1 Timothy 6:6-16, Christians Should be Thankful

Paul’s Pen

6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.

7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

8 And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.

10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

11 But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness.

12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.

13 I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession;

14 That thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ:

15 Which in his times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords;

16 Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.

1 Timothy 6:6-16

A man who is bound for the only father to come before you this morning I pray that this hour our hearts would be filled with gratitude and praise Lord help us to focus on you and to be content in our spirits joyful in our hearts and filled with thanksgiving for all that you’ve done for us Lord I pray that this hour you would help us to focus on you and to realize the tremendous blessings that are ours in Jesus this we ask in his name for his sake and glory His Coming.

Thursday will be a celebration of Thanksgiving a lot of people in America don’t even have a concept of where the roots of Thanksgiving began and to many people it’s going to be football games eating too much food seeing family they may want to see or maybe don’t want to see and spending time for a day off from work that’s not where Thanksgiving came from and it’s not what Thanksgiving is to be in the heart of a believer want to challenge you this morning this coming Thursday to approach things a little different to have an attitude where you begin to stop and think what has God done for me in my life what is God desiring to do in me in my future and how will God use me to bring glory to him and I may be filled with praise and thanksgiving.

There’s some interesting people in scripture and one that comes to mind this morning as I was trying to think of people to that really had a thankful joyful spirit and two men come to mind they were you two young men that grew up together one was David and the other was Jonathan Jonathan was the son of Saul he was slated by the way that the world does things that he would be the next king of Israel when his father Saul died however the way the world slates things and the way that God puts his order of things are often totally different you see the people of Israel had selected Saul to be their king based upon the way he looked based upon that his strength and because he stood head and shoulders above every other Israelite he was a strong handsome man and they wanted a king that could be like every other king and God had said why do you want a king Samuel came to the Lord and was very discouraged when he heard that the nation of Israel wanted to make Saul their king and the Lord told Samuel this has nothing to do with you it has everything to do with me they do not understand I am their king and earthly king is going to put their children into bondage he’s going to make their young men fight his wars he’s going to make their young women do his work he’s going to take their money and their possessions and apply it to his will I was there to meet their needs to take care of them you see Samuel this isn’t a strike against you they are striking out against me and they want to be like the world Saul was made king but the amazing thing Jonathan his son never possessed the character of his father Jonathan and David became best friends the Lord chose David to be the king of Israel and the reason he chose David is David did not view himself as a man who stood above men David saw himself as a servant to whoever he was to serve Samuel when he went to anoint David went to the house of Jesse and had Jesse bring all his sons out and Jesse lined them up proudly from the oldest to the youngest and they were would probably have stood in stature that way too and Samuel went down the line and said this isn’t the one and this isn’t the one and this isn’t the one and this isn’t the one have you no more sons well there’s David well where’s David David’s out taking care of the sheep doing the lowly task while his brothers came in to meet this great prophet who was going to anoint the king of Israel David came and David was the one God chose David through his psalms you can see that he’s got a grateful and thankful heart a joyful heart in the Lord a heart that understands that God is his help in every time of trouble but when David was anointed a strange thing happened he moved into the house of Saul who was the king of Israel and Saul had him sit at his table and sitting at that same table was Jonathan Jonathan became David’s best friend a great companion and someone who was loyal to David only second to being loyal to God and not even as loyal and the loyalty didn’t extend to his father Jonathan understood David was to be the king and not him Jonathan didn’t complain as a matter of fact Jonathan did everything he could to help David Jonathan had a heart of gratitude and praise to God he was grateful for even knowing David Timothy is told by the Apostle Paul godliness with contentment is great gain how is the person content contentment means that you are satisfied with what you have and you don’t lust after that which you do not have. Godliness means you desire above all things to possess the character of the one who created you and redeemed you and you desire to possess the character that he revealed to you when he sent his son to take on the form of a man to walk among us to show us what it was like to walk in holiness before the father so we are to be a godly people and a content people the Apostle Paul in the book of Ephesians if you turn with me to Ephesians chapter 6 Paul tells us there and we study just study that not long ago about putting on the armor of God and he tells us that the last thing we’re to do praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit watching we’re on to with all perseverance and supplications for all saints so we’re to pray for one another we’re intercede for one another and intercede that we can accomplish for one another if you would turn with me to Philippians chapter 4 in Philippians chapter 4 Paul is telling the churches specifically this is addressed to Philippi but it was a letter that circulated throughout the churches in verse 20 says:

