For it is by grace you have been saved...

Friday, November 27, 2009

A Borrowed Thanksgiving List

Here is an absolutely beautiful list of thankfulness from Erik, the Irish Calvinist. To all I say a hearty "AMEN!"


Realizing that thankfulness is not merely manners but a spiritual apprehension graced by God (Rom. 1.21; Col. 3.17), I have a short list of things I am thankful for this am…
-I am thankful that God made a covenant with his Son to save his people from their sins (John 17.4)

-I am thankful that God created this world as the stage to display his glory (
Ps. 19.1-7)

-I am thankful that God created men & women to reflect his image, enjoy his creation and rule righteously over it (
Gen. 1.26-28)

-I am thankful that God did not destroy the world when our first parents sinned, but instead announced that he would bring relief (
Gen. 3.15)

-I am thankful that God continued to lovingly communicate redemption through the prophets at various stages (
1 Pet. 1.10-12)

-I am thanfkul that Jesus, God’s Son became a man without ceasing to be God, in order to earn my redemption (
John 1.1, 14)

-I am thankful that Jesus, motivated by love and in obedience to his Father, fully obeyed the Law of God in the place of a rebel like me (
John 8.29; Matt. 3.17)

-I am thankful that Jesus own life of obedience is a sufficient basis to credit & cover me with so that I might stand blameless, holy and beyond reproach in his site (
Rom. 3.26; Col. 1.22)

-I am thankful that the sufficiency & perfection of Jesus’ work is eternal, it will not fade and is forever acceptable in the site of God (Heb. 7.25-27)

-I am thankful that Jesus did not cave into pressures, become weak, or turn aside from the cross as he marched resolutely to Golgotha in order to be the surety for my debt of not obeying God’s Law (
Matt. 26.39)

-I am thankful that upon that cross Jesus fully drank the divine cup of wrath that was due a rebel like me; the foaming, fully fermented cup of righteous wrath, that was due me, is now empty and therefore I have peace with God (
Rom. 3.24-26, 5.1)

-I am thankful that Jesus powerfully rose from the dead, furnishing proof that he is who he said he was, and God has accepted him (
Acts 17.31)

-I am thankful that Jesus is the head of the church, that is he is the Lord and lifegiver of it (
Col. 1.18)

-I am thankful that Jesus will come again for his church, finally defeat all of his foes, and put all things into subjection to himself as he will rule over creation righteously as the Last Adam (
Eph. 1.10-12, 20-22; 1 Cor. 15.24-25)

-I am thankful that God has given his Holy Spirit to point me to Jesus, instruct me in Jesus, by unfolding the Word of God that I might know, enjoy and be satisfied in God alone (
1 Cor. 2.10-16; 2 Cor 3.17-18)

-I am thankful for many many other blessings this Thankgsiving, however, at the end of the day the source and substance of all that is truly a blessing is the knowledge of, experience of and joy in God himself.

1 comment:

Frances Clements said...

Excellent series on Thanksgiving. Thanks for sharing!