Good Evening: It is Fall. I love the Fall…Yes I do get my Pumpkin Spice Oatmilk Latte every year…Just one because they are $8 after tip… The stores though are already Christmas themed. I’ve seen Lights for Christmas. But what about Thanksgiving? Hold the line. It is the week before thanksgiving and it is appropriate for us to ponder below the surface of turkey, gravy, and pumpkin pie. So 1 Thanksgiving sermon followed by 4 advent sermons.

READ: Matthew 6:25–33 (Not page 61…beginning on page 811).

[25] “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? [26] Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? [27] And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? [28] And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, [29] yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. [30] But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? [31] Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ [32] For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. [33] But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Pray

#1 The Problem – We live in an anxious disenchanted world. (vv. 25)

#2 The Solution – Re-Enchanting Providence: (vv. 26-30)

#3 The Priority – Seek the highest good and then enjoy the ordinary. (vv. 31-33).

#4 Practical Implications for A Re-enchanted Thanksgiving Day.

#1: THE PROBLEM: We live in an anxious world

One of the reason, One of the reasons this is a very anxious world is that we’ve lost sight of PROVIDENCE

· Because we have lost a view of Providence, we are anxious and fearful for things outside of our control.

o We fear THE BIG PICTURE. We fear where HISTORY is going.

o And such fear harms our Gratitude and Thanksgiving to God and his providence. This mode of living makes Thanksgiving an inconsequential and unpleasant Holiday to most modern Americans…Put a pin in that I think there is a reason why American currently Obsess over Halloween in October and then Jump to Santa Claus Christmas in December and have a smaller, stressful little “Turkey Day” and Macy’s Day Parade in November…

· We are anxious and by and large americans live in a disenchanted world and we fear for the Big Picture.

o Writer Aaron Renn says, “I think a large part of this angst is the feeling that we don’t control our own narratives anymore. Everything’s run by big political or corporate forces. It’s out of our hands…we’re stuck in this pervasive sense of catastrophe fatigue.

§ In a disenchanted world …We rightly realize we don’t control the big pictures. There are 300 Million people in the U.S. And common worldviews and beliefs are highly fractured. We are out of control…And if there is not a God is who is in control…Our Fears…Our Anxiety as we scroll twitter and social media is only going to increase and increase….

o We fear for tomorrow…many feel impending doom… Renn continues “This is born out by the data on Americans’ greatest fears…In 2014, Americans’ top ten biggest fears included public speaking, heights, scary animals…flying, strangers, zombies, and darkness.

o But by 2023, that had wildly shifted. Instead, it was corrupt government officials, economic/financial collapse, Russia using nuclear weapons, the US becoming involved in another World War, people I love becoming seriously ill, people I love dying, pollution of drinking water, biological warfare, cyber-terrorism, and not having enough money for the future.

§ There is some overlap…But there is a clear shift….

§ “What many of these [new items] have in common is the shift from being afraid of things you have some degree of control over (like public speaking) to things you have a lot less control over (biological warfare, the economy, war, or loved ones dying….” End Quote.

§ Economies made up of millions of people…Death, Dying, the Unknown….Powerful people in our world who hold our lives in their hands…whether The Roman Empire….The Feds…

§ Why these anxieties? Americans are the least equipped to suffer than they ever have been. To make sense of their suffering. To have strength and courage of Body and Soul…[1]

o And I believe this is because people have lost Providence. Lost a heavenly Father.

§ People do not believe Jesus’ teaching, here in Matthew 6…we don’t talk like we believe it, do we?…we don’t celebrate holidays that conform to this…Or celebrate our holidays consistently with Providence, and we often don’t live our family lives like we believe this.

§ As a people, We have lost Providence. We have lost a Heavenly Father. We have lost the Gospel with the promise that there is a Kingdom with a King who has promised Certain salvation of our Souls.

· And this is a Thanksgiving sermon…It could easily sound like booo secularists, godless progressives… Thanksgiving is going to be a pain with my unbelieving family and friends.

· No – there is broad societal suffering that comes from disenchanting Providence.

· We, like Jesus should have compassion, Pity and sorrow for the anxious and fearful, for their lostness, for lives cut off from having a heavenly Father. Pity and sorrow for the lost. They are Orphaned. To be an orphan is a fearful and anxious thing.

· Thankfully, Jesus’ words, his teaching, his solution to this problem offers encouragement to the lost and an explanation of their misery.

§ The world we live in is a far better. Far more Transcendent. A Far more Spectacularly Enchanted world than the anxious one people think they are living in.

§ We have a heavenly Father and having a Heavenly Father who is Sovereign changes everything.

o ILLUSTRATION: Who do you call when you have a car wreck? Everything is out of your control. Your Father….

o Having a higher authority who loves you changes everything.

o But When you have no higher authority…No ultimate Faith, Hope, and Love, no Kingdom. No King. No God our Father with the Holy Spirit in your Heart. When suffering and scary things happen in the world you are Alone….

Jesus rebukes such functional atheism…And offers the Antidote of a robust Fatherly Providence.

