Welcome to this weekend's In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley. First Thessalonians five, verse eighteen tells us to give thanks in all things. It's a simple command, but not so simple to fulfill. Today's podcast teaches the key to cultivating a truly thankful heart. What is it I need to know in order to be able to give thanks when everything in myself does not want to give thanks? Well, here's the key. And listen, without this key, you absolutely will not. You cannot emotionally or mentally, truly, genuinely give God thanks without this key. And here it is, hundred and third Psalm and the nineteenth verse. The Lord has established His throne in the heavens and His sovereignty rules over all. Now, if you don't believe that, you're not going to be able to thank God for everything. Because watch this, what this verse says, God is in control of your circumstance no matter what it is. He's in control of whatever's come against you, God's in control. Whatever's causing you pain, God's in control. Whatever's causing you joy and happiness and peace, God's in control. Whatever has caused your friends to turn against you, God is in control. Whatever physical suffering that you're going through, God is in control. That is, there's not anything in the life of a believer in which God is not in control.
Well, the truth is, He's in control of everything. Now, there are many examples in the Scripture. But look, for example, at Joseph in the fifteenth chapter of the book of Genesis.
Look what God did. He took Joseph as a seventeen-year-old teenager, hated and despised by his brothers. Put him in a situation where his brothers threw him in a pit and we're going to kill him. Finally sold him into slavery into Egypt. Went to Potiphar's household, was very successful, he turned everything over to him. Wife lied about him, tried to seduce him, got him thrown in prison, he was in prison. If you'll think about from the time he was about seventeen till he was almost about thirty years of age, he could have said, God, where are You? Nothing in my life has been good. Nothing, nothing, nothing has been good for all these thirteen years and I'm supposed to trust You as Jehovah God and You're in charge and my father and my mother taught me to trust You and that You're the only true God.
Where are You? Until one day. They called for him, dressed him up and stood him before the Pharaoh of Egypt. And the Pharaoh said, I hear you can tell about dreams.
You can decipher them, you can interpret them. And probably in just a matter of an hour or so, he was announced. He would sit second only to Pharaoh in all the land of Egypt, which was the greatest civilization of the time and one of the greatest that has ever existed. So, for thirteen years, where's God? There's nothing good about being in prison. Nothing good about being betrayed. There wasn't anything to rejoice about.
Until the day God said, I was causing all things to work together for good. And I said, I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to do that.
I'm not going to do that. Listen, according to my purpose, my purpose was to save you, place you in a position of absolute authority in order not only to save Egypt but to save your family back there in Canaan and to fulfill my awesome purpose of the Messiah through this bunch of Hebrews. That's what I learned to do, is to thank Him on this side of it when things aren't going so well. So, let me just say this, when we think about God being involved in everything, in the life of the unbeliever. For example, you're not a Christian. And you say, well, how could God be involved in my life? If I'm an unbeliever and I'm an atheist or I'm an agnostic, God's not involved in my life.
Yes, He is. He is involved in your life in this way. His offer of grace is still extended to you as an unbeliever. Secondly, not only is His offer of grace still there, but God and His judgment is still hanging above you. That is because you have disobeyed Him, His judgment is still hanging there, His wrath, His chastisement. That is because you have obeyed Him. That is because you have obeyed Him. That is because you have obeyed Him. Likewise, when I think about how He's involved, think about in this life, in the life of every unbeliever, there is a limitation of your wickedness.
There is a limitation of what you can do and how you can respond. And the things that you do in and through your life and by your life and to others. But I want you to see also that God's involved in our life even in our sin. You mean God causes sin?
Never. There's not a single verse in the Bible that says God causes sin. Does He know about it? Yes. Does He allow sin? Yes. Does He prompt it? No. Does He lead us into sin? Never. Does He know about it?
Yes. Listen, will He stop us from sinning? Sometimes He does, and sometimes He allows us to have our way. You say, well, if God is a God of love, why wouldn't He stop us? Because He's a God also who loves us enough to give us a choice. Is He involved in that?