Therefore my brethren dearly beloved and longed for by my joy and crown so stand fast in the Lord in dearly my dearly beloved down in Philippians 4:20.

Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice let your moderation be known unto all men the Lord is at hand. Philippians 4:4

Be careful for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God how are we to pray even praying for others as Paul told us in the book of Ephesians how are we to be content in our godliness Paul tells us in the book of Philippians that were to pray but were to pray with Thanksgiving Thanksgiving are you thankful in your heart the roots of Thanksgiving in America started in 1621 when the Pilgrims had landed at Plymouth Rock they had a horrible winter first year they were there they lost just about half of their colony husbands lost wives wives lost husbands parents lost children the whole reason that they had left England to come to America was that they could have freedom to worship God in England at that time there was a strong political movement and the crown was attached to the Church of England and if you desire to worship any other way than the Church of England told you to worship you were persecuted severely not only that false teaching it entered into the Church of England and it wasn’t the Bible wasn’t being taught the way it should be taught and so you had this group of people first they went to the Netherlands but they didn’t find freedom there and then God directed them to go to America they suffered tremendously but in 1621 there was a tribe of Indians that were in the area that they had made a pact with that they would not harm one another that they would work together and they held their first Thanksgiving where they came together for a feast but at the heart of the pilgrims feast was a thankfulness to God that is lost today in our culture a thankfulness to God that he had given them the great privilege of being able to raise their children in the freedom to worship him as the Bible taught them to worship a freedom to come and to be able to come before his throne with praise and Thanksgiving when America was founded a day of Thanksgiving was proclaimed by our first president George Washington it was to be the last Thursday of every November and the reason he proclaimed it is because he saw the hand of providence upon America and that God is the one that ordained that America should be established and it was unique among all the nations of the world you probably heard that we have that were there were unique experiment among the nations and we are we weren’t founded by a king we weren’t ruled by a monarchy we weren’t established by one nationality or nation but we became a people who would be ruled by the people and be ruled of the people for the people under God our nation has never been a democracy no matter how many times they say that we’re constitutional republic we’re representative form of government where the people represent elect the representatives and they go and make the decisions on behalf of the people and must be accountable to the people George Washington understood the uniqueness of what had happened he understood as the founding fathers understood when they wrote the Constitution the Declaration of Independence first and then the Constitution that this was uniquely established under the principles of God’s Word most people don’t know that the current Constitution we have is not the first Constitution we possess there was the article of Confederation which really happened about twelve years before the current Constitution that we possess was written one of the things that was in the Articles of Confederation that they changed in the Constitution which in my opinion I agree with Patrick Henry made our current Constitution weaker in this sense than the Articles of Confederation the Articles of the Confederation stated that this nation was being established for the glory of Jesus Christ there were some that were not Christians amongst the founding fathers there are some deists there were Masons some of them got it changed from the from Jesus Christ to one nation under God once you understand that may in our minds we know who God is but I want you to know in the minds of many people today if you mention God their God is a totally different God than the God of the Bible and they feel to say see the connection between the God of the Bible our founding of our nation and how we’re to live Benjamin Franklin made a statement about what had been given to the people of America said today we have given you a Republic it’s up to you to keep and on and hold on to it but he also even though Benjamin Franklin never professed of saving faith in Christ one of his favorite men to listen to was George Whitefield an evangelist who changed thousands of lives across early America through his evangelistic Crusades Benjamin Franklin made the statement the only way this Republic will ever stand is if it stands on biblical principle otherwise it will fall today do