Give Thanks To The Lord

[0:00] singing together. I was really blessed by that. Give thanks. So please open your Bibles to Psalm 136.

[0:11] Psalm 136 as we prepare for Thanksgiving coming up. And I love that song, Give Thanks.

[0:23] Why are we giving thanks? Why are we thankful? And ultimately it ought to be because of what the Lord has done for us. What exactly is it that the Lord has done for us?

[0:39] Anybody. Christina. He died for us. Yeah, that's huge. Give thanks because the Lord has died for us.

[0:52] What else has He done for us? Y'all thought that was the answer, right? You thought that's it. It's all He's done for us. I hope that's not the answer. The end answer. He rose. Amen.

[1:06] Jesus Christ is risen today. Absolutely. Daniel. He created. Absolutely. He created all things.

[1:17] He created us. If He didn't create, well, we wouldn't have anything to be talking about, right? We wouldn't be here. So, yeah, He created all things. Anything else? Jenny. He forgives.

[1:29] Absolutely. Linked in with what Christine was saying about He died for us and through that death He offers forgiveness. Anybody else? I like this. Go ahead, Carrie.

[1:39] He's promised to return. That is excellent. Yeah. Good eschatology there. He's promising to come back again. All right. Christina wants to add to her answer.

[1:53] He is good. He has given us His goodness. And He has expressed that. Can you, would I, if I put you on the spot, would you feel comfortable with that?

[2:05] Okay. I won't do that then. So how does God show His goodness? Chase. His love, yes. Huh?

[2:17] He provides for us. Yeah. Excellent. Kayla, did you want to add to that? That's what you were going to say? Okay. Yeah, He provides what we need.

[2:29] He provides the reins on the just and the unjust. He shows His goodness, His love. It's great things to think about. Great things to consider as we go into this Thanksgiving week.

[2:41] And then, even beyond that, what happens? After Thanksgiving, where do we head? We go to Christmas. Right? And so, you know, around here, things will start to change.

[2:55] Like, just in general, we'll get snow and bitter cold and all that stuff. And people will be wearing, like, you know, red hats with white, poofy balls at the end or Patriots hats with white, poofy balls at the end.

[3:09] I don't understand that fad. But, yeah, so we're going to get into the Christmas season and, you know, our sermons will kind of gear towards that.

[3:22] But it ultimately, and this is one reason why Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, is because it causes us to reflect. It causes us to think on the things that God has blessed us with.

[3:34] And I appreciated, Dennis, what you shared about gratitude with your class today in that it's not just being thankful and recognizing the blessings we have. Because we do. We have so many blessings and they do come from God.

[3:48] But it's not, what do we, you know, how are we acting on that? How are we, you know, in response, expressing our gratitude for what He has given us? And so I do. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year because of these things.

[4:02] It really challenges me to look at, because it's easy to get bogged down with the trials, right? It's easy to get bogged down with the hardships. It's easy to get bogged down with the, you know, the difficult situations this week in Sanford and Portland and like everywhere, it seemed, in the state of Maine with these calls and these threats that were ultimately a hoax.

[4:23] We praise God for that, that that was the case, but it was still a sick, twisted thing to happen and to occur. And it's easy to just get bogged down with those types of things. It's like, oh, this is, you know, the world is horrible and what we see and what we experience and the hardship and it's easy to forget all the good and especially the goodness of God and the love and the mercy that He has shown to us.

[4:48] And so that's one reason why Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. And I'm not going to lie, it's also because of the food. Right? I love, I love Thanksgiving dinner and the, you know, the like week or two worth of leftovers that happened after that because of all the food on Thanksgiving.

[5:10] And turkey is, you know, I absolutely love turkey and stuffing and pumpkin pie. Well, anyway, I don't want to go on. I'm sure you could contribute to this goodness as well.

[5:23] But as we prepare for this week, I want to go through Psalm 136. Psalm 136, it's a psalm of praise to God from the nation of Israel because of what He has done for them.

[5:39] And ultimately, they're giving thanks for the ways that He has blessed them. And so I would like to go through this. This is a good responsive reading text because that's how it's written out.

[5:52] It's kind of how it was expected to be played out in the nations in their reading of this. You got the first part that's read by whoever and then the response from those who are listening.

