In this message, Dr. Stanley walks with us through a number of Psalms that extol the greatness of our God. These verses lift our attention from earthly circumstances and inspire us to respond to His gracious favor with grateful hearts. When we focus on the Lord, we cultivate a spirit of gratitude that recognizes His goodness, guidance, and provision. He is worthy of all praise and every thanksgiving! For more messages from Charles Stanley, including this week’s broadcast, go to www.intouch.org/watch
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Dr. Charles Stanley: When you
think of Thanksgiving, what do
you think about?
Do you think about the landing
of the Pilgrims in 1620
on this shore after a long hard
trip across the Atlantic?
Or do you think about the
landing of turkey and dressing
on your plate at your house on
Thanksgiving morning?
Well, either one would be okay.
But don’t you know that they
were grateful beyond all
measure, leaving their land
of difficulty and hardship,
especially about their religion,
their faith?
And coming to a new land
unknown, adventurous, uncertain
probably lots of hardships
but they were free.
They were free to worship God
the way they intended.
And when I think about
Thanksgiving I think about what
they must have thought about on
that first Thanksgiving that
they observed and probably they
would have read the
hundred Psalm.
So I want us to read this
hundredth Psalm and then I want
to talk about what God
has saying to us in it.
“Shout joyfully to the Lord,
all the earth.
Serve the Lord with gladness;
Come before Him with
joyful singing.
Know that the Lord Himself is
God; it is He who has made us,
and we not we ourselves; we are
His people and the sheep of
His pasture.
Enter His gates with
thanksgiving and His courts
with praise.
Give thanks to Him,
bless His name.
For the Lord is good; His
kindness is everlasting and
His faithfulness to
all generations.”
What an awesome Psalm.
And if you’ll think about it for
a moment there is not a single
negative note in
that whole Psalm.
It’s all positive.
It’s all about God, and it’s
all about who He is and
what He does.
And it certainly ought to be
our attitude and though our
circumstances today were
probably like theirs.
They left because they
were afraid.
They left because they didn’t
have religious freedom.
They left the continent because
they wanted a new beginning,
and a new start, and a new life.
And every time a person trusts
the Lord Jesus Christ as their
personal Savior,
they’re born again.
It’s the beginning
of a new life.
Does that mean the end of
problems and heartaches,
and burdens?
No, and neither did that mean
that for them because there were
Indians to face, and cold
winters, and all the rest.
And so, life was new, but it
was a beginning of a whole
new perspective on life.
And when I read this Psalm
I think about how positive it is
in every single way, and I think
about all the things we have
to be grateful for.
So I want us to look at this
Psalm in the light of what God
is saying to us, and what our
attitude ought to be toward Him
in spite of all the things
that we see today.
So, I want us to look at it in
the light first of all of how
positive it is.
Look at this: “Shout
joyfully to the Lord.
Serve the Lord with gladness;
come before Him with
joyful singing.
Know that the Lord
Himself is God.
Enter His gates with
thanksgiving.
Give thanks to Him,
bless His name.
For the Lord is good; His
kindness is everlasting and
His faithfulness to
all generations.”
Think about all that God has
said in those few verses.
We’re to shout, serve, come,
know, enter His gates, enter His
courts, give Him thanks,
and bless His name.
Think about it.
Look back over all the weeks of
this year how good God has been
to you, and all the kind of ways
He’s been good.
So, what does He say?
Shout about Him, serve Him, to
come before Him, know Him, enter
His gates, enter His courts with
praise, give thanks, and bless
His name.
We have lots to be grateful for.
And then I think about in this
passage the Lord is a key figure
in this Psalm.
He’s our creator.
He’s the Good Shepherd,
the Provider, the Protector.
He’s good to us, loving kindness
is everlasting,
faithful forever.
When you think about God,
think about how awesome He is.
How good He is to you every day.
You could go to sleep, and could
have gone to sleep last night
and not woke up
this morning.
