A Thanksgiving Message To Discontented People

Transcription

1 Message for THE LORD'S DAY EVENING, November 22, 2015 Christian Hope Church of Christ, Plymouth, North Carolina by Reggie A. Braziel, Minister Thanksgiving Message TOPIC: Thanksgiving, Gratitude, Discontentment A Thanksgiving Message To Discontented People Jeremiah 29:4-6 (NKJV) Please turn with me in your Bibles to Jeremiah chapter 29. And let's read verses 4-6. Jeremiah 29:4-6 (NKJV) 4 Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all who were carried away captive, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit. 6 Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters that you may be increased there, and not diminished. P R A Y E R ***************

2 I N T R O D U C T I O N ILLUSTRATION: A rich man was walking along a seashore one day when he spotted a fisherman sitting lazily beside his boat. Why aren't you out there fishing? asked the rich man. Because I have caught enough fish for today, said the fisherman. Why don't you catch more fish than you need? The rich man asked. What would I do with them? replied the fisherman. You could earn more money came the impatient reply. And buy a better boat so you could go deeper and catch more fish. You could purchase nylon nets, and catch even more fish, and make more money. And soon you would have a whole fleet of boats and be a rich man like me. The fisherman asked, Then what would I do? The rich man replied, You could sit back and enjoy life. What do you think I am doing now? responded the fisherman as he looked peacefully across the sea. Our Daily Bread, May 18, 1994 Benjamin Franklin once said, Contentment makes a poor man rich, while discontentment makes a rich man poor. There's a whole lot of truth in that statement!

3 Ever since the beginning of creation, there has always been someone, somewhere who was unhappy with his position in life. It all started with the angel Lucifer, who was not satisfied to simply be an angel. He wanted to be worshiped as God. And his seething discontentment with his lot in life caused him to lead a rebellion against God that resulted in one third of the heavenly angels being expelled from heaven. Discontentment was at the very root of Satan's rebellion against God. After that, Satan used discontentment as a weapon to cause Adam and Eve to rebel against God, just as he himself had done. As you know, God had granted Adam and Eve permission to eat from every tree in the Garden of Eden except one, the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Satan convinced Eve that she could never be content until she ate of the forbidden fruit. Eve bought into Satan's lie, and led Adam to do the same. Six thousand years later man is still unhappy, discontented and dissatisfied. Man still wants more than he presently has. -If we're young, we want to be older. If we're old, we wish we were younger. If you're short, you might wish you were taller. If you're real tall, you might wish you were shorter. If you're overweight, you wish you could be thinner. If you're real thin, you might wish you could put on some weight.

4 -If we have an apartment, we want a house. If we have a house, we want a bigger house, a newer house, or a nicer house. Or some people who have a house wish they could move into a smaller house or a condo or an apartment. -If we have a job, we wish for a better job, a bigger job, a better-paying a job with more benefits, or a job closer to home. -If we own a car, we wish we had a newer car, a different color car. This is not to say its wrong to want to improve or do better. For example, if your discontentment with your weight motivates you to start exercising and eating healthier, that's a good thing. Or if your discontentment with where you are in your spiritual life drives you to study the scriptures more and spend more time in prayer, that is a good thing. But more often than not, discontentment drags us down spiritually. It is a cancer to our spirit and soul. Discontentment causes us to grumble and complain and become thankless Christians who are never satisfied with what God blesses us with. And that is a recipe for a miserably unhappy life! *************** As we go back to our text here in Jeremiah chapter 29 we find a wonderful thanksgiving message to a group of discontented people, even though the words thanksgiving and discontentment are not found in the verses of our text. In this brief passage we learn three valuable truths that will help all of us be more thankful.

5 TRUTH #1: You Are Where You Are Because God Wants You There 1. We learn in the opening verses of this 29 th chapter that most of this chapter is actually a letter written by the prophet Jeremiah to the Jewish people who were exiled faraway in the land of Babylon. 2. To say that the Jewish people were discontented with their circumstances would be a gross understatement. They hated Babylon! It was the last place on earth they wanted to be. They longed to be back in their homeland, going about their normal daily routine, living the life they had always known. 3. Making matters even worse was the fact they knew their exile wasn't going to last just a few weeks or months, but seventy long years. They felt as though they had been abandoned, forsaken, and forgotten by God.

6 4. But in the opening lines of his letter to the Jewish exiles, Jeremiah writes this message from GOD HIMSELF. Jeremiah 29:4 (NKJV) Thus says the LORD of hosts, the GOD of Israel, to all who were carried away captive, whom I caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon. 5. Did you catch that? God is saying, I did this! Don't blame the Babylonians! You sinned and rebelled against me and brought this judgment upon yourself! I am the One who carried you away from Jerusalem to Babylon. In other words, You are where you are because that is where I want you to be. 6. The same is true of you and me. You are where you are right now because God wants you there. You may be happy with your current circumstances or you may be miserable. Most likely you are somewhere in between. But it really doesn't matter; you are where you are right now because God wants you there. How do I know that? Because if GOD wanted you to be somewhere else you would be somewhere else, and when He wants you to be somewhere else you will be somewhere else, until then, you are right where He wants you to be.

