Which Is Sovereign? God's Will or Our Free Will

Name something for which you can thankful but for which such thanks does not need to be directed to God. (I.e., if you're giving credit to whom credit is due for all the good things in your life, is there ANYTHING at all for which full credit could go to yourself or someone else and not at all to God? If your answer is "No, I can't do that," that's because God is sovereign, right? ... over all things.)

More specifically, think of this in terms of the free will argument. If I choose Christ -- if I'M the one doing the choosing, if I exercise MY free will to follow Christ, -- then I get the credit for that, right? But doesn't that immediately rub you the wrong way? (like, Wait a minute. God doesn't get credit for something good that happens? How can that be?)

Please know that I don't deny the existence or the exercise of free will; but neither do I think it is quite what many Christians make it out to be. I believe God sovereignly works through the means of my free will to accomplish His own will and purposes.

Did you know ... about Thanksgiving?

Did you know that the joint committee of both Houses of Congress requested the President of the United States "to recommend to the people of the United States, a DAY of PUBLIC THANKSGIVING and PRAYER ..."?

Did you know that the accompanying proclamation stated "that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions"?

Yeah, really! No joke! Check it out!

Merry Thanksgiving

Within the Proverbs, the Holy Spirit establishes an antithesis between a merry heart and a sorrowful heart. Proverbs 15:13 – “A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken.” A chapter earlier (14:13), we find that “even in laughter the heart is sorrowful; and the end of that mirth is heaviness.” Still another Proverb (16:23) explains that “the heart of the wise teacheth his mouth, and addeth learning to his lips.” The mouth does not teach the heart; the heart teaches the mouth. So a cheerful countenance from a merry heart is telling the truth, but laughter from a sorrowful heart is lying. But that is not the only entailment of such laughter.

It is also momentary (short-lived). Antithetically, “he that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast” – Proverbs 15:15. Thus, we conclude that the merry-hearted men and women of God are the only ones who can truly celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday.

Just as the triumphal exultation of a heart surgeon much challenged by a recent operation is far better appreciated by his colleagues than by the actors who only play doctors on TV, so too may holy people relate with the Pilgrims far better than heathen people. For we, like the Pilgrims, acknowledge the Great Heart Surgeon Who “brings forth food out of the earth.” It is His “bread which strengthens man’s heart” and His “wine that makes glad the heart of man.” (Psalm 104:14b-15)

The heathen’s laughter comes on Turkey Thursday and is gone by Monday, but he whose face God’s oil has made to shine keeps on feasting. So “eat, drink, and be merry; for this will remain with [you] in [your] labor all the days of [your] life which God gives [you] under the sun. Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise: be thankful unto Him, and bless His name.” (Eccl. 8:15 NKJV; Eccl. 9:7; & Psalm 100:4)

Thanksgiving to Whom?

Thanksgiving – That time of the year when we are encouraged to “give thanks” to God for His abundance of blessings to us, the greatest of which is the opportunity to know Him through His Son Jesus Christ!!

That’s right; we “give thanks” to God, the LORD Almighty, JEHOVAH Jireh (the LORD Who provides)!!! Not to Allah because it was not the Muslims that came over on the Mayflower. Not to the Great Spirit because it was not the Native Americans who initiated this celebration. And certainly not to the turkey because, if it was up to him, he would probably do away with this holiday.

Perhaps we can and ought to give thanks for those Pilgrims who ventured here; perhaps we can and ought to give thanks for those early Indians who helped them survive; perhaps we can and ought to give thanks for those who struggled, fought, bled, and died here to preserve this land, its resources, and our freedom; and perhaps we can and ought to give thanks for those founding fathers who feared God enough to establish our government upon the principles of That Which has been guaranteed to stand forever – the Word of God. It is appropriate to give thanks for these, but to Whom do we give thanks?

We give thanks to the One Who gave those adventurers their courage; we give thanks to the One Who gave those Indians their heart for hospitality; we give thanks to the One Who gave those early Americans their determined will; we give thanks to the One Who gave those founding fathers their great wisdom. we give thanks to the One Who gave us His only begotten Son “that [we] might have life, and that [we] might have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10, King James Version of the Holy Bible)

Now, … have a happy Thanksgiving!