You could have.
Who woke you up?
You say, “I woke myself up.”
No, you didn’t.
Let me tell you something.
God wakes us up every morning.
You may have to have an alarm,
but God’s still’s the One
that wakes you up.
He’s the One who gives you
good attitude about the day.
He’s the One who enabled you to
love someone whom you’re married
to, love your children, love
your husband, love your wife.
You are blessed, and we have
much to be grateful for to God.
And this Psalm is all
about giving thanks to God.
So I wonder how often in a given
week or a month, you just stop
and give thanks to God?
Just say, “Lord I just
want to thank You.
I want to thank You, thank You,
thank You, Jesus.
I want to thank You
that I can talk to You.
I want to thank You
that You hear me.
And Lord there’s a lot of things
going on in this world I don’t
like, but You’re God and You’re
going to make it turn out
to suit You no matter what.
You’re Jehovah God.”
We have Him to praise and
to sing praises to.
And I love this Psalm because
it’s all about Him.
Now, many times in the Psalms
we’re admonished to make
a joyful noise.
And oftentimes we forget that,
moan and groan, and talk about
how bad things are.
The–watch this–the world is
always going to be bad,
but watch this–you and I, no
matter what the world does,
we live in this awesome capsule
of the grace of God, Almighty
God is in our life protecting
us, watching over us,
and caring for us.
And even when we go through
times of sickness, and
heartache, disappointment,
He hasn’t changed.
Think about this.
Your friends come and go.
And sometimes the friends you
think are the most faithful and
loyal are not there
when you need them.
I love it because God’s name is
mentioned thirty-one times in
the first book of the Bible.
This book is all about God.
And when we come to
Thanksgiving, He’s the object
of our thanksgiving.
And so, when I think about the
Psalms–so I want you to turn to
several of them and just
read them together.
And if you’ll look in
Psalm sixty-six first.
Psalm sixty-six first, and I
want us to read it and look at
it and see what God is saying
because He says the same thing
in every one of them.
Psalm sixty-six,
verse one and two.
Look at this: “Shout.”
How?
Well, that’s not very good.
Shout, how?
“Joyfully to God, all the
earth; sing the glory of His
name; make His praise glorious.”
That is when he says shout
joyfully: cheerfully, happily,
lighthearted, thrilled, the
excited about the fact that
we love God.
“Shout joyfully to God,
all the earth.”
And then go to if you will, to
Psalm eighty-one and let’s look
at that for a moment.
Psalm eighty-one and
look at these verses.
Again, the Scriptures says,
“Sing for joy to God our
strength; shout joyfully
to the God of Jacob.
Raise a song,
strike the timbrel.
Blow the trumpet.”
These people made a noise
serving God, and oftentimes
we think about being reverent.
Well, there are ways
to be reverent.
And I think about churches for
example, where you’re supposed
to walk in and be quiet.
Don’t say anything and
everybody is quiet.
The choir sings a quiet hymn,
and the pastor gets up, and very
quietly reads a passage of
Scripture, and says a few things
quietly, and you go out quietly.
Listen, he says shout joyfully.
Then if you’ll turn to
the ninety-fifth Psalm.
Ninety-fifth Psalm
verse one and two.
Look at that.
“O come, let us sing for joy to
the Lord, let us shout joyfully
to the rock of our salvation.
Let us come before His presence
with thanksgiving, let us shout
joyfully to Him with psalms.”
Isn’t it interesting that the
psalmist says every time we’re
to shout joyfully?
You can’t shout joyfully
and be quiet.
You say, “Well, I thought you
should come to church
and be reverent?”
Reverence doesn’t always
mean quietness.
It means an attitude.
A reverence it an attitude
about the One I’m serving.
I can reverence for God and
shout to the ends of the earth.
I can reverence God
and be absolutely quiet.
Reverencing God speaks of our
acknowledgement of Him, who
He is, and all that He is.