[6:04] So that's how we're going to go about this. So we're going to start with verses one through nine. We're going to just go through this text and bring stuff out and see where it goes from there. Actually, I have preparation stuff.

[6:15] I mean, I know where it's going to go from there. But we're going to read verses one through nine. And I will read the first phrase. And the phrase that you will respond with is, for His steadfast love endures forever.

[6:33] For His steadfast love endures forever. So we'll try that, verses one through nine. If you need to look at Psalm 136 to remind you of that, that's fine. Verse one.

[6:45] Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. Give thanks to the God of gods. Give thanks to the Lord of lords.

[7:03] To Him who alone does great wonders. To Him who by understanding made the heavens. For His steadfast love endures forever.

[7:15] To Him who spread out the earth above the waters. For His steadfast love endures forever. To Him who made the great lights. For His steadfast love endures forever.

[7:28] The sun to rule over the day. For His steadfast love endures forever. The moon and stars to rule over the night. For His steadfast love endures forever.

[7:39] Amen. so as we get through this section here we want to give thanks to God for his creation and that's really what they're focusing on here right they give an introduction they'll give thanks to the God of gods and the Lord of lords for a steadfast love endures forever well how do we see that playing out how do we see that taking place well we see it first through creation we see it taking place through creation see creation according to verses 4 and 5 it's a reflection of his intellect it's a reflection of his intellect he does great wonders who by understanding made the heavens as we observe the created order around us we cannot conclude anything less than an intelligent creator's signature on this work of art that we get to enjoy that we get to observe and see day in and day out

[8:40] Romans chapter 1 uses creation as the general revelation to all of mankind that there is a creator that there is a God and that all man is without excuse that there is a God to whom we must give an account to and an accounting to a parallel passage of Psalm 19 the heavens declare the glory of God and proclaim his handiwork I know I'm getting ahead of myself I probably have that on my next slide but everything we observe points to a creator points to a greater power and all this came about think about by somebody who had understanding and made these things think about all the earth's systems work in perfect harmony making it too coincidental to have to have come about by chance and that's one of those fun things

[9:47] I get to talk about so a little bit of my testimony in that I grew up in a home that was not really a Christian home per se and I got to go to a public school which was not particularly a Christian public school right and so in the school they're teaching what they're being told to teach right I mean that's just kind of how things go right and so one thing that happened I got saved when I was 13 and so I was not particularly late in life I know some of you have your testimony is when 30 or older and you know it's just amazing that God brings people at different times right I've known people who were saved when they were 5 you know in their teens you know later in life whatever so it just shows that God saves at all times right you know so we can there's never hope is never lost on an individual who is lost

[10:47] I just want to put that out there so I saved when I was 13 and I not to like toot my own horn but I will I was a pretty smart person pretty smart kid always did very good in school I was the I was the kid who always like you know excelled with you know A plus and all that stuff kid that not so smart kids hated but so but when I was going through high school so I was already saved at this point but I wasn't really mature in the faith I wasn't really getting a whole lot out of what my pastor was sharing at church like I went to church faithfully but it just didn't quite click and make sense and at youth group I heard some good lessons and whatnot but I was more concerned about my social my friend circle there and whatnot but when I was going through science science is one of my favorite subjects I love science earth science biology chemistry even though I did horrible at it I'm just intrigued by science and so as we're going through science and we're you know being taught like you know the millions and billions of years of evolutionary origin and so on and so forth it wasn't because I'm a Christian per se that I didn't really get it

[12:05] I didn't really like I wasn't convinced of it it was because it just didn't make sense to me how is it that you can just keep adding years and years and years to try to get random chance processes and mutations and such to happen and make sense when you consider things like the complexity of the body and the different body systems that work together in harmony that if they weren't set up and if it wasn't set up to work from the beginning there's just no way it could have evolved and come about by chance correct me if I'm wrong anybody like can we actually see that happening I mean are there body systems that kind of work together things in the body that like you kind of need all the parts together at once okay I just wanted to be sure I was understanding that right so I mean think about that complexity of the body and how that works think about like the cycles in nature the water cycle and the carbon cycle you know they work in a manner that's consistent with the laws of nature but these laws of nature are given to us by God you know because if we didn't have these laws and these things like we would never expect the experiments to have the same outcomes as they do when they're repeated and such so it just boggles my mind how people can listen to and hear this over billions of years of time and chance and blah blah blah blah blah