7 7. The first thing we want to do when we find ourselves in an unpleasant circumstance is to get out of it as fast as we can. -When we are discontent with our job, we want to quit and get a different job. -When we are discontent in our marriage, we want to dump the old mate and get a new one. -When we are discontent with school, we want to drop out. -When we are discontent with Church, we want to go to another Church. 8. When you recognize discontentment in your life, the very first thing you need to do is STOP! STOP the grumbling! STOP the complaining! STOP the sulking! STOP stomping around the house! STOP lashing out at others! And STOP the pity party. And remind yourself, I AM WHERE I AM RIGHT NOW BECAUSE THIS IS WHERE GOD WANTS ME TO BE! And most importantly, Give God thanks IN your present circumstance because this is God's will through Christ Jesus for you!

8 Now, here's the second truth... TRUTH #2: It Is God's Will That I Make The Most of My Current Circumstance 1. In verses 5 and 6 God gives the Jewish people very specific instructions as to what He wanted them to do while in captivity. Jeremiah 29:5,6 (NKJV) v. 5 Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit. v. 6 Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters---that you may be increased there, and not diminished. 2. To coin a phrase we use today, what God was telling them was, Bloom where you are planted. I know you don't like it here in Babylon, but this is where I have planted you, so unpack your suitcases...build homes...get married...have some kids...plant you some gardens...because you are going to be here for a long, long time, so make the most of the situation.

9 5. Now you know good and well that was the very last thing those Jewish exiles wanted to hear. But they knew if that is what God commanded them to do they had better be doing it. They were already in enough trouble the way it was. 6. Any time we are discontent with a situation we are in, one of the hardest things to do is to continue to be productive and make the most out of the difficult situation. When we are discontented with a situation in our life, we often give into the temptation to shut down and stop being productive or to just quit everything thinking, If God sees just how miserable I am in this situation He will change the situation to my liking or He will plant me somewhere else where I will be happier. That's exactly what JONAH thought, and we all know what happened to him, don't we? 7. We must realize when we are in an unpleasant situation that GOD has placed us in, it is His will that we make the best of that situation. Shutting down or refusing to give less than our best is not going to change God's mind or change our situation. In fact, we will probably grow even more miserable, and God will leave us in that unpleasant situation longer until we yield to His will. 8. In fact, one mark of spiritual maturity is when we are able to still give our best, even in unpleasant circumstances.

10 A third truth we learn from this passage is this: TRUTH #3: God Wants Us To Live In The Moment 1. Let's move down to verses JEREMIAH 29:10-14 (NKJV) 10 For thus says the LORD: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place. 11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. 12 Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you, says the LORD, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the LORD, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive. 2. In these verses GOD is pointing the Jewish exiles to a bright and glorious future after their seventy year exile has ended. He is giving them the hope that they aren't always going to be in Babylon. He is giving them the hope that many of them will one day return to the land of Judah they love. He is giving them the hope that one day they will once again enjoy a beautiful relationship with Him.

11 3. But God doesn't want them to sit around reminiscing for the next seventy years about the good old days back in Judah. Nor does he want them sitting around twiddling their thumbs until the seventy year exile is over. GOD WANTS THEM TO LIVE IN THE MOMENT, AND TO LEARN FROM THIS DIFFICULT EXPERIENCE, AND TO GROW FROM IT. 4. Sadly, many of us waste precious days of our lives playing The If Only Game. -If only I could get married, I would be happy. -If only I could get a new job, I would be happy. -If only I could make more money, I would be happy. -If only I could move into a nicer house, I would be happy. -If only I could get that promotion, I would be happy. -If only I could win the lottery, I would be happy. 5. GOD doesn't want you and me wasting away precious days of our lives in discontentment waiting on better days ahead. He wants us to be THANKFUL for each and every day, and to always live in the moment!

12 C O N C L U S I O N One afternoon Christian author Patsy Clairmont found herself on an airplane, sitting next to a young man. She writes, "I had already observed something about this young man when I was being seated. He called me "Ma-am. At the time I thought, "Either he thinks I'm ancient, or he's from the South where they still teach manners, or he's in the service. I decided the latter was the most likely, So I asked, "You in the service"? "Yes, Ma-am, I am.? "What branch"? "Marines.? "Hey, Marine, where are you coming from"? "Operation Desert Storm, Ma-am. "No kidding? Desert Storm! How long were you there"? I asked. "A year and a half. I'm on my way home. My family will be at the airport. I then commented that he must have thought about returning to his family and home many times while he was in the Middle East. "Oh, no, Ma-am,? he replied. "We were taught never to think of what might never be, but to be fully available right where we were.? (Focus on the Family, July, 1993, p. 5) Dr. Tony Evans once said, Everything in the universe is either caused by God or allowed by God and there is no third category. That means,behind every circumstance we go through, whether good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant, there is a divine purpose at work. And for that reason we should always be thankful, and be fully available to God right where we are!