And think about what
He’s done in your life.
Every single one of us has a
reason to be grateful to God
and to shout His praises.
And yet we’re taught
to be reverent.
Be quiet when you go to church
and reverence God.
But when I look at the Psalms
there’s nothing quiet
about that.
Listen to it.
“Shout joyfully.”
“Shout joyfully.”
“Shout joyfully.”
“Shout joyfully.”
In this ninety-eighth Psalm:
“Shout joyfully to the Lord,
all the earth;
break–“listen–“break forth
and sing for joy
and sing praises.”
That’s what the choir does,
and we sing with them.
“Sing praises to the Lord with
the lyre,” that’s a string
instrument, “with the lyre
and the sound of melody.
With trumpets and a sound of
the horn, shout joyfully before
the King, and the Lord.”
When I read those passages,
I think, there should be such
a joy in our hearts.
And listen, if you’re not joyful
in a joyful church, you’re not
going to be joyful
in a quiet house.
And I think God has us meet
weekly to be reminded of the
truth of God’s Word, to reminded
to be reminded of who He is
and what He’s doing in our life.
We all have to be reminded,
because we can all get caught up
in what we do day after day
and week after week.
And once in a while when I’m
sitting home studying, I’ve been
studying for a long time that
day I just find myself thinking
well, I’m getting down
in all this.
So I just walk through my
house and praise God.
You ask me what do I say?
Whatever comes to my mind.
Thank you, Jesus.
Thank You that I’ve learned
something new.
Thank You that You’re
in my heart.
Thank You that You’re getting
me ready for this.
Thank You, thank You,
thank You, God.
Who hears me?
Nobody but God.
Doesn’t make any difference
because I’m not talking
to anybody but God.
You have a right to be
quiet and worship Him.
You have the right, the
privilege, and the biblical
reason to shout as loud
as necessary if that’s
the expression of your heart.
That is, we are to make a holy
noise before God, praising Him
and thanking Him.
And so, these verses, these are
just a few verses in the Psalms,
and then let’s think about this
in listening to these Psalms,
and how God speaks to us, and
there are many other verses,
but there are seven reasons for
our joyful thanksgiving,
if you’ll think about all these
verses that we’ve read.
And the first one is this:
He’s our God.
To think–listen, there are many
gods created by many people down
through the ages.
Many gods, and they
worshiped them.
They’re gods that
do not exist.
They’re gods that are
in their mind.
There are gods that have
they’ve been taught.
And that–it’s idolatry, but we
have a reason to shout
to holy God.
And so, if you think about this,
that the first chapter of the
first book of the Bible
is all about who?
It’s all about God.
It is an expression of God.
What’s the expression of God?
It’s creation.
“In the beginning, God created.”
It’s all about God, the Creator.
And sometime we forget that and
think about all of the things He
created, but He intends for us
to know that He’s the source
of all creation.
He’s still the Creator.
He’s the One who created
a new life within you.
You were born-again.
Almighty God, sovereign
Lord of the universe.
Jesus Christ His Son.
We have so much to
be grateful for.
He is our God.
Secondly, He made us,
we didn’t make ourselves.
He gave, listen–He
gave you life.
He gave you the
privilege to live.
He gave you gifts and
talents and skills.
You compare yourself with
somebody else, you can’t do
that, God didn’t make him
and you alike, He made us
all differently.
He made us all for a purpose.
He’s the God who has created us,
and He’s the God who’s made us,
and He’s not made any mistakes.
Anything and everything in
our life God has allowed
for a reason.
So think, He’s our God, He made
us and we’re His people.
That’s what the Scripture says,
we’re His people.
We’re the people of God.
You’re not just somebody, you’re
a child of God, and we have
a reason to shout
to the world that.
And then of course, He says,
we’re the sheep of His pasture.
Think about that.
Think about how
intimate this is.
