Introduction
Hi guys, welcome to my blog! My name is Khairah and I will be using this platform to share with you my thoughts, things I’m learning, things I’m having to unlearn and hopefully help and relate to you as a young christian.
I’ve wanted to start this blog for the longest time but I’ve held off for quite a while. However I thought seeing as I recently turned 21 I thought it would be cool to start something new with my new age. On the topic of turning 21, I am so thankful to Jesus that I have been able to enter this new age saved and walking with Christ - if it wasn’t for Him I truly don’t know where I’d be. And this leads me into my very first topic - gratitude.
This is something that God has really had to teach me in recent years (and is STILL teaching me). Having grown up in church since the age of 3 I think I became so used to hearing phrases like “give God praise”, or “lets give a praise offering to God”. And even in my own personal bible study when I would read through certain books like Psalms for example, where David thanks and praises God often - I really would pay no mind to the thanksgiving parts and pay more attention to the other parts of scripture. I didn’t understand just how important and crucial gratitude and thanksgiving is to a christian’s walk.
This all changed when one day around 2 years ago I was listening to this sermon called: “Is Gratitude Faith?” by Pastor Garret King (linked below). And in that sermon he talked about how he wrote down a list of all the things in his life that he was grateful for, and so after listening to that sermon I did the same and it really changed my whole perspective on a-lot of things. Side Note: I recommend you do it as well - you will be surprised at how many pages you can fill with all things God has done (and even those pages wouldn’t be able to contain how good He has been to us).
Before this I had been struggling with a-lot of worry and fear, and when writing down all the things I had to be grateful for its like all these cares minimised. All these things that I had given so much thought to and allowed the enemy to take a hold of in my mind dissolved. That’s why it makes so much sense when the Bible says “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, WITH THANKSGIVING, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7).
Another thing that I have found that thanksgiving combats is discontentment. It’s so easy to look at what we have and become discontent and begin to almost feel ‘entitled’ to more, however when I began to INTENTIONALLY thank God He exchanged that discontentment for contentment. Whilst listening to that sermon I referenced earlier, Pastor Garret shared a statement which said - “we didn’t shed one drop of blood for our salvation, yet we look at our salvation with such entitlement as if we deserve anything that we have.”. *mic drop* - when he said that it really tumped me in my head - as in how dare I ever look at my life and what I have with such discontentment and entitlement as if I deserve anything I have anyway!
Before closing I want to quickly touch on being intentional with our thanksgiving to God. It tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:18 - “in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” This is a command - meaning that this is essential to our DAILY lives as christians. It is something to be incorporated intentionally to our every day lives - and the reason why I say intentionally is because I’ve found that not every day will we ‘feel’ like doing so - but trust me when you do it, it not only helps you, but it is also pleasing to God as it is a sacrifice unto Him. And as we begin to make thanksgiving a daily habit it becomes something you desire to do and becomes a heart posture.
In summary here are some reasons why gratitude is important:
It gets rid of entitlement
It produces humility and is an antidote to pride
It puts your worries and cares into perspective
It shows God that we are dependant on Him
The Bible actually commands us to do so
It takes our eyes off ourselves
It gives God all the glory and is His will for our lives
If you got this far, thanks for reading - stay tuned for the next one :)
“Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name” (Psalm 100:4)
LINKS
SERMON LINK - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEAsrTv6nXg