Good evening. It's good, it was good to have been here all. Thank the Lord for the opportunity to be here and to be able to share with you, uh, during these weeks. And as Brother Johnny saying, we'll be leaving tomorrow in the will of the Lord. Remember us in prayer as we go. Turn your Bibles with me to the book of Second Timothy for two verses, and then we'll go to the book of Ephesians chapter five. Second Timothy three, the first two verses. This This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy. I want you to be mindful of the word unthankful. And then Ephesians chapter five, We want to begin reading at verse seventeen for connection. Rather, verse eighteen of Ephesians chapter five. And be not drunk with wine rare in its excess, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God. I want to emphasize verse twenty, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord add a blessing to the reading of his holy and precious word. Amen. I want to share with you under the theme, and this theme is no, by no means original, an attitude of gratitude. Having an attitude of gratitude. We have just celebrated, uh, along with the Americans, Thanksgiving. And within three days, I ate three turkey dinners, and all was delicious. They all were. But Paul said that one of the things that's gonna characterize the people of last days is that people are going to be unthankful. They're not going to have an attitude of gratitude, along with all the other characteristics that he mentions in second Timothy chapter three. He says that people are going to be unthankful, that men and women, teenagers, uh, children, with all that God blessed them with and has blessed us with, that there are some of us who are not as grateful as we ought to be. And as we reflect back on this year, think about how God has blessed you. Think about the myriads of blessing that has flowed into your life. And for some of us, as we look forward to this Christmas season, especially the young people and the children, you are going to get some tremendous things. How grateful are you going to be? How grateful are you? As a matter of fact, one of the hymns in our Redemption Songbook says that we count our many blessings and name them one by one. Even if we do it this past day, you will be surprised what God has done. And so, the Bible says that the people of God should enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise, whether be thankful unto him and bless his name. And so the attitude of ingratitude should not be a characteristic of the child of God. We should be peop- be a people who are very thankful. And Paul, as he wrote to the saints at Ephesus, says that people who have an attitude of gratitude are people who are controlled by the Spirit of God, because it comes out of that context. People who are filled with the Spirit have an attitude of gratitude. And so Paul says, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so in this verse, four things I want to point out, and many of you probably can even preach this message from this verse. When are we to give thanks? You help me. When are we to give thanks according to this verse? I know we in the brethren assembly, we don't like to talk back, but it's just humoring me tonight. I think that our audience knows we'll close their air if you help me tonight. When are we to give thanks? Always. Thank you very much. For what are we to give thanks? Everything. Everything. To whom are we to give thanks? God. And the Father. Through whom are we to give thanks? The Lord Jesus Christ. And that's my message right there. We can go home now. But let me go on just for a little bit longer. When are we to give thanks? The Bible says, always. Now, always means what? Always. At all times. That's what it means. It means ever. Is it possible to give thanks always? Does Paul really mean, well, rather, does the Spirit of God, as he writes to the Apostle Paul, intend for you as a Christian, as a child of God, whether you be five years old to whatever's the older person in here, to be thankful. I know, be like the other passage in the book of First Thessalonians where it says, be thankful in all things. But he says, giving thanks always. Is that possible? I think it is, because if it wasn't, God would not have put it there. Having always been have a, and thankfulness doesn't mean you always have a smile on your face, but it is in the heart. It is an attitude of the heart. When you look at the writings of the Apostle Paul in the same book, chapter one, verse fifteen and sixteen, he's giving thanks. Philippians one three and four, Now, remember, he's in jail. He's giving thanks. Colossians one and three, he's giving thanks. First Thessalonians one and two, he's giving thanks. Paul was a man who took to heart what Psalm 100 and verse four says, that he entered into God's presence always with thanksgiving. And God wants us to have an attitude of gratitude, always, not just now and then, always. And so as you go through the season, as we go into this season, as you go into the new year, let's ask God to help us not to follow in the stream of this world and be people who are unthankful, but to be thankful always, even when things are rough, and sometimes that's very difficult to do. But he doesn't stop there. He doesn't stop there. When are we to be thankful, he says. For what are we to be thankful? All things. Now, Kevin, what do you mean? What