About 25 years ago, on the week of Thanksgiving, I sat down one night to pour out thanks. This was my first Thanksgiving as a Christian, and my mind was so aware of all the people in my life for whom I was thankful. So, even though I had never written letters in the past, I sat down at my iMac and began the “two-finger peck.” Once I had finished, it felt so healing to sit down and tell people how much they mean to me.
An interesting phenomenon occurs when we think about what we are thankful for; more thanks come to mind. Even today, as I write this blog with a mindset of how grateful I am to receive texts from Michael, who is a traveling lineman, my mind becomes so thankful for so many things that it becomes distracted with other ways I am grateful and find myself forgetting what I intended to write about today.
Psalm 95 says this in the first two verses, “Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!”
I am thankful today for this text I got from Micheal, “I’d rather have the Spirit and the fire than a 100 billion dollars. I’d rather have nearness to Jesus than all the fleeting comforts this world offers. He is enough. He is sufficient. He can do ALL things!” You have to understand that I have many times each week when I feel insufficient at my job as a pastor, and this text was a reminder that I am not enough, but Jesus is! What if I seek the Spirit in all things? Then He is enough when I am not able.
Then Michaels text went on, “Oh God! Wake us up to who You are and what You can do! Oh, what great limitations we place on You! What little expectations we have! Forgive us, oh God! Show us that even though You surely use these things, we don’t need to go to a conference or set of meetings to get fired up for a few days and then burn out. We can walk in the fire every day! (Meeting or no meeting.) Open our eyes. Let the vision of your power being restored to Your church be burning in our hearts! Let us walk in both purity and power! Let us share the good news everywhere we step. Let us go, and oh Lord, let there be a circle of fire around us that when others get near, they are no longer thinking about their life and circumstances (whether big or small); instead, they are in immediate desperate concern for their souls!”
After reading one of Michael’s texts, I am sure you can see why I am so thankful that God sent the Spirit to Michael and prompted him to text me. Every time I get a text from him, it is just what I need for encouragement for that day.
This Sunday is Thankful Sunday, where the sermon is you. This Sunday is when we hear what God is doing in your life. Our team is praying for the Holy Spirit to encourage and allow you to share your “heart praise.” That thankful that it is so close to your heart that it might cause you to cry or tear up. The kind of testimonial of what God has done in you that has power. See, this is God’s story that you are sharing, and someone inside Vine & Branch needs to hear it so they, too, might find hope amid darkness.
Please remember that Sunday is about what God has done in your life. We want to give God the Glory and not steal it. I know we are all thankful for our family, our jobs, and the food on our tables, and these are all the great things we get to share with our families around the dinner table next Thursday. This Sunday is about what God has done and how thankful we are for what He is doing in our lives and Vine & Branch.
I am so excited to see and hear what God is doing in our church, and I can not wait for Sunday morning.
In Him,
Pastor Chris