How Thanklessness is a Mark of a Society in Decline

How thanklessness is a mark of a society in decline. That is a topic we'll discuss today, this Thanksgiving weekend here on the Christian worldview radio program, where the mission is to sharpen the biblical worldview of Christians and to share the good news that all people can be reconciled to God through faith in the person and the work of Jesus Christ. I'm David Wheaton, the host of the program, and our website is thechristianworldview.org.

Well, we hope you all had a nice, thankful Thanksgiving weekend here in the midst of that right now, and we're going to discuss thanklessness and thankfulness today here on the program. You know, in the first two chapters of his letter to Christians in Rome, the Apostle Paul establishes that all people are sinners and separated from God. And he spans the spectrum from non-believing Gentiles, pagan or spiritual or otherwise, to those who are the religious Jews of his day, the Pharisees and Sadducees, those who are very moralistic, that they're all under sin. He describes what leads that former group, the non-believing Gentiles in Romans 1, into this downward spiral. We're going to read this passage today, this downward spiraling degrees of sexual immorality and other sins, that it is because they suppress the truth and they don't acknowledge God.

That's why there's this decline in society, this further spiraling downward. And that makes sense when you read it, when you reject the authority of God and that may make man the authority. That goes a long way to explain why, let's say, our American society is what it says toward the end of Romans 1, that it's, quote, depraved and full of strife and arrogant inventors of evil and gives hearty approval to those who practice sin. That's right from Romans 1. But there's another reason given in Romans 1 that leads a people to being, as it says in that passage, given over by God to unrighteousness.

It's very interesting. Verse 21 says, for even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks. In other words, not giving thanks to God for who He is and all that He gives leads to a society in moral decline.

Now why would that be? So this weekend here on the Christian worldview, we're going to discuss why thanklessness, not just the suppressing of truth and the not acknowledging of God, thanklessness is at the root of our society's brokenness and how Christians need to speak and model something very different. So let me just read this passage in Romans chapter 1.

Maybe it's familiar to many of you, but for those who aren't familiar with it, I think it bears reading to get a sense of this downward spiral of a society, whether secular or religious, in rejection of God. It says, Paul writes in Romans chapter 1, before he gets into that downward spiral, he talks about his purpose. He's writing to Christians in Rome and he's going to come and visit. So he says, so for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you who are in Rome. For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it, the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith as it is written, but the righteous man shall live by faith. And would that be all of our, if you're a follower of Christ, would that be all of our mission in life, to be not ashamed of the gospel, to know it's the power of God for salvation? It's the only way, the only door to being right with God is the good news that God sent his son Jesus Christ to live a perfect life and then to offer himself as the substitutionary sacrifice on behalf of our sin to satisfy God's wrath and justice so we can be forgiven and made right with God. That's the gospel. And that is received, by the way, not by going to church or becoming a better person, it's received here.

It says in verse 17, the righteous man shall live by faith. This is received by faith, not in what Jesus did plus what we do, but it's received by faith solely, 100% on what Jesus did on our behalf. As I said at the beginning of the program, the person and work of Christ. Who is Christ? He is this perfect son of God, the sinless son of God, so therefore the only one that could be the sacrifice for our sin.

He didn't have to die for his own sin because he was perfect, he was sinless. And not only the person of Christ, who he is, but his work, what he did for us in his perfect life and his substitutionary death and his his supernatural resurrection from the dead. That's how you, if you've never believed that message of the gospel, that's how you can be forgiven and made right with God by believing in who Jesus Christ is and what he did for you on the cross. That's the most important decision that you will have to make in this entire life, whether you receive that news, that revelation from God, or whether you reject it. And it's going to determine, your response to that will determine, the Bible says, where you spend eternity. Whether you reject God and what he's revealed to you, or by faith you receive it.

So we hope that you will receive that most precious, most important, most invaluable gift that God offers. So that's right there in Romans 1, but then it goes into the consequences for rejecting it, the unbelief. If you reject that message of the gospel, here's where it goes.

Not only for you personally, and I'm going to be varying degrees, but for a society in general that rejects the truth, the gospel of God. It says in verse 18 of Romans 1, for the wrath of God is revealed. Now we see the goodness of God, the gospel in the previous earth.