He says He’s made us, and
He’s made us for Himself.
We’re His people, we belong
to Him, we’re the sheep
of His pasture.
What a beautiful way of
speaking about our relationship
to Him.
Think about all the other
animals and so forth
in the world.
Sheep and a shepherd,
doesn’t that sound like God?
Why is–why did God choose that
relationship in the Scripture?
Because He loves us and because
He wants us to know that His
attitude toward us is, He
shepherds us, watches over us,
cares for us, protects
us, guides us,
that’s what shepherds do.
Never forget this–my first trip
to the Holy Land we were sitting
in this restaurant and eating,
and I was sitting next to the
window, and I saw three
shepherds bring their sheep
together at a well, and
everything else was going, and I
just happened to be watching
this, and I was watching out
of curiosity because all those
sheep mix up with each other.
And I thought what a mess
that’s gonna be.
I couldn’t hear what was saying,
but I did see this shepherd,
one of these shepherds lifted up
his rod and said a few things.
I couldn’t tell
what he was saying.
I watched those sheep separate
according to the voice of that
shepherd, until they were all
going in a different direction,
and what bought them away from
the water to follow a shepherd
was the voice that they knew.
Their shepherd they knew
which to follow.
And I’ll never forget
there thinking God,
I hope I’m like that.
I hope I can live such a life
that whenever Your voice come,
I’ll know it’s You, it’s not the
devil, it’s not somebody else,
it’s You.
And when He says, we’re the
sheep of His pasture, and He
didn’t just say we’re His sheep
of His pasture which means
He’s the Provider.
He’s the Provider, the Shepherd.
We’re His sheep.
Now, sometimes we may act like
goats, but we’re not goats,
we’re sheep, and if a person
is lost, they fit the goat
attitude, probably, but we’re
the sheep of His pasture.
We have a shepherd, we have
somebody to protect us, to
provide for us, to guide us,
to lead us.
Shepherds protect their sheep,
shepherds provide for them,
shepherds watch over them, and
it’s interesting–sheep know
their shepherd’s voice.
And I wonder if you know the
voice of God in your life.
Do you know when God is
speaking to you, that’s not
just your attitude?
It’s not just something
you’ve thought up.
Can you say that you can
identify the voice of God
when He speaks to you?
I think there’s one thing that
I learned very early in life,
and it probably was my
Pentecostal background,
a little bit, because somehow
their emphasis on prayer made me
conscious of the fact
that God would speak to me
if I would listen to Him.
And I was saved when I was
twelve, and so one of the first
things I wanted to do is to
learn how to listen to Him.
Didn’t take me long, and I
remember saying, “Lord, I don’t
know what all that means,
but I do want to learn to be
able to listen to You,
and to know that You’re
the who’s speaking to me.”
And if you’ll think about it for
a moment, what more valuable
lesson can you learn than
to listen to the Shepherd?
You say, “Well, I don’t
think God speaks to me.”
Yes, He does, you may not
listen, that’s your fault.
Does God speak to you?
Yes, He does.
And God intends for us
to listen to Him.
We’re the sheep of His pasture.
Not just sheep, the
sheep of His pasture.
We have a Shepherd, not two
shepherds, just one Shepherd:
the Lord Jesus.
When you trusted Him as your
Savior, He did an awesome thing.
He came into your life, into
your spirit, and to live His
life through you.
So we have His voice, we have
His protection, we have His
provision, we have the pathway
that He wants us to walk.
When I think about how
intimately loving and personal
God is, we should never feel
like a stranger.
You should never
have to feel alone.
Now I know there’s a certain
amount of aloneness when you’re
by yourself if you happen to
live by yourself, or whatever it
might be.
But not alone.
Once you receive Jesus Christ
as your Savior, He’s in you.
He is–watch this–watch
this carefully–He is the
Shepherd who has created every
single thing that exists,
and He’s your Shepherd.
