Devotions

The subject of thanksgiving came to me recently during a time of great personal heaviness. At the time, our church building needed major work. Parishioners’ problems were piling up. Everyone I knew seemed to be going through some kind of trial, and I was feeling the burden of it all.

I went into my office and sat down, feeling sorry for myself. I began to complain to God, “Lord, how long will you keep me in this fire? How long do I have to pray about all these things before you’ll do something? When are you going to answer me, God?”

Suddenly, the Holy Spirit fell upon me, and I felt ashamed. The Spirit whispered to my heart, “Just begin to thank me right now, David. Bring to me a sacrifice of thanksgiving for all the past things I’ve done for you and for what I’m going to do in the future. Give me an offering of thanksgiving, and suddenly everything will look different!”

• • Those words settled in my spirit, but I wondered, “What does the Lord mean, ‘a sacrifice of thanksgiving’?” I looked up the phrase in scripture and was amazed at all the references I found.

• • “Let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing” (Psalm 107:22, NKJV).

• • “I will offer to you the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the name of the Lord” (Psalm 116:17).

• • “Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving; let us shout joyfully to him with psalms” (Psalm 95:2).

• • “Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise. Be thankful to him, and bless his name” (Psalm 100:4).

We live in a day when our high priest, Jesus, has already presented the sacrifice of his own blood to the Father to make atonement for our sins. Christ has wiped out all our transgressions, never to be remembered against us. For us, the work of atonement is finished.

We must no longer bring God sacrifices of blood or offerings of silver and gold for atonement. Instead, we are to bring him a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. “Therefore by him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name” (Hebrews 13:15). The “fruit of our lips” is gratitude and thanks!

When the children of Israel were going through testing, were they really supposed to express gratitude and thanksgiving in the midst of it? When they were surrounded and in a hopeless situation, did God really expect them to have a joyful reaction?

Absolutely! That was the secret to getting out of their difficulty. You see, God wants something from all of us in our times of overwhelming troubles and testings. He wants us to offer him a sacrifice of thanksgiving in the midst of it all!

I believe James had discovered this secret when he admonished, “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience” (James 1:2-3, NKJV). He was saying, “Don’t give up! Make an altar in your heart, and offer up joyous thanksgiving in the midst of your trials.”

Of course, the children of Israel did offer the Lord praise and thanksgiving, but they did it on the wrong side of the Red Sea. The people rejoiced all night, but God had no pleasure in it. Anybody can shout in gratitude after the victory comes. The question God was putting to Israel was “Will you praise me before I send help, while you’re still in the midst of the battle?”

I believe if Israel had rejoiced on the “trial side” of the Red Sea, they wouldn’t have had to be tested again at the waters of Marah. Had they passed the Red Sea test, the waters at Marah wouldn’t have tasted bitter but sweet. Israel would have seen water springing up everywhere in the desert, rather than having to go thirsty.

God help us to sing the right song on the testing side of trials. This brings the highest delight to our heavenly Father.

Are you going through a most difficult time right now? Then sing! Praise God! Say to the Lord, “You can do it. You delivered me before, you can deliver me now. I rest in joy.”

One of the most important verses in all of scripture is found in Peter’s first epistle where the apostle speaks of the necessity of having our faith tested. “That the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7, NKJV).

The Greek word used for trials here means “examining or testing with difficulties and adversities.” This passage suggests that God is saying, “Your faith is precious to me, more precious than all the wealth of this world that will one day perish. In these last days, when the enemy sends all manner of evil against you, I want you to be able to stand strong with an unshakable faith.”

Peter says, “Then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment” (2 Peter 2:9). The Greek word here that is used for temptation means “putting to proof adversities.” Clearly, God does not want to keep us in our trials. Why would he be interested in keeping us in the midst of temptation and affliction? He doesn’t get any glory from testing his children but from the results of our testings!

There is only one way to escape our trials, and that is by passing the test. Think about it. When you were in school, how did you finally escape? You passed the final exam. If you didn’t pass, you were sent back to class.

That was the case with ancient Israel. When God brought them to the Red Sea, he was testing his people, trying them, proving them. He brought them to the very brink of destruction, surrounding them by mountains on two sides, a sea on another and an approaching enemy on the other.