Now all of a sudden you reject that. Now here comes the wrath of God. Now this may not have been told to you in church.

You may go to a church that only emphasizes the love of God, but that's not what the Bible says. God is a God of love, but he's a God of just wrath, and he's angry over sin. He is the king of the universe. He deserves our full allegiance and obedience. And when we reject his ways and reject him, he's angry, as any sovereign would be angry, except he's perfectly, righteously angry. It says, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. And here's the first category of why this happens, this downward spiral, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, his eternal power, and divine nature, they have been clearly seen being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, now here's the second one, they did not honor him or give thanks. That's what we're going to focus on today.

I'll get more into that today. But they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. In other words, they make idols, they worship things that aren't God, whether it's money or materialism or just idols, they carve out a wood, whatever.

They just go in this downward spiral. And that's what we get in Romans chapter 1 to the end of the chapter in 32. Here's the downward spiral, and it keeps on repeating this phrase, therefore, God gave them over. Therefore, God gave them over. And God is basically saying, you want your own way? You can have your own way, but there is a consequence in going your own sinful way. So in verse 24, it says, therefore, God gave them over in the lusts of their flesh to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.

And here's another condition here of why this downward spiral happens. It's suppressing the truth. Here it is, for they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator who was blessed forever.

Amen. Next verse, 26, another gave them over for this reason. Because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, God gave them over to degrading passions. See the spiral here, it's getting deeper and deeper, degrees of depravity.

For their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. Verse 28, here we go again, another giving over. This downward spiral continues, and just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, we've gone from suppressing the truth, to exchanging the truth of God for a lie, to not seeing fit to acknowledge God any longer, here's another giving them over. God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful, and although they know the ordinance of God, they know it, that those who practice such things are worthy of death.

What do they do? They not only do the same, but they give hearty approval to those who practice them. This is a powerful, powerful passage, and this doesn't just describe, I think, the culture in America at this time, I think it does describe that, but it describes any culture, any society over time, that suppresses the truth, that exchange the truth of God for a lie, and that does not see fit to acknowledge God any longer. Once individuals do that, or once people do that, they're given over, and there's this downward spiraling digression of immorality and all kinds of other sins. And this idea of suppressing the truth, it's the idea of knowing truth, what do you do when you suppress something?

You know about something, but you try to cover it up, you try to hide it. It's like they know about God, and he says in this passage, they know about God through creation, just looking around us leads us to think, well, wait a second here, this couldn't have happened by itself, it didn't just spontaneously combust and arise out of nothing, there had to be a, we look at a building, there had to be a builder, we look at creation, there had to be a creator. So he says through creation, we can know there's a God. And also through our conscience, we know there's a God.

He said that in this passage, that even though they know God, they did not honor him or give him thanks. We know, we know inside of us, there are certain rights and wrongs. Who put that inside of us? Why don't animals know that? I mean, animals don't know what's wrong to steal and kill each other, but we do. It's not just intelligence, there's something in us that knows, and that's the conscience that God has put inside of us. So even though we know those things through creation in our conscience, we suppress them. Not only do we suppress them, but we exchange the truth of God for a lie.

It's like we have something in our hand, and we say, no, I don't want that, I want to exchange it for something else. And then we won't acknowledge God any longer, we push him out of society. And then finally, there's this hearty approval of sin. Not only do we suppress and exchange and won't acknowledge God, but then we just approve this depraved, debased society. But that one phrase in that passage in Romans 1 is very interesting. It makes sense why the suppression of truth and the exchanging of truth of God for a lie and won't acknowledge him, that makes sense why that would lead to really a bad state of a society or a person. But it's what it says in verse 21, for although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened. That is interesting that a lack of thankfulness to God is part of this downward spiraling into depravity. It's interesting because when we're not thankful, and this is what we're going to get in today, for all his good gifts, whether life or breath or health or the creation around us or for food or for his incredible design, what does that lead to if you're not thankful to God? Leads to complaining, to entitlement, to bitterness, to strife, and ultimately to rage.

