A Thanksgiving Reflection

I love Thanksgiving. I love the idea of taking a day to put more emphasis on being thankful. We have so much to be thankful for, especially here in the States. It saddens my heart to see how people so often rush past Thanksgiving and make a day that's mostly about satisfying your flesh. First people gorge themselves on a plethora of food. And then they try to gorge themselves with more stuff by trampling other human beings in a line just to get a sale on a thing. It's so important to take time to be thankful for everything we have. But instead people turn Thanksgiving into a time of trying to get more stuff.

On the flip side, I think we as people have a bad habit of trying to sugar coat things on Thanksgiving. We name all the things we're thankful for that are easy to be thankful for. "I'm thankful for my house and my education and a free country..." and so on. We try to ignore all of the bad parts of our lives on Thanksgiving so we can highlight and be thankful for all the good stuff. But when was the last time we thanked God for the bad stuff too? True thankfulness is not just praising God for the good stuff, but for the struggles and hard things to be thankful for too.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 says, "Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances. For this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."

We are called not just to be thankful for the easy things the thank God for. We are called to thank God for the hard things too. When we're living in God's will, trusting that he turns even trials into blessings, then we can give thanks in all circumstances and thank him for the hard things too.

I'm reminded of the old hymn "It Is Well" which says, "When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well, with my soul." This song is a reminder that life is filled with both good and bad times. But with the God of the universe on our sides we are able to give thanks in all the hard times too because through peace he gives it can be well with our souls.

I'm thankful for my family even though they drive me crazy. I'm thankful for an education even though it costs a lot of money. I'm thankful for my car even though it has some problems. I'm thankful for the finances I do have even though it isn't much. I'm thankful for the hard times I go through because I know God uses them to make me stronger and more mature and closer to him.

So this Thanksgiving, my challenge to you is stop sugarcoating. Stop focusing on only the good stuff and thank God for some of the tough things too. He is able to turn the hard stuff into even bigger blessings than he good stuff. This Thanksgiving, dare to be thankful in all circumstances.

The Spirit, The Seed, And Me

Last night I volunteered with the Word of Life Superbowl in Binghamton and the COOLEST thing happened! While I was sitting at the Davis table, helping admissions out with recruiting, a girl came up to the table. She was unsure of my name at first but she recognized me. It turns out that she had been one of the girls that I had counseled last year after they had both made first time decisions for salvation. She told me that both she and her friend were back this year and they had brought four more friends back with them. Those friends made the decision to accept the Lord tonight.

It was so cool! Partly it was cool simply because those girls didn’t make a decision that night on an emotional high just to fall away from it later. It is always encouraging, especially as someone who has done salvation counseling with many different people, to see that they really meant it. But more than anything, it was cool because I remember counseling them. And I remember feeling like I had done a horrible job at it! I hadn’t reviewed the gospel with anyone in a while, I was missing points, I was distracted and all over the place! And they both had kind of given me deer in the headlights looks when I was done. So it was so amazing to find out tonight that even though I felt like I had done a terrible job, and maybe from formal training standpoint I did, I was still able to impact those girls so much that they remembered me a whole year later!

I don’t say that to brag on myself at all! I say that to brag on my God! It was such an awesome reminder to me that I am unable to do ministry on my own. Because if it hadn’t been for the Holy Spirit working through me, even in the disorganized rambling mess that I felt I had been, I never could have adequately counseled those girls. If the only tool I had was my rambling on about Jesus, those girls probably wouldn’t have come to Christ that night. They probably would have left and completely forgot about it. But because I had the Spirit of the Living God working through me as I counseled those girls, my words were able to minister and impact those girls in spite of my rustiness. The Bible says in Luke 12:11b-12, “Do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.” What a testament to that promise this story truly is. Even when I lacked words, the Spirit still spoke through me in a mighty way.

Lastly, this encounter really impacted me because the girls came back with more friends! God used me to plant a seed in their lives. Not only did that seed grow, it started producing and planting more seeds! And that is such refreshing news for someone in ministry. Not only did God use me to plant seeds in just two girl’s lives, he used me to plant seeds in their lives so they could spread the same seed in the lives of their friends. And who knows how much further it will continue to spread. I may never know how far the seeds I have planted will reach, and I don’t need to know. It is just so refreshing to be reminded that a seed planted truly never is a waste. You never know how many more seeds will be planted because of just one.

I shared with those girls what a blessing they had been to me by sharing all of this. And God laid it on my heart to pray with them again. So I got to pray over the girls again before they left. They both gave me hugs and said, “See you next year!” I don’t know if I will actually see them next year or not, though I hope I do. But even if I don’t, God used them in my life on that one night to remind me that even when I feel like I have failed, the Spirit can still work through me to plant seeds that grow and then continue spreading. I am so glad that God used an encounter as cool as this to teach and remind me of these important ministry truths.

Nothing I Hold Onto

We held Ruah, a worship and prayer night for the students here at school, tonight. It was a powerful time and God really moved in the hearts of many that came. He especially moved in my heart! And it was so awesome to see how God spoke through me but also to me in the same message. It was powerful to see how he used some of the stuff I had been struggling with this week and turned it into a means of encouraging others. I was truly blessed by just how simply good God really is.

 

I personally had been struggling through out the week and semester to live for God wholeheartedly. It is so easy to let other people, or things, sins, or addictions get in the way of having a deeper walk with God. So as I have been seeking out this deeper walk with God, desiring to gain a new level of intimacy with him, it is only natural that he is making me more aware of the things that I have put before him in my life. I needed this message tonight as much as anyone else there did!

 

I delivered this brief message before the people spent some time in group prayer. I wanted to share it with you too! At the bottom there is also a video version of the message if you would rather watch that. I hope you are blessed by this too!

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Who are you worshiping? What consumes you? I think we'd all like to say that God does, but is that really the truth? God is pursuing you and he wants to be near to you. He loves you and wants to have a close relationship with you. But we get so distracted by the things of this world that don't enter into a closer relationship with him. So instead we have half-hearted relationships with God. We invite him into our lives, but we invite the things of the world in too. We let worldly things take the place of a Holy God. 

 

And then we get addicted, and instead of trying to draw close to God, we let these things, these idols take control. We all know what our idol is. It's different for each of us. For some people it's a person, for others a thing, for some a sin. But we all struggle with something.

 

But the Bible says in James 4:8 " Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world." Surrender yourself fully to God. God is right here in this room waiting for you to come back to him. He has been standing here with open arms and he desires for you to come back into them. He wants to be close to you. 

 

So tonight is the night to let go of that idol in your life, stop living half-heartedly for God and live a life of self-abandon, living wholeheartedly for God! Find people to pray with and spend some times praying over the idol in your life that is keeping you from having a closer walk with God.