Thanksgiving

Nehemiah had a hard life and a tough assignment. And yet, from what we can tell, he was not a bitter person. One practice that helped keep his heart from being shredded with resentment was expressing gratitude to God.

After a long season of work, Nehemiah and the people of Israel prayed together:

Nehemiah 9:9-33
“And you saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt and heard their cry at the Red Sea, and performed signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants… And you divided the sea before them... By a pillar of cloud you led them in the day, and by a pillar of fire in the night to light for them the way in which they should go. You came down on Mount Sinai and
spoke with them from heaven and gave them right rules and true laws, good statutes and commandments….You gave them bread from heaven for their hunger and brought water for them out of the rock for their thirst…
But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them. Even when they had made for themselves a golden calf…you in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness…You gave your good Spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst. Forty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out, and their feet did not swell. “And you gave them kingdoms and peoples and allotted to them every corner…. But after they had rest, they did evil again before you, and you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies so that they had dominion over them. Yet when they turned and cried to you, you heard from heaven, and many times you delivered them according to your mercies. And you warned them in order to turn them back to your law….Many years you bore with them and warned them by your Spirit through your prophets… Nevertheless, in your great mercies you did not make an end of them or forsake them, for you are a gracious and merciful God… Yet you have been righteous in all that has come upon us, for you have dealt faithfully, and we have acted wickedly.

Notice all of God’s activities they list with thanksgiving. They also connect his actions to his character: ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, righteous, faithful.

Prayer is a powerful conversation with God – one that changes us along the way. Expressing appreciation to God for all that he is and all that he has done is a necessary part of a Christian’s life.

Spend some time in prayer right now expressing gratitude and thanksgiving. Consider beginning with this:

I give thanks to the God of gods, to the Lord of lords, for his steadfast love endures forever. Psalm 136:2-3(ESV) Your goodness is your glory, Exodus 33:19(ESV) and it is for that which all your works give thanks to you and all your saints bless you. Psalm 145:10(ESV)

You are gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, Psalm 145:8(ESV)
and have told me that you do not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men; but, though you cause grief, you will have compassion according to the abundance of your steadfast love. Lamentations 3:32-33(ESV)
I am thankful.

You visit the earth and water it; you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; you provide their grain, for so you have prepared it. You water its furrows abundantly, settling its ridges, softening it with showers, and blessing its growth. You crown the year with your bounty; your wagon tracks overflow with abundance. Psalm 65:9- 11(ESV) I am thankful.

You have set the earth on its foundations, so that it should never be moved; Psalm 104:5(ESV) And you have made good what you have sworn, that the waters of Noah shall no more go over the earth. Isaiah 54:9(ESV) I am thankful.

Your covenant with the day and with the night is not broken; Jeremiah 33:20(ESV) but still you give the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, Jeremiah 31:35(ESV) and are faithful to that covenant of providence. That while the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease. Genesis 8:22(ESV) I am thankful.

How grateful am I that God shows his love to me, in that while I was still a sinner, Christ died for me, Romans 5:8(ESV) that I might be reconciled to him by the death of his Son. Romans 5:10(ESV) In this is love, not that I have loved God, but that he loved me and sent his Son to be the propitiation for my sins, 1 John 4:10(ESV) and not for mine only but for the sins of the whole world. 1 John 2:2(ESV)

I thank you that by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. Hebrews 10:14(ESV)

 Prayer Points

Consider praying along the prompts in the “The Praise” sections of the prayer points found here.