And then more spin spirals down. We're going to talk about the importance of thankfulness today here on the Christian worldview radio program. More after this. David Wheaton here to tell you about my boy Ben, a story of love, loss, and grace. Ben was a yellow lab and inseparable companion at a stage in my life when I was single and competing on the professional tennis tour. I invite you to enter into the story and its tapestry of relationships with Ben, my aging parents, with a childhood friend I would finally marry, and ultimately with God who caused all things, even the hard things to work together for good. Order the book for your friend who needs to hear about God's grace and the gospel or the one who has gone through a difficult trial or loss or just the dog lover in your life. Signed and personalized copies are only available at myboyben.com or by calling 1-888-646-2233.

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I'm David Wheaton, the host. Our website is thechristianworldview.org. Just a quick couple announcements before we get back into our topic of the day, which is how thanklessness is a mark of a society in decline. Just released our end of the year letter. We do one annual print letter every year. Of course, we do the Christian worldview weekly email every Friday, but once a year at the end of the year, we do this end of the year print letter. So those of you who are on the mailing list for that, that's going to be mailing this week.

It's already off to the printer. It's a really nice letter this year. And I want to draw your attention to some of the resources. There's a resource catalog in there of all the resources we offer and so forth. And by the way, our resources are carefully picked to jibe with our mission to sharpen the biblical worldview of Christians and to share the good news, the gospel that all people can be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ.

In other words, they all are carefully picked. There's lots of things with a wide tent of what's called Christian out there. We really try to narrow it down and get the best resources so you can have a sharper biblical worldview. Now, I would just encourage you coming up to Christmas to bring some of these resources, something with substance and meaning into your Christmas giving rather than the typical things we give, a sweater or a tie or whatever, toys, that kind of thing, because we have resources for both adults and for children. So just going to highlight a couple. And by the way, we've already uploaded the end of the year letter to our website, thechristianrealview.org.

So those of you who aren't on the list, the mailing list for it can just go and view it right on our website. And a couple things. We have DVDs. We have both American gospel films out.

And these are excellent. We're going to be featuring these on the program coming up. One's being released in early January. The first one, American gospel, has already been released.

We're going to get into these in the coming weeks on the program. But those would be great DVDs. One is about how the prosperity gospel has distorted the gospel and how that theology is being exported abroad.

The second American gospel DVD is about how postmodernism and progressive, quote, Christianity leads to a false gospel. So those DVDs are excellent. Both there are excellent.

Both there. We have the Life is Best series, which we featured this year. We have things on DVDs on global warming. All kinds of books. Costi Hinn's book, God Greet and the Prosperity Gospel. Lots of people like to order the Hymns of Grace hymn book, which we offer. It's a fantastic hymn book for your family. We have books on apologetics and social justice, which we covered a lot this year in the program.

Books by John MacArthur and Alistair Begg. And then one of the most important resources we really believe, even though this program isn't probably directly geared towards kids, but we put special emphasis on children's resources because that is just a most impressionable age. I mean, that is how we're to receive faith in Christ, like a child, a believing child. And they need to be led in the way of truth at the youngest of ages. So we put lots of emphasis on finding really good, sound theological resources for kids. And so we have ones from the Answers in Genesis, a special door.

We have ones on fingerprints, what makes you uniquely you. Just think Little Pilgrim's Progress, the 10-Minute Bible Journey, the Gospel Story Bible. All of these resources are ones that we actually use ourselves with our son. And we just think they would be really helpful for you to have them. We have many more that we couldn't even include on here, but this is what we have for this year. We have the Theo DVD Bundle. We strongly believe in that resource.

It's been highly popular over the years. That's a 15-episode DVD series. The Adam Raccoon book set, eight-book set, is another one by Glen Keane, Disney animator.

So good, so strongly solid. We even have the Sugar Creek Gang set this year. So these are some of the things that we just encourage you to take advantage of by going to thechristianworldview.org. These items are already in our store, but you can also just read the end-of-the-year letter and get into the resource guide there. And one more favor I will ask—you'll see this in the resource guide on the end-of-the-year letter as well—is My Boy Ben, my book. I've mentioned that we've been doing a kind of an online strategic marketing social media campaign for the book here at its five-year anniversary. We've seen such good feedback over the years, and we just want to get the book in front of more people.

