Gen 41:50-57; Luke 17:11-19-An Attitude of Gratitude: 9/7/14

Happy Grandparents Day!

INTRO
With all of the deep truths seen in Joseph’s life, what we are going to look at today can be easily missed or glossed over.
It is something about Joseph’s life that shows an appropriate response to God’s blessings in it.

It is an attitude of gratitude.

THRUST
Even after all that Joseph has been through, he responds with an attitude that says, “I always want to remember the good things God has done for me.”

I know that life is difficult. I know it is hard to smile all the time when you are just having one of those days. I am not talking about a fake smile that you have to force. I am talking about inner gratitude and thankfulness that can sustain us in the deepest trials.

Joseph could have been bitter, or ungrateful. After all, he was abandoned, enslaved, betrayed, and estranged. He had a rough life, we know this, but do we find any hidden anger?

No, instead we find an attitude of gratitude. Again I urge you, look at the Genesis passage, and then ask yourself this? Why do parents give the names they do to their children? There is something powerful, something symbolic.

It is like “I want you to embody this in your life”. And every time you call out the name, you are reminded of just how and why you chose it.

Joseph chose two names that honored God’s work in his life. Those names were Manasseh and Ephraim. They were meant to remind Joseph of God.

God took away the pain and the suffering that Joseph experienced, and instead blessed him richly with mercy and grace.

In a way, does not this also reflect the life of us as Christians? When we place our trust in Jesus Christ, God takes away and also blesses.

He takes away our sins, and blesses us with freedom and new life. He takes away our wrongs, and blesses us with love.

He takes away our loneliness and blesses us with community. That is what we experience when we, like Joseph, refuse to walk away from God when times get tough.

God not only took the bad away but blessed Joseph with the good: wealth, love, and a family.

God takes our bad away, and blesses us with spiritual wealth, holy love, and a church family.

The only way I am convinced that someone can truly rise above trauma and struggle is with a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

I know that is how Joe did it, and that is how any of us can do it, and the right response to it is to be thankful, to have an attitude of gratitude.

God notices when we give Him praise and thank Him. People avoided lepers but Jesus pursued them.

This story teaches us that on average nine out of ten people suffer from ingratitude.

If you look at the good things in life as what you have earned, then may never be satisfied because there will always be that thirst in your soul, like trying to drink ocean water to quench thirst yet never being satisfied.

Rather if you look at the good things in your life as gifts from God, then you receive them with more joy, more humility, and more thankfulness.

Grateful people focus on what they have, instead of what they have-not.
Gratitude gets us through the hard stuff, the tough stuff, and to reflect on your blessings is to rehearse God’s accomplishments and to do that is to discover his heart

Like the sun burns up mist in the morning, our dread and bitterness is burned away.

Gratitude looks to God and away from dread, this is the bedrock for why we do things as Christians.

It should all spring out of an attitude of thanksgiving that even if God has not chosen to bless us with anything else…he gave us salvation in His Son because he simply loves us.

That is why we can be thankful and it is that reason, out of thankfulness to him, that we serve one another.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW!
***An attitude of gratitude. Joseph had it. The Samaritan whom Jesus healed had it, and it is the response we should have. When we reflect on God’s goodness, we are thankful, when we are thankful, we are joyful, and when we are joyful, we serve one another, in love.

For full sermon, click http://faithinactionrichlandcob.wordpress.com/genesis-4150-57-luke-1711-19-an-attitude-of-gratitude/