We need to believe in and remember God’s active presence, reducing life to mere mechanics or chance feeds anxiety. Re-enchantment invites a return to a worldview that embraces God’s intimate, wise, and involvement in all aspects of creation.[2] An enchanted interest – definitionally, feeling greater pleasure and delight, the pleasure and delight of Providence.

And My prayer is that it will address both your very close daily fears. What about my food, my body, my life, AND Big Picture fears, all those big scary forces of human history that I have no control over those things will doom me.

· Vv. 25. Jesus says, I tell you, do not be anxious about your life. And he asks Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Yes. Yes it is.

o And from the outset we must say, Jesus is not forbidding, future planning, hard work, even a stress response to a difficult circumstance that gives you focus and care for some weighty and important matters.

o But there a disordered care, an over-concern that leaves God out of the Picture. That Disenchants God’s providence in your life.

o

Jesus continues in v. 26…

[26] Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? [27] And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? [28] And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, [29] yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. [30] But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

In (vv. 26-30) Jesus is saying, Consider Your Father’s smiling providence towards the Birds & Lilies and remember you are made in his image, you are loved and cared for, you are more valuable to God! Then any of these things.

· It is true but so easy to forget. But if we do believe it…would not much of our anxiousness would be removed?

· So I exhort you (and I preach this to myself) to Re-enchant two areas the Ordinary and the extraordinary your Salvation

o re-enchant ORDINARY Happinesses (what we call blessings) and Ordinary Sadnesses (difficult providences, or miseries of this life),

o And the extraordinary: God given rescue from sin and misery as we are caused to hate sin, and trust God in a fallen world, and have joy in redemptive grace being brought into the Kingdom of God, the Church.

· Our Culture struggles to do this. In common American conversation, we talk frequently of: fortune, fate, or luck, or chance.

o The Reformation study bible reminds us that

§ Fortune is Blind – God in his fatherly care watches over us.

§ Fate is impersonal God is “my Father” “our Father” in heaven.

§ Luck is dumb luck. It cannot speak. God says, I have made you, I have called you by name and you are mine!

§ Providence says, you may not know how, or when, or why but both the frowning providences you cry through and the smiling providences you rejoice in and in Both of these; Give thanks! For God is over all!

§

· And so we must wrestle to Talk like we believe in providence.

o The you know that the youth do not have Potluck’s we have: “Pot-providences”

· Why would people talk like this! Because they are well taught from the bible! And they are Presbyterian & Reformed to the core of heart, speech, and exhortation towards eachother

· Oh and we don’t just talk like this WE SING LIKE THIS!

· We sang these truths earlier as all good hymns do

o We Gather together…. Sing praises to His name, He forgets not His own Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,ordaining, maintaining His kingdom divine;so from the beginning the fight we were winning:the Lord was at our side- the glory be Thine!

· We Write Documents that talk like this.

o WSC 11: What are God’ s works of providence? God’ s works of providence are, his most holy, wise, and powerful preserving, and governing all his creatures, and all their actions.

o WCF 5.1 God our great Creator upholds, directs, disposes, and governs all his creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least,) by His most wise and holy providenceaccording to his free and immutable counsel of His own will, For what purpose? to the praise of the glory of His wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy.

· What glorious shining jewels of Truth.

o Teach your children the golden truths of Providence.

o How much better than our Current cultural Creed: “YOLO” “vibes” “luck” “privilege”

o instead we have: A Heavenly Father, Covenant Faithfulness, God’s provision to us, and we in gratitude and praise offer provision to others.

o Providence not chance. “Lord willing,” Gratitude to their creator and Father. Every good thing is a Gift from God to be stewarded and cultivated.

· It Changes how you interpret the Events of your life.

o STORY: My Dad how he viewed Jobs and gifts from God not economic downturn and upturns. …Once processed through providence it wasn’t “people” it was God’s provision for the next thing. He took an enchanted interpretation of providence. (though I’m sure my Mom got the less theologically processed version that the kids got in the end).

· The world is re-enchanted when God’s wisdom, his meticulous and good care for us is our reflexive thoughts.

·

o A Car nearly hits you on the highway – not phew that was lucky. –vv. 28 which of you by being anxious can add an hour to his life? No that life event if you are spared means God in his Providence still has a plan for your life a calling.

· On the other hand….When the Car wreck happens…We encounter difficult Providence right.

o And our theology does not remove trials and weightiness…It does not remove tears or mourning.

o but it does tell us where to reach for, for the solid rock, the firm ground, the Person, a heavenly Father to cling to in the good and the bad.

o The Hymnast write…Whate’er my God ordains is right:here shall my stand be taken;though sorrow, need, or death be mine,yet am I not forsaken.My Father’s care is round me there;he holds me that I shall not fall:and so to him I leave it all.

o And though sung with tears….We have the antidote to despair.

We’ve looked at the Problem. The Solution. And now Briefly #3 The Priority. (vv. 30-33).

30] But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? [31] Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ [32] For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. [33] But seek first [prioritize] the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

· Seek the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus… particularly make sure you don’t have a a little Jesus. Make sure you have him who enters down into the pit of your sin and shame and lifts you out. Who calls you by name. Jesus is a King, with a Kingdom, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

· Christ’s Kingdom is forever. And his kingdom is your priority.