And it's hard to do. And so the book is owned by The Christian Worldview, and we would just ask you a favor. If you have a social media page, whether it's Instagram, whether it's Facebook, just link the new website that was created to the book, myboyben.com, and just recommend it or encourage someone to get it as a Christmas gift. They can go there. They can get a signed and personalized copy. We just believe in the message of the book that people need to understand what God's grace is and what the gospel is, told through the story of this yellow lab named Ben, and how God uses the relationships of our life, even with the dog, but with family and others, and our circumstances in life, how God uses those to shape us. So if you could just link that in your social media sites, that would be very much appreciated.

Again, the website is myboyben.com. Okay, now let's get back to the topic for the day here, is how thanklessness is a mark of a society in decline. If you just join us in the first segment, we went over this passage in Romans 1, which describes how a person or a society spirals downhill. And that spiraling, that regression, that digression occurs when that person or that society as a whole suppresses the truth and righteousness, when they exchange the truth of God for a lie, when they don't see fit to acknowledge God any longer.

That's what happens. That explains why we are where we are in America today. But there's this other little reason given in there that seems like maybe not as strong of a connection as some of those other things to why we're going downhill. And it's a society that does not honor God, but also give Him thanks. And when you don't give God thanks for who He is and what He gives, for all His good gifts of just the gift of life or the gift of your next breath or the fact that you have relative health at this particular point in your life, or you're still alive, or for the beautiful creation around you for giving us food to eat, giving us the capacity to farm and raise animals for food and the incredible design of our bodies and everything.

There's so many things to give God thankful for when you don't do that. Well, what does that lead to? That results in sort of complaining like, well, things aren't as they should be and I want things better or at least to entitlement.

I really deserve something. Or it leads to this simmering resentment of bitterness. And then all of that starts to lead between strife between people. And there's a rage and there's a lack of peace in society. And that describes the way it is in America today. Just look at the news any given night. There's just such a division in this country. And you can say, well, it's political, it's Trump, and it's the liberals and the Democrats versus the... Yeah, I mean, that's the surface. But where that really comes from is the ideas, the worldview that undergird the different political philosophies. It really comes down to religion, so to speak, your worldview.

That's what it comes down to. If you reject and suppress God and you're not thankful, you're just going to be an angry, upset person. Things should be better because I deserve it. Thankfulness is really gratefulness for the situation you're in, knowing that you really don't deserve anything but judgment, and that God is good and gracious for his every good gift, and that things could be a lot worse if not for God's goodness. It's looking at God and saying, um, you're in control, you designed all this, and I should be thanking you for whatever good gift comes into my life, not expecting things to be as I want them, but to be trusting in the ways that you have them. It's not necessarily lowering your expectations or giving up on improving your life, not at all, but it's trusting God and thanking God over and above your own personal expectations. So this Romans 1 chapter, I think, really does represent where America is today.

It's suppressing the truth, it's not acknowledging God, it's giving hearty approval to these sins, and above all, I think it's not giving thanks. I mean, we have a political party. I'm not trying to put, you know, the Republicans are perfect, but we have a political party in this country that literally stands for these things, stands for the killing of unborn children, that stands for homosexuality, transgenderism, the redefinition of God's establishment of marriage, stands for legalizing recreational drugs, will stand for, by the way, soon, I'm almost positive of it, euthanasia, the removal of anything Christian, and is very, is very, not very supportive of God's chosen people, the Jews in Israel.

I mean, that's literally like their platform. It's this exchanging the truth of God for a lie, suppressing the truth and unrighteousness, that's what that party stands for. And again, not saying the Republicans are some moral, you know, theocratic, not at all, but this one party is so overtly this way now, and so there's this incredible divide in this country, and again, the political is just the surface.