Yet the Lord put Israel in that circumstance expecting a certain reaction. He wanted his people to acknowledge their helplessness. He wanted to hear them say, “We remember how God delivered us from the plagues. We remember how he brought us out of the furnace of affliction where we made bricks without straw and had no rest. God delivered us then, and he will do it again! Let us rejoice in his faithfulness. He is God, and he has given us promises he will keep. He will protect us from every enemy who comes against us.” Such faith is a sweet incense to God.

The book of Genesis in the 22nd chapter has a very interesting beginning that we often skim right over. It starts with “After these things God tested Abraham…” (Genesis 22:1, ESV).

After what things? The answer is the previous test Abraham had already been through. There’s some wonderful ancient literature written by rabbis that give a commentary on Genesis called the Mishnah, and in the Mishnah, it speaks of the 12 tests of Abraham. These rabbis went through the scripture and found that Abraham was severely tested by the Lord on 12 different occasions.

The first test was when he was in his homeland. God said, “I want you to get up, take your possessions and go to a new land that I’m showing you.” That’s a test! To leave everything you know, to leave everything that you’re comfortable with and to go into a different land. Was he going to trust God? He did, and he went to this new land God was showing him. He walked into it, probably saying, “God said go here! Here I am, Lord; now bless me!”

Immediately, test number two came along. The Bible says there was a severe famine in the land. So he went to Egypt, and in Egypt, maybe he thought he’d escaped from this test; but instead, the pharaoh of Egypt saw Abraham’s wife, and he wanted to take her for himself. The tests just kept on coming with no seeming relief.

All of us have been tested.  Have you ever been in Abraham’s situation where you’ve had a test within a test? Have you ever rebuked Satan in the middle of a test? “I resist you, Satan; get behind me!” Then you realize the person you’re pointing at is God?

The Bible doesn’t say the devil tested Abraham. It doesn’t say his flesh tested him. All those things do happen, but there’s a difference. A temptation is from Satan; a test is from God. Satan tempts us to doubt. He tempts us to give up. He tempts us to accuse God of not being good. There’s a difference between a test and a temptation.

The Bible says, “God cannot be tempted. He will never tempt anyone” (James 1:13). A temptation moves us closer to sin, if we don’t fight it; a test moves us closer to God, if we don’t fight it. I’m glad God doesn’t tempt us, and he never tests us beyond our ability to endure.

When Joseph was a young boy, he received a great promise from God. God revealed to Joseph through dreams that he would become a leader with great influence. Not only that, Joseph also was favored above all his brothers by his father who gave him a coat of many colors.

A mark of immaturity still rested on Joseph at that point, however. He was rather boastful as he shared with his family the dreams he had. “Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. He said to them, ‘Hear this dream that I have dreamed: Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.’ His brothers said to him, ‘Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?’ So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words” (Genesis 37:5-8, ESV).

Joseph still lacked understanding of the purpose of God’s power and provision. In eager anticipation of seeing God’s promise fulfilled, he neglected to realize that there would be unanticipated stops along the journey. The first stop? A pit and a place of abandonment and betrayal.

Out of jealousy, Joseph’s brothers threw him into a pit and eventually sold him off to a band of Ishmaelite merchants for twenty pieces of silver. What greater betrayal could Joseph have faced? I don’t think we can fully grasp his pain. How deeply it must have wounded his heart to know that this treachery had been done at the hand of his very own brothers. Betrayal is perhaps one of the most difficult classrooms we have to go through in life. Yet we must remember it is also the road Christ traveled, so we cannot expect to escape it.

I understand that these things can hurt very deeply. The most severe wounds inflicted by people you have grown to love and trust over the years. Perhaps, like Joseph, you shared something God had given you, only to discover that some people who were close to you did not believe in your dream or actively worked against it.

In times like this, we must cling to the knowledge that God’s provision for a vision he has given us also covers betrayal and suffering. He knows exactly what we need to grow into the vision he has given us.

^{Carter Conlon joined the pastoral staff of Times Square Church in 1994 and was appointed Senior Pastor in 2001. In May of 2020 he transitioned into a continuing role as General Overseer of Times Square Church, Inc.}