is good. He is deserving of our thanks and our praise.
And one final reason to give him thanks: “His love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations”(v. 5). God’s love is not a fickle kind of love. God’s love doesn’t change with the seasons. God’s love doesn’t blow away like the leaves when those frigid, winter winds come howling out of the north. God’s love endures forever. It never ends. His love is faithful love.
Boy, can we relate to that, huh? How many of us haven’t been hurt by someone who said they loved us only to find out later that they really didn’t. Thank God he isn’t like that! His love is faithful. He remains faithful in his love to us even when we don’t remain faithful to him. Even when we sin against him, even when we go our own way and do our own thing, God doesn’t say, “All right, that’s it. If that’s the way you want it, out! Get out! You’re not my people anymore. My children don’t act the way you’re acting. See ya’. Don’t call me; I’ll call you.” No, because he is faithful, God continues to love us as his children. If we wander away, he comes looking for us. He leads us back to his fold, washes away our sin and assures of his love. He continues to watch over us, continues to provide for us, continues to lead and guide us. And he promises to continue to do so until we’re safely home with him in heaven. How can we help but worship him? How can we help but give him thanks and praise? One would think that people would have to tie us up and gag us to keep us from coming to church, to keep us from giving thanks and praise to such a loving and faithful God!
Most of you probably don’t know the name John Mentzer, but you probably know his song. John Mentzer was a man who experienced more than his share of misfortune in life. He endured numerous hardships and setbacks. He lived most of his life in poverty. At one point, when he finally seemed to be getting ahead in life, he lost everything he had when his house burned to the ground. The only thing he managed to save was his life and the clothes on his back. So how would you respond if that had happened to you? What would you say? This is what John Mentzer said: “The devil shall not say that he filled me with sorrow and discouragement!” And then he sat down and wrote the following words:
Oh, that I had a thousand voices
To praise my God with thousand tongues!
My heart, which in the Lord rejoices,
Would then proclaim in grateful songs
To all, wherever I might be,
What great things God has done for me.(CW 194:1)
Like John Mentzer, we too have experienced our share of trouble and hardship in our lives. But as the psalmist reminds us this morning, we too have plenty of reason to worship the LORD and give him thanks.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name. For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.(vv. 4+5)
Amen.