· We are members of that Kingdom but we are placed to live here and now. And I believe with Jesus’ teaching on God as our Father who exercises Providence over all things we are equipped to live in the midst of an Anxious generation, and an anxious country

· And so My prayer is here locally we may be a trusting congregation, a courageous people, who Excel in Thanksgiving.

· Paul in his letters often gives 2 or 3 Chapters explaining a great theological truth and then you get this one chapter where he lists rapid fire implications of it…That is what I want to suggest…I not Paul or the Lord ask what are implications for

#4 How Shall we than live: The New Testament is filled with examples of how to have a mindset that seeks first the kingdom of God. That puts on the mind of Christ.

And this is after all a thanksgiving sermon so that is how we will apply ourselves. But this is also a timeless sermon because I would argue every family meal is an opportunity to return thanks. Every Christian conversation. Every holiday. Every life event births, death, healing, and sickness offers many of this things.

So to Close in Pauline Fashion 15 Or so Exhortations.

Practical Advice for Thanksgiving.

1. Psalm 145:15-16 The eyes of all look to you [God], and You give them their food in season. You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

a. Take time to give thanks throughout the year but especially appropriate is Harvest time, and at thanksgiving supper. To consider Providence and Return Thanks.

2. Be thorough about what you are thankful for. Do not make it perfunctory, fathers and mothers perhaps write down a list so as to teach your children and give them ideas. Warn people ahead of time, or search for a list of questions to HELP people be thorough.

a. Ephesians 5:20 always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

3. if you have had trying and weary year and Ask God to be your shield and defense in it, but thank him for his comfort. Give thanks for the Lord for his steadfast love, and faithfulness in the midst of it.

a. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 Give thanks in every circumstance [Every means every], for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

4. Acknowledge thanksgiving is difficult. Rejoice with the who rejoice and weep with those who weeps.

5. Give thanks to the Lord for his smiling providence if you have had provision.

6. Give thanks in the name of Jesus. Praise for your salvation.

a. always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. – Eph. 5:20

b. Which is short-hand for faith in Christ and trust in his holding you fast.

7. Spend time in Prayers of thanksgiving after having heard them around the table and pray for the coming year.

a. Something like…”Heavenly Father, thank You for the abundant blessings You have bestowed upon us. As we gather around this table, Bless this food, the hands that prepared it, and the hearts that share it. May our gratitude extend beyond this day, reflecting Your love and generosity in our lives. Amen

8. Sing Songs of thanksgiving

a. Keep your Bulletin from Today and look at all the preludes and hymns sung and meditate on the lyrics. They will instruct your heart and mind this coming week.

9. Exercise Christian Hospitality beyond your immediate family: If you are in town and you are alone, I know, I know for a fact there are families with open homes, and open tables. If you are in town and have the large table and the extra space, consider opening that invitation up.

10. Be intentional with your STORY and Traditions of Thanksgiving…Its not just Turkey Day.

a. The Westminster Directory for Publick Worship Give this direction to Churches for “special days of thanksgiving.” That mostly have to do with the worship service but I think it is helpful to the church and the family: When God gives a special providence and we ought to return thanks then it is appropriate to designate a day for Thanksgiving, Prayer, Singing, and to seal the memory of those events in the current and next generation.

b. So I would encourage Families to in miniature to not just let people lounge around the house the whole day (I said the whole day, I will be on the couch napping part of the day) but my encouragement is for Father’s to give notice that a the Meal or at 3PM we will pray, sing a hymn, and I will tell of the mercies of God to our families. If its not planned for it won’t happen.

i. The Directory for Publick worship says, Let him then make some pithy narration of the deliverance obtained, or mercy received, or of whatever hath occasioned that assembling of the congregation, that all may better understand it, or be minded of it, and more affected with it.

ii. Do you believe truly, that magnifying God’s providence in your family and over the events of history and his Fatherly care will help stem the tide of our “anxious generation” this generation of young people is more anxious than any before it?

1. I firmly Believe that reclaiming Providence, Thanksgiving, A Family history and fostering true belief in a Merciful God will help stem the tide.

11. Lastly, #11 the Westminster directory for publick worship says, At one or both of the public meetings that day, a collection is to be made for the poor, that they poor may bless us, and rejoice the more with us. And the people are to be exhorted, at the end of the latter meeting, to spend the residue of that day in holy duties, and testifications of Christian love and charity one towards another, and of rejoicing more and more in the Lord; as becometh those who make the joy of the Lord their strength.

a. I think for americans this happens all in the lead up to thanksgiving, but do remember the poor in the lead up to Christmas as well. God in his Providence has provided for your family, do not anxiously hoard up treasure on earth but out of love, out of charity make a provision for the poor. The outreach team has a host of ideas for this I am sure.

- V. 33: But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

o You have a King and Kingdom, a promise and a great salvation. Do not be anxious. Fulfill your calling with courage and conviction, and your food, your home, and provision will be added unto you.

- Prayer

Benediction

[2] Note also re-enchanting providence allows us to take sin and the problem seriously again.

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