Do you acknowledge Him as that?
Do you see Him as that?
Do you think of Him as being
your personal Shepherd?
He is, and we’re His sheep.
Now we don’t always
obey the Shepherd,
and you know what He does?
That’s why He has a rod.
[laughing]
Well, you know, God still
has a rod, thank God
He doesn’t let us get so far.
And why do you think there’s
a hook on the other end
of that rod?
Pull him back.
How many times has God pulled
you and me back in times
of trial, or temptation,
or whatever it might be,
by His grace and love and mercy.
An awesome God He is.
And when you read Genesis
chapter one, it’s all about God.
The–watch this–the rest of the
Bible is about God dealing with
His sheep, and He loves us.
He loves us, eternally,
completely, absolutely enough
to cause us to
fellowship with Him.
To praise Him, to shout His
glory and His praises, and
to give Him thanks.
He’s our God, He made us, we’re
His people the Scripture says.
We’re the sheep of His pasture.
God is good.
And if you had to sit down this
morning and write out a little
biographical sketch of the good
things God’s done in your life
throughout your life, you could
fill up probably half a book.
At least twenty or thirty or
forty pages maybe of how God’s
been good to you.
Now you can take another pen,
another book and write down all
the things that’s happened to
you that were not so good.
I assure you when you count
correctly the good things that
God has done in your life far
outweighs the difficulty,
hardship, and pain
that you’ve suffered.
But somehow we forget that.
We forget how good He’s been
because we’ve all been through
difficult times.
We’ve all hurt; we’ve
suffered physically,
we hurt suffered emotionally.
We’ve all been through
difficult times but we all–
listen to this–we all live in
godly times because you are
filled with the Spirit of God.
Your name has been written
in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
You’re on your way to Heaven no
matter what the world does,
the whole thing can blow
up and it’s not going to
affect your eternal life.
We forget how good God is.
We can sing about it once or
twice a year but think about
how good He’s been to you.
You say, “Well, but you
just don’t know how bad
it’s been for me.”
No, you don’t know how bad it’s
been for people around you.
But the truth is He’s
been good to you.
Because even in the difficult
times God showed up.
When you were in need
God showed up.
When you were sick He showed up.
When you were lonely
He showed up.
When you were going through
times that you couldn’t share
with anybody else and you were
lonely and you were fed up with
life and you thought about
ending it, He showed up.
Why?
Because He’s an awesome,
good God and the Bible says
His lovingkindness
endures forever.
Think about this, when you and I
are going through a tough time,
we have His lovingkindness.
Now we may not recognize it,
but we have His lovingkindness.
Sometimes you say, “Well,
why does God chastise us?”
Because He loves us.
And if a sheep gets astray,
the shepherd goes after the
sheep and depends upon where the
sheep or how far, or whatever.
He may have to tap him a little
bit to remind him not to do
that again.
Watch this carefully–can you
honestly say that you’re happy
when God chastises you?
Can you say that, amen?
I didn’t think I’d
get much on that.
Think about this.
If God never chastised us,
what would we do?
We’d keep going till
we went over the hill,
fall off the mountain.
It is God’s loving hand that
chastises us, to remind us don’t
walk out of His will,
there’s danger over there.
You’re going to regret it.
You’re going to find yourself
in trouble, just stay
with the pack.
Follow the Shepherd,
listen to His voice.
Because the Shepherd’s always
going to provide what we need,
when we need it, how we need it.
Does that mean there’ll never be
rainy days, hard days,
difficult days, rocky
days to walk on?
No.
But the Good Shepherd is there
to protect us and to guide us.
This Psalm is all about God’s
goodness, and our worship of
Him, and our recognition
of who He is.
And so, His faithfulness
continues with us throughout
all generations.
That is–watch this–you will
never have a moment of your life
when God ceases to be faithful.
He will always be faithful.
He will always be
who He says He is.
He will always do
what He says He’ll do.