It's the worldview that undergirds it. So when you stand for all those things I just mentioned, that are mentioned in Romans 1, homosexuality, the perversion, the depravity, and so forth, what's the result? The result is a complaining, a strife-ridden, a divided, a raging, burn down the system, fundamentally transform America, no acknowledgement of God and the great country we have, what's left of it, and what we once had, and so there's this thin, we now feel in America. So what we're going to get into in the next segment is, shouldn't we all be thankful to God? I mean, I was watching the Pilgrim story this past week about coming to America. We're going to get into what the Pilgrims had when they came to America versus what we have today, and do we really have any reason to be unthankful at all?

We'll do a little comparison and find out where this thanklessness is coming from. We have some very interesting sound bites about what is being taught to school children in this country, and what happens when they get into higher education. That's coming up next on The Christian Worldview. The Christian Worldview annual print letter, which is delivered to your mailbox in November. It contains a year-end letter from host David Wheaton and a listing of our store items, including DVDs, books, children's materials, and more. You can sign up for the weekly email and annual print letter by visiting thechristianworldview.org or calling 1-888-646-2233.

Your email and mailing address will never be shared, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Call 1-888-646-2233 or visit thechristianworldview.org. Social justice is a gospel issue. This has become the mantra of many evangelicals. Rectifying perceived inequities of race, gender, sexuality, poverty, immigration, amongst others, is considered a top priority. But what exactly is social justice? Is working for social justice a biblical mandate, an application of the gospel? Cal Beisner has written an insightful booklet entitled Social Justice, How Good Intentions Undermine Justice and Gospel. Also included in this revised 44-page booklet is a copy of the just released statement on social justice and the gospel. You can order the social justice booklet for a donation of any amount to The Christian Worldview.

Go to thechristianworldview.org or call 1-888-646-2233 or write to Box 401 Excelsior, Minnesota 55331. We hope you had a thankful thanksgiving, thankful to God for all of his good gifts to us as we talk about how the opposite of that, how thanklessness is a mark of a society in decline based on Romans chapter 1. And I was thinking, you know, should we as Americans be incredibly thankful to God? I mean, we have, we live in the most affluent country in the world by far. I mean, the poor here in America, just compare the poor here in America to any other place in the world. Have you ever visited India or Africa or South America, Mexico, places like that? I mean, the difference in the poor there and the poor there is night and day.

Or visited repressive countries like China or Russia or what about North Korea? I mean, when you start comparing and contrasting this country to every other country around the world, you begin to realize that we should be incredibly thankful to God for the incredible abundance and affluence that we have in this country, the opportunity in this country, the educational system opportunities we have in this country, the high standard of living comparatively to the rest of the world and all throughout past history, the long lifespans we live. I was watching this special on the pilgrims this week. I mean, people were living till they're, you know, 30, 40, maybe 50 years old back then.

What's our life expectancy now in America today with the health care we have is what, late 70s, around 80? The incredible natural resources we have in this country. This is truly a beautiful land.

The diversity and variety in the various areas of this country is just amazing. We have the most powerful military in the world, which keeps bad actors in the world from overtly trying to take over our land, at least at this point. We have relative peace within our country. Yes, you know, there is violence and there is murder and so forth. But, you know, for a land of 300 and some million people, you're going to expect in a fallen world with sinful natures, there's going to be violence.

But relatively speaking, there's not coups and things going on like there are, let's say, in Iraq or Syria or North Korea or, you know, overt slavery and persecution of peoples like in China, imprisonment without due process. I mean, we have these freedoms enshrined in our constitution of freedom of speech and to assemble and freedom of religion. We have the ability to vote and influence who's going to be our leaders. We have a charitable kind.

I mean, it just goes on and on and on. I mean, there's been no country as blessed, maybe aside the nation of Israel, back in the day at certain points in history, no country as blessed as the country we live in today. And yet a lot of our country are going to vote for someone and believe that they're skeptical of this country. They're haters of this country. They're like, we need to burn down this system. We have an oppressive country.

It's racist, it's sexist, it's unjust, it's immoral, it's genocidal. It's just, it's no wonder there's so much strife and division. There's no wonder there's this downward spiraling into all kinds of depravity, this God giving them over dynamic that's at work in our country today. So despite all this great abundance and affluence in our country, we have this attitude of, well, it should be better. We can create utopia. We're not there.

