5. Appropriate Thanksgiving? Psalm 66:13-15

Text: “I will go into Thy house with burnt offerings: I will pay Thee my vows, which my lips have uttered, and my mouth hath spoken, when I was in trouble.”

Psalm 66:13-14.

Good morning, grateful and thankful Christian!  Being ever conscious of the wonderous things the Living Lord God has done for you and for me, we are just as consistently conscious of our profound need to bring the Lord God continual and heart-felt worship, thanksgiving, and praise. 

If we seek to practice this level of thanksgiving to the Lord God, we do well, and the Lord is pleased with such consistency and sincerity of worship.  He takes Divine note of our appropriate thanksgiving, service, and worship, and writes it all in His ‘Book of Remembrance’.  We have His own Word on this matter.

“Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon His Name.  And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up My jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.”  (Malachi 3:16-17)

Any time we sincere, Bible-believing, Christians come before the Presence of the Lord God in prayer, in worship, or in praise – we can come into His Holy Presence in one way only, in, and through the precious shed Blood of His Holy Son, Jesus Christ.  We can come no other way, and without that level of sanctifying Sacrifice.  And we can come boldly, if Christ be our Saviour/Lord.

“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”  (Hebrews 4:16)

The Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Redeemer, has suffered the penalty required by God’s Holiness for your sin and mine PERSONALLY.  He took all of your sins – past, present, and future sins – upon His sinless Self, and suffered the wrath of God against sin for us, in our place, as our Divine Substitute.  (See the doctrine of Substitution on this site).

This full Atonement Sacrifice of Christ Jesus on Calvary’s Cross is what enables you and I, and all who are truly and Spiritually regenerated by His Blood, into the Holy Presence of our God of Almighty wrath against all sin.  We must appear before our Father in Heaven, covered by the precious Blood of Christ, God’s Lamb.

“For the life of the flesh is in the Blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar (the Cross) to make an Atonement (at-one-ment, sinful man with Holy Lord God) for your souls: for it is the Blood that maketh (makes, and continues to make) an Atonement for the soul.”  (Leviticus 17:11)

All though Holy Scriptures – Genesis to Revelation – we find TYPES, Spiritual illustrations and analogies, that reveal one vital theme – Christ Jesus on the Cross, making the Atonement for our sins.  We theologians call this concept typology.

With such a plethora of Scriptural illustrations of what it took to redeem sinners from our vile sins; the cruel suffering, and painful death of the Cross, one would think we would begin to think more profoundly about the level, and appropriateness, of our worship, praise to God, and sincerity of thanksgiving to Him.  However, this is not always the case.

So often in this increasingly apostate, 21^st Century where luke-warm Christianity is too often in evidence, do we see people going out with religious constancy to church-meetings, with the attitude that they are doing God a favour?  It seems to often be the case that, such luke-warm churchy people believe that the frequency of their dressing up and going out to ‘church’ meetings is what counts in the eyes of God.  Perish the thought!

“But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship Him.  God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”  (John 4:23-24)

It is not how many of these ‘church-meetings’ that count - if attending such legalist gatherings counts for anything at all – but HOW sanctified one comes before God, and HOW truly loving and grateful to the Lord we are!  Sanctification of soul, and thankfulness of heart are what the Living Lord God deserves from each of us for whom He suffered and died!

Verse 13.  “I will go into Thy house (prayer?) with burn offerings.  Even the thankful heart dares not come to God without a victim of grateful praise; of this as well as of every other form of worship, we may say, “The Blood is the life thereof.”  Reader, never attempt to come before God without Jesus, the Divinely promised, given, and accepted burnt offering.”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 285)

“Jesus saith unto him (Thomas), I am the way, the truth, and the life: NO MAN COMETH UNTO THE FATHER, BUT BY ME” (John 14:6)

Verse 13. “…I will pay Thee my vows.  Beware of going into the Lord God’s Presence to barter with the Almighty!  Making conditional vows to the Lord is not a practice to make.  ‘Dear Lord, IF you will do xyz…I will do xyz in return?’ This is not appropriate fellowship with Almighty God!  Reader, desist!  Hear what Solomon says on that foolish subject:

“When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for He hath no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed.  Better is it that thou shouldest NOT vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.  Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; neither say thou before the angel, that is was an error: wherefore should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thine hands?”  (Ecclesiastes 5:4-6)

Verse 15. “I will offer unto Thee burnt sacrifices of fatlings.  The good man will give his best things to God.  He who is miserly with God is a wretch indeed.” (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 287)

Appropriate thanksgiving, worship, and praise begins with a sincere knowledge, acceptance, confession, and forsaking of our personal sin.  Then the way is open for true born-again believers to come into the Presence of our Holy Father in prayerful thanksgiving, worship and praise.  When we come into God’s Presence in prayerful thanksgiving, we come covered from all sin by Christ’s precious and sinless Blood.  Then our service and worship of God is truly acceptable in His sight, and we enjoy the bliss of His Holy Presence.  Hallelujah!  Dear Father, we worship you, in Christ Jesus!  Amen.

Thought: “Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.”  (Psalm 19:14)