[13:41] I've heard the argument from very beginning on it just doesn't make sense it never connected with me I'm like Lord I don't understand this I don't get this it doesn't make sense even in class I could get all the right answers I could tell you what you wanted to hear I could do that very well with a teacher okay I know what you're wanting me to say so I'll just put that down I got the A but it didn't make sense it didn't make sense until I got the word of life we're like Bible Institute we had guest lecturers come in and one of the guest lecturers name was Mike Riddle he was working with an organization the time answers in Genesis I knew nothing about answers in Genesis I'd never heard of Ken Ham I heard of him once and like kids in youth people oh he's so cool and awesome I'm like I listened to him I said I don't understand the accent but it turned out Ken Ham's part of answers Genesis so Mike Riddle came and he taught us creationism and he taught understanding science and he taught understanding our world around us and how we see things and how experiments work out from a biblical world view and at that point it just was like the light went on

[14:50] I'm like oh now what I observe makes sense because I'm not trying to understand it from a well we've been here from billions of years or billions of years ago there was something and then there was nothing and then all of a sudden there's something and all that something kind of congealed about and all that like now I'm being told oh there's a creator who intentionally made things the way they did because God made it with understanding and only he could do that bacteria bacteria is known you may have heard this if you stayed awake enough during biology bacteria is the simplest form of life on the planet but there's nothing simple about bacteria because scientists still do not fully understand how it works and how things happen the way it does so it's the simplest form of life but it still confounds scientists now it's in that vein that I can look at and understand oh I can see how medical doctors don't have all the answers they work with what they think they know and what they've been taught but it doesn't always work out that's why

[15:56] I don't give too much flack to the meteorologist who is wrong 80% of the time because I understand that they're dealing with stuff that they're still not fully understanding and can comprehend but God through his understanding made it and by the way if you want 100% accurate meteorology report open your door and look outside that's all I do and that comes back to bite me sometimes I don't know it's going to rain or snow in a given day and I'm caught off guard but it's whatever so I think I reference Psalm 19 verses 1 and 2 the heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork day to day pours out speech and night to night reveals knowledge this what we observe and what we see and what everybody interacts with on this planet is pouring forth speech and knowledge about a creator it declares his glory for what he has done and what he has given to us through his goodness he's given us creation and because of his goodness he's revealed himself through that creation so creation reflects the intellect of God creation is also a reflection of his kindness verses 7 through 9 so most people in this room are not particularly interested in the cold winter weather that's coming down the pipe not everybody some people like the extreme cold yeah there we go and we got some people who absolutely detest the extreme cold so it works out perfect look at that we're gonna have loads of snow filling our driveways which I'm really looking forward to last year I got gypped out of being able to use the snow blower

[17:47] I was very upset by that because every time we got precipitation it just condensed into ice and couldn't do anything with it I hated that so I'm hoping for snow that we can throw that'd be great bitter cold wind chill negative temperatures frozen pipes in the kitchen no we don't want that but Dennis is like what are you talking about dude so that's what we've got coming towards us in the next few months and you know what it does it makes you appreciate the warmth of the sun for some of you it makes you appreciate the warmth of a radiator like a radiator heat and what not anyone have those in their house like the hot water radiators that kind of stand next to the wall anyone know what I'm talking about you do yep so those things get nice and warm and hot and they stay hot for a while so like on a bitter cold day you want to go kind of hug it don't do that but you kind of want to do that because it's so warm and hot but it really the bitter cold makes you appreciate the warmth that we have imagine if we didn't have the sun we wouldn't be having this conversation right so God gives us the sun to keep things slightly warm allow us to live he's the one who created the sun and he created everything that we take for granted around us he's given us heat and warmth from the sun he gives us light from the sun the moon and the stars this does not mean that the moon emits its own light

[19:19] I've heard that interesting theory once upon a time by somebody who doesn't believe the earth anyway you know where I'm going sorry going back to science but he's given us these luminaries and I was just out actually we're outside Friday night in the parking lot about 1030 at night playing a game with the boys during the sleepover time and we're outside and I was talking with Scott he had just gotten home from work and we're talking just looking at the stars identifying oh there's Mars and there's Jupiter and like kind of all that and it was just like it's amazing to look at and say because these things we use to tell us the time the days the years the seasons all this stuff like and yet we want to talk about this being just kind of accidental no it's all intentional God gave us these things for a purpose gave us the sun the moon the stars to give us light we use it to tell the seasons and the years and such so it's just it's amazing and it shows his kindness and his intellect it's really great