We have an inherently unjust structural problem in our country. I want you to compare where our country is today from a positive standpoint, all that we have, to what the pilgrims had when they came over in the early 1600s. I'm going to play a short little sound bite here from radio host Bill Meyer. He was formerly one of the hosts of the Focus on the Family program.

He created this little two-minute feature on Thanksgiving. As you prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving with turkey and pumpkin pie, why not teach your kids about the very first Thanksgiving? The 17th century was a time of religious struggle in England. The rulers wanted the people to follow the established church, but some held different beliefs about how to practice their faith. One of those groups decided to travel to North America to a place called Virginia. They believed there they could find the religious freedom they were seeking. In the fall of 1620, these pilgrims departed for the new world on board the Mayflower. The Voyager Cross was treacherous and the group suffered from seasickness and disease. After 66 days at sea, the Mayflower spotted land. They had arrived on the coast of what is now Massachusetts, hundreds of miles from their original destination. The pilgrims spent most of that first winter living on board the Mayflower. They began to build a few small cabins on shore, but the cold and illness began to take a terrible toll.

By April, half of them had died, mainly from pneumonia. That spring, an Indian warrior named Samoset walked boldly into their camp. He introduced them to another Indian named Squanto, who had been to England several years before. The pilgrims gave the Indian gifts and the Indians taught the pilgrims where to find the best fishing and how to plant corn with fertilizer.

By summer, their crops were plentiful. To celebrate and thank God for their survival, they held a three-day harvest festival in the fall of 1621 and invited the Indians to join them. In his journal, Governor William Bradford wrote these words, Our fathers were Englishmen, which came over this great ocean and were ready to perish in this wilderness. But they cried unto the Lord, and He heard their voice and looked on their adversity.

Let them therefore praise the Lord, because He is good and His mercies endure forever. Three of the pilgrims needs to be a reminder every Thanksgiving. I hope you spent some of your Thanksgiving reading and being reminded of who these pilgrims were and what they came over, what they believed in, and what kind of life they had, and their thankfulness, because it's truly incredible. We watched the PBS American Experience video or film, it's a two-hour film on the pilgrims and their crossing. Now, of course, the PBS has a bit of a leftward slant to it, but I thought it was overall fairly accurate and fair.

And it's just a great reminder. I mean, think about these people, think about where we are today in America and all we have. These people, the pilgrims, they were persecuted in their own country in England. They had to sneak out of their country. They couldn't leave their country for the other sneak out of their country to go to Holland, so they could have more religious freedom. They had to work super long days. Their children had to work in Holland just to be able to survive. Then they had this perilous ocean crossing because they were seeking greater religious freedom. Half of them died.

It was like 100 and some that came over half died. They had nothing materially. They spent every waking minute in the New World, whether they were on the Mayflower in the port, waiting to go on shore, they were sick. They spent every waking minute trying to survive, building shelters, cutting wood for heat, hunting for food, fishing, planting, caring for sick people, making clothes.

Think about it. They couldn't go down the street to the local supermarket and have a choice of 17 different types of chips to buy or food or steak or chicken just sitting there. They couldn't travel anywhere. They didn't have cars or trains or planes or anything like that. They couldn't just go to the side of their house and turn up the thermostat when it's a little cold.

Just turn up to 68, please. They had no running water, no hot showers, no hospitals, no roads, no transportation. They couldn't get two-day shipping on Amazon for anything they needed. They couldn't go down the street.

They couldn't get two-day shipping on Amazon for anything they needed. They had a constant threat from the Native Americans, the Indians who lived in their region. Some of them are friendly. The one tribe that they mentioned, that audio, I can't remember the name of it. That wasn't the Narragansett. It was the Wampanoags. They were friendly with them, but the other ones rid them from the eastern seaboard. There was constant threat of just living. They had short lifespans. There was death everywhere. They were constantly burying their dead. They barely survived. And yet the second year they're here, they have a three-day festival about how thankful they are, how thankful they are to God just to be able to survive in His bounty.

Just compare that to the thanklessness that we have in America today. I was listening or watching this video recently of a, it's called Brain Pop. It's a video series that they use in the public school system in America. And it's called Brain Pop Junior.

