A New Thanksgiving (Guest Blog)

The youth group students and leaders who led our first Youth Sunday.

While preparing this week’s sermon, I Googled the definition of the word thankful. According to Google, to be thankful is to express gratitude and relief. The relief part of the definition was new to me. It was the perfect discovery for this message. We express our gratitude to God because of the work Jesus did to give us another chance to be in relationship with God for eternity. We experience relief as we no longer have to experience separation from our Creator. This separation is what we know to be Hell.

Colossians does a great job of reminding us that we were made by God, for God, and for His glory (Col. 1:16). God gave us an identity and a purpose. As His people, we live out our purpose (glorifying God) by loving others. The kind of love that we are talking about is agapē love. BibleProject has an awesome video explaining agapē. Love is the binding factor as we practice mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and forgiveness which leads Christians to unity and peace. The more closely we follow the way of Jesus, the more we experience His peace. God made us for community, so it makes sense that as we pursue Him, we build up our community through peace.

At the end of Colossians 3:15, there is a call to be thankful. The call comes after the Colossians were instructed to ruthlessly cut off their old way of life and to pursue the new life they receive through relationship with Jesus. The command to be thankful is not an afterthought though. Our thankfulness comes as an overflow of our relationship with Christ.

6 And now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow him. 7 Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.

Colossians 2:6 - 7, NLT

Colossians 3 continues the theme of Colossians 2:6 - 7 as Paul gives direction on how to give thanks (see Col. 3:16). Whatever it is we are doing in our ordinary, everyday lives, we are instructed to do it with thankfulness in our heart. We live our lives intentionally for the purpose of bringing glory to God. In his commentary Colossians and Philemon, N.T. Wright says,

The centre of Christian living is grateful worship, which is to affect ‘whatever we do’: since ‘all things’ have been created through him, Christians can do all that they do, whether it be manual work, political activity, raising a family, writing a book, playing tennis, or whatever, in his name and with gratitude. (pg. 145)

This Thanksgiving, I hope that you don’t have a “pull yourself by your boot straps ‘cause I’m an American” kind of attitude towards your expression of gratitude. I don’t want you to offer empty thanksgiving for the sake of the holiday. I hope that you reflect on Jesus this Thanksgiving. I hope that you reflect on His death and resurrection in order for you to be in relationship with God again and that that is the root of your thanksgiving.

There are two songs that keep coming to mind as I’ve worked on this message. They are linked below for your listening pleasure.

Find Me by Jonathan David Helser and Melissa Helser

Be Like Him by Bridgetown Church

Happy Thanksgiving!

Kathleen Blake
Director of Student Ministries