[20:32] Matthew 5 45 talk about the goodness of God right Christina Matthew 5 45 so that you may be sons of your father who's in heaven for he makes the sun rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the just and the unjust so Psalm 136 verses 1 through 9 give thanks to God for his creation and then I've already mentioned alluded to Romans 1 18 through 20 the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth for what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them he's shown it to them through his creation for his invisible attributes namely his eternal power and his divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made so that they are without excuse what we're being told is when people are denying the existence of God they're suppressing that truth his existence through their unrighteousness when we try to explain away God in creative order what we're doing is we're in through our unrighteousness suppressing the truth that he is divine that he is all powerful that he exists because he's given it to us for that purpose creation points to a creator just like a painting points to a painter watch you've heard the whole the watch points to a watch maker it doesn't just happen oh look here's a watch pick it up oh man

[22:13] I wonder how this happened we don't say things like that now it's like no we understand that a watch the complexity of a watch that there can be points to the fact that there was somebody who designed that the complexity of creation points to the fact that there was a creator continuing on let's read go ahead don't read that I mean you can but just again pointing to these men who are through their unrighteousness suppressing the truth of a greater God so Paul and Barnabas were preaching in Lystra and the people wanted to worship them and that was kind of their way of like they understood there was something greater than they are and they wanted to worship Paul and Barnabas and Paul was like this isn't good don't don't don't worship us it's not us there's one God and we gave them a chance to share the gospel right so Psalm 136 I'd like to read verses 10 through 22 all right you ready wake up

[23:17] I want to hear you as loud as you were earlier to him who struck down the firstborn of Egypt and brought Israel out from among them with a strong hand and an outstretched arm to him who divided the Red Sea in two and made Israel pass through the midst of it but overthrew Pharaoh and his hosts in the Red Sea to him who led his people through the wilderness to him who struck down great kings and killed mighty kings and killed mighty kings and Sihon king king of the Amorites and Og king of

[24:18] Bashan and gave their land as a heritage a heritage to Israel his servant give thanks to God for his power you look here in these verses here verses 10 through 12 he's got power for judgment right God fought the battle for the nation of Israel against the mighty Egyptians right his chosen people had been enslaved and Pharaoh refused to let them go you know the account you know the story Gemma actually brought to me the craft she did during their Sunday school time and she said they talked about Moses and the crossing of the Red Sea I didn't confirm this with her teacher but she told me that's what they talked about and is that Sue were you her teacher today is that what you guys talked about that's exciting because it shows God's deliverance of his people from the Egyptians it was God who did the work you know the ten plagues right in Egypt there that was all God working

[25:32] Moses was the spokesman but God did the work and God ultimately delivered them out of the hand of Pharaoh and the Egyptians and he's God's the one who sets up rulers and nations and he's the one who tears them down you know the nation of Egypt was a great power but was still no match for the Lord I'll just you know take a pause for a second this is not in my in my notes here but it's God who raised up the United States of America and God will be the one who brings it down all right it's not going to be the Democrats or the Republicans or the independents or the crazy people in Washington anything like that all right God is in charge we still like to blame people absolutely right so I just want to put that you know in mind as we've gone through an election cycle right and there's like oh we didn't get what we were hoping for oh the world's going to end and the

[26:37] United States is going to fall to its knees yeah it might but it's going to be because God ordained it that way so let's keep that in mind so Romans 13 verses 1 and 2 says let every person be subject to the governing authorities for there's no authority except from God and those that exist have been instituted by God therefore whoever resists the authorities resist what God has appointed and those who resist will incur judgment no one is impervious to God's judgment because we must all stand before the throne and receive our sentence God sets up he sets up the rulers we have you may not like it and that's okay draw closer to God call on him even more allow the trial that we may be going through or the perceived trial that you may feel like you're going through allow that to have its result and allow God to use that for perfecting you into the image of his son because ultimately in the end we do not identify oh I'm a