You can find it online. They use it for grades K through three. And I'm going to play this and just going to give you a contrast to that little audio I played from Bill Meyer there on Thanksgiving and the perspective there versus what kids, school kids are now, young school kids are hearing in the classroom. And I'll say this, most of it is fairly accurate and so forth. But then as it gets towards the end, there's this spin on the there's this spin on this myth of the pilgrims. This nothing's quite like it seems. And there's a slant against the European Christians and in favor of the Native Americans and so forth.

And so what does that do? It makes people who are here think, well, our country is really not what it was cracked up to be. There's lots of things wrong with the country.

And we really shouldn't be so grateful for all that we have because it's just sort of a myth that's been developed over the years. Let's hear the first minute now. We'll get into the rest after this last break of the day. Dear Tim and Moby, how did Thanksgiving begin? From Carrie and Tibby. Well, you've probably heard the story of a group of settlers called the Pilgrims. How in 1620 they came to America in a ship called the Mayflower. How they made friends with the native people and had them over for a feast. And they called it Thanksgiving and we've been celebrating it ever since.

Only problem is, a lot of that stuff is slightly inaccurate. They weren't called Pilgrims and they didn't dress that way. They wouldn't have called the meal Thanksgiving either. For the settlers, Thanksgiving meant a religious day of fasting and prayer.

This was more like a harvest festival. As for their relationship with the Wampanoag, well, friends is kind of pushing it. The Wampanoag are a Native American people. Back then, they controlled a chunk of what's now Massachusetts and Rhode Island. They've been living there for thousands of years in dozens of different villages.

And they've been trading with European visitors for over a century. Okay, we'll take a stop at there. You can probably see where this is going. When we come back, you will hear where it went.

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That's 1-888-646-2233. Or visit thechristianworldview.org. Okay, final segment of the day here on the Christian Real View radio program. We've been talking about thankfulness versus thanklessness and how not giving God thanks is one of the things that causes a society's free fall, as we read about in Romans chapter one. So if you missed any of the earlier part of the program, I encourage you to get it when we upload it to our website thechristianrealview.org. But we were playing, why is this, why have we led to this thankless generation? When we go back to the educational system, I'm playing some other audio right now of what they play to kindergarten through third graders in public schools called Brain Pop Junior on Thanksgiving.

I'm just going to play the end of it now. And they've been, it's been a fairly accurate representation of the pilgrims and so forth. But there's this slant that is biased against these Christians and that they stole their land and they brought disease and they had their own version of Christianity and they stole and they robbed graves and, and so forth and so on. But it's what it gets into at the end that this, this national myth we've developed, let's hear the rest of the, the finishing part of this audio. No, bravery and gratitude are awesome qualities that we should all try to live up to. That's kind of the purpose of national myths, to provide examples of our best selves. But myths oversimplify complex stories. We know that Massachusetts was not a wilderness. It was home to a civilization that went back thousands of years. And Plymouth's founding was a dark turning point for those people.

They were pushed off their land and had to adapt to a different way of life to survive. That pattern was repeated across the continent for the next 200 years, which is why some Native Americans consider Thanksgiving a day of mourning. For those of us who do celebrate, we can honor that perspective.

Taking time to consider it wouldn't be a bad addition to your list of Thanksgiving traditions, even if it's a little heavier than watching football, hanging out with friends, and. Okay, there, there it is. So you can see the, the undermining, the skepticism, the diminishing of these people who came over here for religious freedom. They weren't perfect people, of course, but neither were the Indians. We could get into the whole thing of whose land is it.

We won't get, we don't have time to get in that today. But what does that do to early elementary kids when they hear about, oh, well, these, these people who founded the country, who started America really weren't that great after all. This really isn't that great of a country. We're not really an exceptional nation. And so what that turns into is later in life, as they go up through the educational ranks, and they come into higher education, then they're asked, well, do you think America is an exceptional country? Do we have such great abundance? And is this really an amazing country?