does the Bible mean by all things? What does the word all mean? All, right? God wants us to be thankful for the tangible things, for our cars, for the houses, for the jewelry, yeah, and those are the things that we often pray about for our family. But what about some of those intangible things? What about some of those things that aren't so pleasant? What about some of those things that come into our lives, uh, you know? Should I be thankful for cancer? And we've been hearing a lot about that, and I know many of you have been hit hard with that in your families. Some of you have experienced that. And I've never, but I have an aunt who did. And I guess only people who have been there could say it, and I don't say this lightly, but she said she thanked God for cancer, and I said, how could she say something like that? But she put it this way, I thank God for cancer because if it wasn't for cancer, I never would have trusted Christ. That was her experience, but not everyone experience. I had a friend of mine about a month ago, sitting at his breakfast table in Nassau, working for one of the, uh, financial institutions in the Bahamas, in Nassau, after twenty five years, came out of high school and went straight to work for this particular financial institution. Last year, they told him that they might be downsizing, and he, his job might be out, you know, gone. And so for a year, they had him in, you know, in limbo. He didn't know what to do. And finally, one day, he thought everything was going to be fine, and he got this call to come up to the office, up to the head office, and he went not knowing, and he was told that, uh, effective thirty days from now, you're not going to have a job. How would that hit you? He said he went home for the rest of the day and started writing resumes and, you know, started to panic and started to think about his family and mortgage and all the other things. But as we were sitting at that table, he looked at me and said, you know what, Kevin? I thank God I lost my job. And I said, what? He said, I thank God I lost my job. I said, you have to explain this to me now. He said, because I lost my job, now I'm heading in a new direction in a business that I never thought I would go in. He said, but not only that, my wife and I spent more time, more time together. We're getting closer than we've ever been. And he said, I have more time to spend with the Lord than I've ever had to spend. And so he says, I thank God I lost my job. See, it all depends on how you look at it. All depends how you look at it. What is your perspective? Can you thank God for the bad things? God says for all things. Why? Why? Why? Why can we be able to thank God for all things? I think it's in Romans chapter eight comes in, because all things work together for good to them that love the Lord. All things. Somehow, and please, I don't understand it. You're not gonna understand it, how God takes the bad things, and some of you have experienced bad things, loss of loved ones, someone precious. How does God take that? How, how can that be, how is God working that out for your good? I don't know. I don't know. But the Bible says, like how we have to be thankful for all things. God says because all things work together for good. Again, like I said, all depends on how we look at things. And we can look at scripture, we can look at Job, all that he went through, but we see the end product. It wasn't good in the process and going through it, but Job's latter days were better than his first. You think about Joseph, righteous young man who did nothing wrong, and yet his brothers despised him. He was sold into slavery. He went into part of his house. He was lied on. He was placed in prison. Man, what's good gonna come out of that? God elevated him the second command in Egypt. And in the final analysis, he told his brethren, you meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. And there are a lot of things that Satan intend to come into our lives and try to use it to destroy us, but God somehow turns it around. We can go on. David and others. We can go on. So all things work together for good. Better be thankful always for all things. Like the man who was going to work with his lunch, and he looked down and he saw one of his laces was untied, and so he's, he bent down and on one of his knees to tie his lace, and there comes a dog and snatched up his lunch and took off. Now, what could you give thanks in that situation? Hey, Grant, nothing. Not your lunch. Best you not my lunch. But he said, oh Lord, I thank you. Even though you took my lunch, I thank you that I still have my appetite. Still got my appetite. Still got my appetite. Still can enjoy that. So we had to be thankful. Someone said, I'm a Christian, but sometimes I forget to thank God for the things that haven't happened. Not this year. I am grateful for the accident I wasn't involved in, the illness that never developed, and the times I could have been mugged but wasn't. I am thankful my house didn't burn down when I left the iron on for five hours. I am thankful that when we left the garage door up all night, nothing was taken. I am thankful for every uneventful day. I am thankful for my small son's paraphrase of Psalm one hundred, Enter into his gates on Thanksgiving. I am glad I have someone to thank. An attitude of gratitude. To whom are we to give thanks? Someone quoted it, or it was said in