Signs of Thankfulness: Surrender
Psalm 100
Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with jubilation; come before Him with rejoicing. Know that the Lord Himself is God; It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Enter His gates with thanksgiving, and His courtyards with praise. Give thanks to Him, bless His name. For the Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting and His faithfulness is to all generations.
Happy Thanksgiving to you! I pray that you will find a moment or two today in all your busyness to just “count your many blessings.” We have much to be thankful for in each of our lives.
That brings us to the last sign of thankfulness today. If this were a sermon from Psalm 100, I would need to break down the remaining verses in Psalm 100. We have actually only covered verses 1 and 2! The remaining part of this Psalm proclaims more about thankfulness and I encourage you to read this Psalm from beginning to end and consider some of the other truths the Bible tells us about thankfulness.
But for today, let’s consider the final verse, “For the Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting and His faithfulness is to all generations.” Another sign of thankfulness is that we realize all of our gratefulness is found in the attributes of God. God is good, merciful, and faithful. The final sign of thankfulness we are considering today is the sign of surrender. In vs. 4, the Bible says, “Give thanks to Him, bless His name.”
What does it mean to “bless His name?” The idea of blessing God means to surrender. Thankful people bless God, that is we surrender to Him, we kneel and bow before Him. We live daily in surrender. We recognize that our life is not our own, that we have been bought with the price of Jesus' precious blood, and we live in surrender to Jesus as our King.
No more does he speak of his rights; now he joyfully speaks of God’s rule and reign over him. He has surrendered.
But this requires a bit of context. Because the idea of surrender, especially in a human understanding of war and battle is becoming under the rule of an oppressor. And let’s be clear, Jesus is certainly not an oppressor. In fact, He has delivered us FROM the oppression of sin, guilt, and shame.
God is Good
One reason we can fully surrender is because of the goodness of God. We used to sing a song years ago called God is So Good. And the truth is that God is a Good, Good Father. We can live in surrender knowing that God is good and always has our best interest. I am thankful for God’s goodness and because of that can live in surrender to Him!
God is Merciful
God is not only good, God is merciful. In God’s mercy, He has not given us what we deserve - death and separation from Him. Salvation, and for that matter, our daily blessings, are not something we deserve. Remember we are by our sinful nature a rebellious people. But God, in his mercy, doesn’t give us what we deserve. Instead, he gives us grace which we do not deserve. I thank God for His mercy!
God is Faithful
God is also faithful. God is true to His Word; He cannot lie. He is faithful, even when we are not faithful.
“If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.” II Timothy 2:13
According to this verse, if God is unfaithful He is denying His own character. I thank God for His faithfulness.
So on this Thanksgiving day, I encourage you to embrace surrendering to our Lord Jesus who is good, merciful, and faithful.