Yes, He is. Sometimes He stands back and watches us make mistakes that are devastating. You say, well, how can any good come out of the fact that God, if He loves me and He allows me to do this, if He loved me, He wouldn't allow it in my life.
But you say He loves me unconditionally and He's allowed this in my life. How can any good come out of that? Well, how do you and I learn our greatest lessons? By making mistakes. How do you learn how awful the penalty of sin can be? By sinning against Him. And that probably all of us could look back in our life and think, well, I sure wish that had never happened in my life or hadn't done this or hadn't done that. Or it may be something that you did many times, then there came a time and you were tempted and you said, oh God, I can't stand the penalty of that.
I can't stand what I experience after that. What's God doing? He's working your sin for your good. He's turning your disobedience for your good by doing what? Making it painful enough that you don't even want to do it again. You don't even want to go there again. You don't even want to participate in that again. Is He working good in that?
Yes, He is. So, let me just give you some specific things to jot down. First of all, He allows us to sin in order to show us our own weakness and pride. That is, listen, if you just lived a spotless life all the time, you know what you'd be doing?
I can handle it. I'm a spiritually minded person. You get prideful and would ruin your testimony. So, He allows sin into our life. He didn't choose it.
He doesn't send it. He doesn't instigate it, but He allows it. And I'm just simply saying, one of the reasons He allows it is because He reveals our weaknesses.
A second thing is this. We learn in those situations to depend, listen, upon His strength and His knowledge and His understanding, not our own. And it's in those times when we are tested and tried, we learn those things. Then of course, sin is never good, not at any time. But listen, He will turn it for our good every single time if we allow Him. You say, well, does that mean that if I want to live a godly life, I just sin more and more?
I wouldn't suggest that at all. But what I'm saying is this, that God loves us enough even when we disobey Him, even when we fault and fault. How did you grow as a godly person? How have you matured in your Christian life? Reading the Bible and praying and just saying, you know, read the Bible and pray and go to church and give and just be good, that's how I'm going to grow. No, you don't grow that way. You grow by what?
Stumbling and falling and making mistakes and sinning against God and experience His forgiveness and experience His kindness and experience His love and being driven back to the Word to find the solution. What happened? Why did I do this? What is God up to in my life?
That's the way we grow. So, He teaches us by our failures the bitter fruits of the consequences of sin. And what does He do?
He's turning it for our good. He teaches us the availability of His forgiveness. When you sin against God, listen, He says if you judge yourself, He won't judge you. When you and I sin against God, either with our lips or actions or whatever it might be, the proper response is immediately to confess it to God, which means I am agreeing with God. This doesn't fit who I am in my life. I'm asking You to forgive me, cleanse me.
I'd repent of this. I'd turn around and walk the other way. Do you always stay walking the other way? No.
Some things you have to learn over and over again. Is He patient? He's a God of patience. Is He in that?
Yes, He is. How would you ever learn how patient God is if He didn't have to deal with us about the same thing over and over and over again? We learn it by remembering.
Listen, by remembering the consequence. God is turning our situation for our good. And oftentimes we don't even realize that's what He's doing. But if I don't believe He's in control, I'll go off on some direction, some tangent, blaming somebody else, living in misery and wondering where God is. He teaches, this is one of the things He teaches us as I sin. He teaches us the scope of grace, of His grace.
Now watch this. It's one thing for you to gossip about somebody else. Will God forgive that? Yes, He will. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. He'll forgive you. Or let's say somebody gossiped about you. Suppose they damaged you emotionally in a way that takes you a pretty good while to get over it.
Then what's your response? Eventually, if you're living a godly life, you're going to forgive them. You will forgive them for what? All your life. You will forgive them.
You will forgive them for what you want them to do. How many times He's forgiven you? How many times He's cleansed you? How many times He's brought you back? How many times He's answered your prayer?
How many times you've confessed and He said, yes, every single time? God is in all these things in our life and the most important thing is this. When you add all this up, this awesome god of ours is teaching us about Himself. He is a God who loves us so much He chastises us. God is in the process of teaching us about Himself.
That's what He wants us to learn in the process. Go back to Romans eight just for a moment again. And this is a verse most people don't even think about.