the, um, in the quiz or the drill. James one seventeen, The Bible says that we are to give thanks, giving thanks always unto God and the Father. Why? Every good and every perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights, in whom there's no variableness, neither shadow of turning. But not only there's good and perfect gifts, sometimes God will send some other things too. We better give thanks. Bad things. Job nine and nine and ten, then said his wife unto him, dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God and die. But he said unto her, thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh. What, shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sinned with his lips. Better thank God. Better enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Have you ever had a prayer time where you never asked God for anything? You just thanked him. You just thanked him, just thanked him. Every now and then I try to practice that. I don't practice as much as I should. Just when I go to pray, I don't ask God for anything. I just thank him. Starting with, with thanking for his son, for salvation, for my family, you know, just the thing that floods your mind. You'd be surprised how long you could stay there if you just, if, if you just instant giving thanks to God. You'd be surprised the thing that the Holy Spirit will bring to your mind. Just give thanks to God, because what is it that you and I have that we have not received? Nothing. Nothing. So we need to develop an attitude of gratitude as adults, as teenagers, as children. Be thankful to God. Be grateful. And they all come through the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the vehicle. He is the conduit through which God's blessing is dispensed. You know that Paul says in Ephesians chapter one verse three, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who had blessed us with all heavenly blessings in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. So our spiritual blessings comes through Christ. All of the physical and natural all comes through the person of Jesus Christ. And so that's why we worship and we praise him and we bless him, and we adore him. So, this season into the new year, if you and I are maybe get carried away with our own selfishness, let's remember that what we have is not because of who we are and what we have done, it's because of who God is and what he has done and what he has blessed us with. God might use others to be conduit to bless us. Let's be grateful. Let's be thankful. Let's have an attitude of gratitude. And I'm gonna close with this illustration, a legend, and again, it's just a legend, but you'll see the point of the story. There is a legend of a man who found the barn where Satan kept his seeds ready to be sown in the human heart, and on finding the seeds of discouragement more numerous than others, learned that those seeds could be made to grow almost anywhere. When Satan was questioned, he reluctantly admitted that there was one place in which he could never get them to strive. And where is that? asked the man. Satan replied sadly, in the heart of a grateful man. In the heart of a grateful young person. Discouragement could never find room in expression in the heart of someone who's grateful, who's thankful. How's your attitude? Do you have an attitude of gratitude? Are you thankful to God for what he's done for you, what he's doing in you, what he's doing through you, what he's provided for you? Are you thankful? Are you thankful? Let's pray. And again, I want to express my sincere thanks to leaders and all of you for allowing me to be here. And I want to thank God for the opportunity to be a worker together with him and sharing with you these last two weeks. Continue to pray for us, continue to remember us as we remember you. In the will of the Lord, we're going to be more busy next year than we were this year in terms of traveling. Every month next year, Lord willing, we're going to be speaking somewhere. Remember us and remember Bridget and the children. Father, we do thank you for all of your blessings, and most of all, we thank you for that babe who was born in Bethlehem. We thank you for his life. He was virgin born. He lived a virtuous life. He died vicariously, but he rose victoriously. We thank you for your great salvation. We thank you for your Holy Spirit. We thank you for the body, the church. We thank you for the word of God. We thank you, Father, for all things that you have blessed us with. Cause us, O Lord, to be grateful. Help us, O Lord, not to be in the mold of this generation, in this perilous times in which we live, not to be unthankful, but to be thankful for that which we have. For the spiritual heritage that many of these young people have, and the fact that they have parents who know you. Help them to be thankful for that, Lord. Help parents to be thankful for children who desire to be in your house and be able to, and want to sing your praises. Father, there's so much we can give you thanks for. Help us, oh Lord, to be like the Apostle Paul, to know what it is, even in the midst of despair and difficulty and trials, to give thanks. And so again, I commit your people, thank you for them. We bless you. We ask that even as we leave this place, but not your presence, but we will go with a heart of gratitude, in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you, Lord, for saving my soul.