you realize that there are Christians don’t understand why they should be thankful we got books in the back to talk about heretical teachings coming into the church where they take us all kinds of different horrible directions in various churches believing wise and being condemning of the God who redeemed them instead of being thankful Paul tells us we’re to pray and have supplication was to be with Thanksgiving this morning I want us to take about the next 15 or 20 minutes and I just want to ask you what do you want to be thankful for what should we as Christians really focus on what was George Washington thinking about when he said we’re going to have a Thanksgiving Thanksgiving was established formally as a national holiday under Abraham Lincoln about 80 years after George Washington it was one of the most horrendous times in our history where the Civil War was breaking out in 1863 brother was fighting brother father was fighting son it was the bloodiest war our nation ever experienced and yet Abraham Lincoln declared Thanksgiving we need to understand and be thankful why we’re sitting here today I just want you to look at the last verse 8 in chapter 4 where it says finally brethren whatsoever things are true whatsoever things are honest whatsoever things are just whatsoever things are pure whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are good report if there be any virtue and if there be any praise think on these things those things which you have both learned and received and heard and seen in me do and the God of peace shall be with you so what is Paul saying he told us to pray with Thanksgiving George Washington established Thanksgiving Abraham Lincoln made it a national holiday way back at the time of Saul Jonathan was filled with Thanksgiving for David how do you be a thankful person and what makes what do you be thankful for first thing Paul tells us is what is your focus you come into a church where you’re listening to false teachers who speak lies you know what you know whose sin you’re responsible for before God your sin I’m not responsible for my neighbor’s and I’m not responsible for my children’s and I’m not responsible for my parents and I’m responsible for my sin I’m accountable to God for my sin yet the church wants to take away the accountability before God for individual responsibility for sin and replace it with a cultural perspective that transfers it to whole groups of people and destroys the gospel due to critical race theory where depending on how much melanin you have in your skin will determine how much sin you’re accountable for your ancestors that may or may not even have committed the sins total heresy totally coming against the gospel you know what we should be thankful for we should be thankful that God made us accountable for our sin and thankful that he placed within us a conscience that we can understand right from wrong good from evil and that we do not sear this conscience or or quench this conscience or stop this conscience but we allow the Spirit of God to open our eyes to our need of a Savior you want to know why people aren’t going to be thankful on Thursday well they’re going to be all absorbed in football and eating and everything else except being thankful to the Lord because nobody stands accountable before God in their mind for their own sin and they don’t understand the heart of Thanksgiving at the heart of Thanksgiving is the gospel of Jesus Christ and at the heart of the gospel is the fact that every man woman and child in that has ever been born in this world no matter how moral they may seem to us apart from Jesus Christ and God stand immoral a sinner worthy of hell see what we like to do I like to compare myself against other people and I say well I’m not as bad as that person I never murdered anybody I’m not as bad as that person I’m not a drug addict or an alcoholic I’m not as bad as that person I don’t have five different women in five different cities and I can go down the list but guess what I’ve got my own sins that are just as guilty before God because Jesus said that when he came he was dealing with the same attitude amongst the Pharisees they were not thankful ungrateful group of men they were filled with pride and arrogance they thought that simply because they were the Jewish religious leaders they had the right to manipulate and and control the people and use them for their own advantage and cut deals with the Roman government that they could stay in power maintain power and destroy anybody who got in their way that’s who they were Jesus called them vipers he’s called them whitewashed tombs Jesus called them sons of their father the devil who was a murderer from the beginning and the father of lies you and I need to understand it it’s a blessing when God’s spirit shows us the depth of sin in our heart they never saw it and they wanted to silence Jesus instead of yield to Jesus people who rather get involved in all the things of this world and spend time with Jesus want to silence him?