They don't, they read Romans eight twenty-eight and praise the Lord till difficulty comes. But listen to what He says. In the twenty-ninth verse, following verse twenty-eight, of course, but those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to the image of His Son so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren.
Now, look at this. He says He causes all things to work together for good to those who love Him and those who call upon His purpose. Now, He says for those whom He foreknew, what does that mean? He knew before you were ever born you were going to be saved.
Now, watch this carefully. Somebody says, do you believe in predestination? You know why I believe in it? Because the apostle Paul believed it.
Now, listen to what he says. God predestined, that means He predetermined before you were ever born. He predetermined that when you were saved, the moment you made that decision, from that point on, God's work in your life and my life would be primarily this. Every single thing that He allowed, all these things that we don't like and do like, all the good times, all the bad times, all the hard times, He predestined.
To use all of that to do what? To shape you and me in the likeness of the character of His Son. What higher honor could God pay you and me than to say, I want you to be like my son Jesus, because He's the best.
He's it. I want you to be like Him. And so, if you put all of this together, when He says that He's working all things together for our good, well, what's our good? Our good is that, listen, He's predetermined to call on you to do what He wants you to do. He's determined to call on you to do what He wants you to do.
He's determined to conform us to the likeness of His Son. Therefore, on the basis of this, that He is in control of all things, all times, all circumstances, all situations. Does that mean I understand why He allows certain things to happen?
No. There's some things you and I will never understand till we get to glory. But He says, listen, I am to give thanks for everything because He is in absolute control of all things, and He's working all things together for our good and for His purpose. And His purpose is to conform us to the likeness of His Son. Therefore, I have all the motivation I need. I may have to struggle with some things I go through, but I have all the motivation I need to thank Him in every circumstance because He's working it for my good, and He's going to use that to conform me to the likeness of His Son.
Therefore, I not only have the expectation, I have the motivation to say, Lord, I'm going to thank You in this. I don't like it. It is painful. It hurts.
I don't understand it. I've wept and wept and wept. I've asked You why, but I'm going to thank You in a way. Why am I going to thank You?
Because I know You're in control, so You've allowed it for a reason. You're working it for my good, and so I'm grateful for that. And number three, it's part of Your predestined, predetermined conforming me to the likeness of Your Son. Thank You, God, no matter what it is. Now, when you and I come to the position placed in our spiritual life where we can thank Him for everything, here's what you can expect. Number one, our faith in God will prove unshakable. Our faith in God will prove unshakable because you're rooted and grounded in the truth.
And you can thank Him, knowing that He's working it for your good, predetermined, predestined to be conformed to His likeness. The second thing is this, that our conflicts with other people will not leave us bitter, no matter how much they may hurt you. You know what? Somebody says, Yeah, but you don't know how badly I've been hurt. None of us know how badly anybody else has been hurt. God knows all about hurt. But if I thank Him, we won't be bitter. You can't thank God for what's going on in your life and be bitter and be right. Number three, we'll be comforted in times of heartache and sorrow.
Why? Because I'm thanking Him for it. I know He's in control. He's working it for my good and He's conforming me to the likeness of His Son. Then, that being true, even in my most difficult, trying times, I can thank Him. And number four, our circumstances will not be able to steal our contentment.
Why? Because we know He's up to something good. And think about this. This is the God of unconditional love who has no desire to punish His children, who has no desire to have to chastise us, who has our best interest in all times. He wants us to be content. And Paul said in the Philippines, that fourth chapter, he says, I've learned in every circumstance to be content. Look what he went through to learn that lesson. And the last thing is we'll sincerely be able to give thanks in everything.
When you learn the key, but you've got to put these three things together. Remember, I'm to give thanks in everything. It's because I believe that He's in absolute control. He's working everything for my good. And He's paying me the highest honor He could pay me.
I want to make you like my Son, Jesus Christ. That's how you and I can give thanks in everything. Thank you for listening to The Reach of Our Thanksgiving. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-07-14 09:59:35 / 2023-07-14 10:08:05 / 9