[27:46] Republican I'm a Democrat in the end that's not going to matter what's going to matter is are you in Christ and are you living your life as if you are in Christ or not and that's what we're going to stand in judgment about that's not what the sermon's about that's just an aside I put it away and we'll come back to it another day but the fact is nobody is impervious to his judgment Hebrews 9 27 you remember this we studied Hebrews for about a year and you're so you're experts on the text Hebrews 9 27 it's appointed for man to die once and after that comes judgment we live in this world and we will die and eventually we will also stand in judgment that's what's going to happen we'll all be judged before God in verses 13 through 15 of Psalm 136 he has power to provide a way of escape this is you can look at it on many levels here so verses 13 through 15 you've got he divided the Red Sea in two he made

[28:51] Israel pass through the midst of it on dry ground by the way and he overthrew Pharaoh and those who were with him in the sea it's really an amazing count and I love the discussions you can have with people who try to discredit it oh well it wasn't that high of a sea you just jump around the right rocks and all that stuff then great then God drowned Pharaoh with a trickle of water what an amazing thing so either way you want to put it that way I don't know if you've ever heard those arguments against the crossing of the Red Sea that oh it was just really low they could walk across it no big deal well then you've got the problem of him judging Pharaoh killing his army anyway so Psalm 136 recounts what the Israelites were facing as they were up against the Red Sea and what God was bringing them out of in Egypt and you know you think about this before they were when they were being delivered out of Egypt and God allowed them to plunder the Egyptians and they didn't do it by violence by the way remember they're like you know they kind of went to their neighbor's house and they're like oh please just take all this stuff and go and get out of here you can have everything you want everything you need and just go and so the Israelites went with a lot of plunder and God caused that to happen and they come to the Red

[30:09] Sea and they know Pharaoh's pressing in you think about that if you've ever been at that point like it's just kind of between a rock and a hard place as you feel like you're between a rock and a hard place oh man there's there's no hope there's no hope of getting out of this there's no hope for me and then by some amazing stroke of luck right you get through it it's not luck but you know God brings you through that happened with the Israelites see in Exodus 14 11 and 12 they said to Moses is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you've taken us away to die in the wilderness what have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt is not this what we said to you in Egypt leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians for it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness they thought they were dead right they get to the Red Sea oh boy this was a mistake it was good up until now now it's a hard there's a hard place and the rock is coming quick not Dwayne

[31:13] Johnson but like Pharaoh and his army like they're coming quick we can be that way right we get between the rock and the hard place and it's like man when's it going to fall when's it going to end am I going to make it through and or maybe it's in your life your situation an area of temptation know what you're going through and maybe it's something that you're up against and maybe you're tempted it could be anything right it could be an addiction it could be a drug abuse problem it can be pornography it can be a temptation to despair right and to allow depression to overtake you anxiety to overtake you whatever it is your temptation is that you're up against we got to remember that 1 Corinthians 10 13 no temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man there's nothing you face in this world that is unique to just you but it's a common thing that takes place and God is faithful another thing we're thankful for

[32:36] God is faithful and will not let you be tempted beyond your ability but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it there's always a way out than giving in to whatever it is there's always a way out than just succumbing to what has become your status quo God provides the way of escape and sometimes it might be just talking to somebody else who's gone through this problem because 2 Corinthians 1 tells us that he comforts us in our trials so that with the comfort with which we've been comforted we can comfort others and so maybe it's a phone call maybe it's a time of getting together and having a cup of coffee and just saying hey I'm really struggling with this I'm going through this I don't know how I'm going to endure that and we all have that in our lives I'll be honest I'm going through that a little bit right now personally there's been a couple things that have come up in the last few weeks that I'm like

[33:42] I don't know how we're going to navigate that but God is good and he'll help us through God is good and he'll bring us through and ultimately my confidence and dependence needs to be on him Psalm 136 verses 16 through 22 he has power to provide a home for his people and so he led his people through the wilderness and they struck down great kings and mighty kings and there was Sihon and there was Og you remember those guys man they're big powerful and whatever and God took them out and gave us their land so if the psalmist is writing sorry I went ahead didn't mean to so even though the land was already occupied God led his people Israel to victory over those who were in the land in order to claim a home for them and the people were already in the land when God promised it to Abraham so God would have to find a way to give it to