And when I think about our
Heavenly Father always being who
He is, always doing what He
says, always providing what He
promise, always being
with us through any and
every circumstance of life.
We should shout hallelujah,
praise to God continually.
This is the God whom we serve,
not the god the world serves,
because the god the world serves
is all confused; it’s mixed up
with good, bad, and indifferent,
and they pacify themselves while
saying, “Well, God understands.”
The god the world serves is not
the God of the Bible, it’s the
god of the devil that
compromises sin and makes sin
acceptable, and misleads people
to do evil, to think evil,
to become evil.
That’s not the God of the Bible.
You and I have a God who cares
so much for us that He loves us
enough to chastise us, to keep
us in the center of His will
which is the place we
understand and experience
the love of God most.
So when I think about it, and
think about all of that this
says to us, it speaks to me
of His untiring goodness,
continuous goodness
toward us, always.
His sacrificial love for us,
think about the cross, and His
eternal faithfulness to us.
Think of those three things.
His untiring goodness
is always there.
His sacrificial love for us,
always there.
His eternal faithfulness to us,
we don’t ever have to worry
about Him changing.
That’s the awesome God we serve,
we should praise Him
and thank Him,
and glorify His name.
You say, “Well, I believe
He’s forgotten me.”
No.
You may have forgotten him, and
you may be one of those sheep
that’s gone astray.
But if you’ll notice in the
Scripture, watch this–
are you listening?
Say amen.
Jesus never whipped a sheep.
Never beat a sheep.
But He went after the sheep
and brought them back.
And so, you may feel like,
“Well, I know I was saved back
yonder somewhere but God sort of
forgotten me because I back slid
and got into this
and got into that.”
No.
I’ll tell what the situation is.
You’re living in sin and the
Good Shepherd is waiting for you
to come home.
You say, “Well, how
do I come home?”
By asking Him to forgive
you of your sins.
Asking Him to help you get
your life back together.
Asking Him to encourage you and
show you the way and thank Him
for His forgiveness.
And thank Him for His
goodness toward you.
The Good Shepherd
doesn’t beat His sheep.
It’s the sheep who go astray
and He comes after us
to bring us home.
When I think about God’s awesome
love and I think about this
awesome psalm:
“Shout joy to the Lord,
the Good Shepherd.”
And the Good Shepherd will be
your Shepherd to guide you,
lead you, protect you, watch
over you through the last moment
of your life.
When you breathe your last
breath, you’ll see Him
for the first time.
What an awesome eternal
thought that is.
If you have never trusted
Jesus Christ as your Savior,
you won’t see Him.
You’ll be eternally
separated from Him.
You say, “Well,
that’s not fair.”
He’s warned you, He’s told you,
He’s sent the message to you
over and over, and over again.
And why have you rejected Him?
The one person you need in your
life above everybody else
is Jesus.
“Come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden,
and I’ll give you rest.”
“For God so loved the world,
that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whoever believes in
Him will have eternal life.”
If you confess your sins, He’s
faithful and just to forgive you
of your sins and to cleanse you
from all unrighteousness.
Why fight God?
When you can receive the Lord
Jesus Christ as your Savior,
everything changes.
Your name is written instantly
in the Lamb’s Book of Life
from which there
are no erasures.
And when you breathe your last
breath, the first person you
will see is the Good Shepherd,
the Lord Jesus.
Is that not worth praising
God for?
Amen.
Let’s give God a hand.
Praise God.
[congregation applauding]
Father, we thank you and praise
you for Your goodness and
love and mercy toward us
that’s indescribable.
Praise, thanksgiving,
and blessing to You.
Thank you for loving us.
Thank you for putting up
with us.
Thank you for forgiving us.
Thank you for being here for us
twenty-four hours a day knowing
everything about us, know how to
heal us from any and everything.
And know how to bless us.
We just bless you this
morning in Jesus’s name.
Amen.