And here's how they answer. Do you believe that America is exceptional? No, not really. Can you define what American exceptionalism is? Uh, believing that we're better than everybody else, I guess, and that our way is the right way. Do you believe that? Uh, no, I think I've recently, in the last couple years of my education, I've learned not to always believe the exceptionalist viewpoint we were taught at a very young age. Um, do you have any specific points of where they say we're exceptional that you'd specifically disagree with? I mean, I think just like the whole Christopher Columbus and colonialism and westward expansion, all that we were never really told, I guess, the full story.

So it worked. You hear Brain Pop Jr. when you're in K through three, you get that message all the way up through middle school, high school, and you get to college and your professors get educate you out of being thankful for the abundance and the founding values of this country, in least in comparison to the rest of the world. It's sad. And so I want to close today by saying, how can we be thankful? How can we not be drawn into this? Well, for sure, the suppression of truth, uh, and in righteousness, you're not acknowledging God any longer. Those kinds of things are the obvious things that causes a society to go and decline, but how can we as Christians be thankful? You know, thankfulness to God is, is tested not when things are going well.

It's fairly easy to be thankful when, when there's blessing in your life, things are going well, you're healthy and all that. Thankfulness to God is tested under trial. And it's during those times that we submit ourselves to God's sovereignty, his, his authority terrain.

In other words, he causes or allows everything that happens to happen. It's trusting that he knows better and that everything he does is for my ultimate good of sanctifying myself, according to the way he wants me and for ultimately for his glory. It doesn't mean that during those trials that the trials don't hurt and you don't grieve, but that in the midst of them, you trust God and you're, you're thankful knowing that he's in control and has purposes for it that you may not even see at this point. And this says this all over scripture, James 1, consider it all joy, my brethren, consider it all joy when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Psalm 107, give thanks to the Lord for he is good.

His loving kindness is everlasting. It's hard to say that in the midst of a trial, but that's what we're called to do. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. We should be saying so, being thankful to God. 1 Thessalonians 5, rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and hear this verse 18, in everything give thanks.

That means in the good things and the hard things, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. Thankfulness has to be reminded and reinforced every day because we don't naturally want to be thankful. We naturally want to raise our expectations higher.

We want more. We think we deserve more. Think of the Jewish exodus in the wilderness. God was right there in a pillar of flame and fire and smoke by day and night and so forth, and they were not thankful for all the miraculous things God was doing. So it's in our hearts not to be thankful, but it has to be reminded and reinforced every day. And so we should be thanking God every day that He just simply exists and that He's revealed Himself to us through creation, through our conscience, through Christ, and through His word. We should be most thankful that He's sent His Son, especially to come into Christmas, to send His Son to offer us redemption from our sin, offer us reconciliation to Him. We should be thankful for all the things of life for our country, but even life and breath and any kind of health that we have from family and country and that we have shelter over our heads. There's so many things to be thankful for, and we will grow in that when we take in the word every day, when we understand who God is and who we are in light of God and what He's done for us. Our thankfulness will increase, but when you focus on your own circumstances or other people's expectations or what society is selling to us, the unjust country, all that kind of stuff, you won't be thankful.

And then your own personally will spiral down. So it's so key for us to be thankful for every good and perfect gift which comes from above. Thank you for listening today to the Christian Royal View Radio Program. Just a reminder to take a look at our just released annual print letter online at thechristianworldview.org. For those of you on the mailing list, it's coming soon.

Lots of great resources there for you and your family and your kids. You know, we do live in a changing and thankless America, but there is one thing we can always count on and trust in. Jesus Christ and His Word are the same yesterday, today, and forever. Until next time, think biblically and live accordingly. We hope today's broadcast turned your heart toward God, His Word, and His Son. To order a CD copy of today's program or sign up for our free weekly email or to find out how you can be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ, go to our website, thechristianworldview.org, or call us toll free at 1-888-646-2233. The Christian World View is a weekly one-hour radio program that is furnished by the Overcomer Foundation and is supported by listeners and sponsors. Request one of our current resources with your donation of any amount. Go to thechristianworldview.org or call us toll free at 1-888-646-2233 or write to us at Box 401, Excelsior, Minnesota, 55331. That's Box 401, Excelsior, Minnesota, 55331. Thanks for listening to The Christian World View. Until next time, think biblically and live accordingly.