[34:46] Abraham and his descendants and he did John 14 verses 1 through 3 let not your hearts be troubled believe in God believe also in me in my father's house are many rooms if it were not so would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you and if I go and prepare a place for you I will come again and will take you to myself that where I am you may be also Jesus as we talked about today Jesus died on the cross Jesus died on the cross to offer forgiveness for our sin our transgressions against God to offer us eternal life which John 17 verse 2 or 3 says eternal life is knowing God and Jesus whom he has sent so

[35:47] Jesus offers this eternal life and then he makes this promise to his disciples here in John 14 so this is before he goes to the cross he's saying there are many rooms in my father's house and where I am you're going to be also so and he is the one who prepares and makes the way he wants them to come and remember Thomas how do we know the way Lord Jesus says I am the way the truth and the life so Abraham's descendants had no idea how God was going to provide the promised land to them but he did by leading them out of Egypt through the wilderness into victory and we may not have any idea how God's going to work things out in our lives but he will and ultimately when we are in Christ he promises to take us to himself and he will because he's preparing a place for us and he provides the way to get there through his son

[36:52] Jesus Psalm 137 verses 23 through 26 it is he who remembered us in our lowest state and rescued us from our foes he who gives food to all flesh give thanks to God for his deliverance his deliverance from bondage verse 23 this word this term lowest state the lowest state for Israel is that there were slaves in Egypt for over 400 years and the promises that God made to Abraham and his descendants seemed to but a flickering ember of lost hope while they served as slaves and the lowest state of every man is being in bondage to sin because all have sinned

[37:56] John 8 34 Jesus says truly truly I say to you everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin Romans 3 23 says for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God see God has promised deliverance from our bondage to sin through the power of the gospel Romans 1 16 you know this is my favorite verse in scripture I'm sure I'll have another one some other time in my life but this is it right now for I'm not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek Jesus gave himself that we might have salvation and it's offered to everyone who believes verse 24 of Psalm 136 rescued us from our foes he delivers us from evil right just like the

[38:59] Israelites we'll have we all have adversaries we must face they may be other people or organizations for some folks and but we all must face the world the flesh and the devil ultimately the world is simply that the world we talked about that a little bit in Sunday school today that's the world system that we're living in the media the ideas and so on so forth ultimately it's the sinful practices that are propagated in society the flesh it's the sin nature we must deal with on a regular basis that's our own sinful desires that we must learn to master it's what we have in us naturally and of course the devil is the one who rebelled against God he tempted Adam and Eve to sin and the garden of Eden and he desires to see mankind continuously rebel against God 1 Peter 5 8 tells us the devil is our adversary he prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour he's active and looking but as 1 Peter 5 9 says we need to resist by being firm in our faith knowing that

[40:09] God can deliver us from him in Matthew 6 13 at the end of the Lord's model of prayer and it says and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil so we need to pray and depend on God because he can deliver I'd like to end here go ahead and turn to Matthew chapter 6 you can follow along Matthew chapter 6 verse 25 and following and it gives us our last point from Psalm 136 verse 25 that he delivers from starvation Matthew 6 verse 25 and following therefore I tell you do not be anxious about your life what you will eat or what you will drink nor about your body what you will put on is not life more than food and the body more than clothing look at the birds of the air they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns and yet your heavenly father feeds them are you not of more value than they in which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his lifespan or span of life and why are you anxious about clothing consider the lilies of the field how they grow they neither toil nor spin yet

[41:44] I tell you even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these but if God so clothes the grass of the field which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven will he not much more clothe you oh you of little faith therefore do not be anxious saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear for the Gentiles seek after all these things and your heavenly father knows that you need them all but seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow for tomorrow will be anxious for itself God is our creator is also our provider as Donna pointed out earlier and he provides for all of his creation and for that we ought to be very thankful so as you continue to give thanks and enjoy the bountiful harvest of food on Thursday and all the leftovers for the days to follow remember to give thanks to

[42:52] God for the things that matter most without his creation we would not be here to begin with give thanks without his power we would be hopelessly left up to our own capabilities give thanks and without his deliverance we would forever be in bondage to sin and separated from him give thanks father help us in our weakness help us lord when we don't know what to say or how to say it help us to give thanks in all things in all matters in all situations in life knowing that you use it for our good in Jesus name amen