Offer prayers of thanksgiving always
PROTECTED CONTENT
If you’re a current subscriber, log in below. If you would like to subscribe, please click the subscribe tab above.
Username and Password Help
Please enter your email and we will send you a password reset link.
Faith Fitness
Bro. Sam Kaufman
Some people like turkey for Thanksgiving. Others prefer ham. Then there are those who like both during their traditional Thanksgiving meal.
More power to all of them! We’re free to eat whichever meat we desire without our conscience bothering us. It is one of the perks to living in the current dispensation.
But God tells us we are to receive it with thanksgiving, of course. I Timothy 4:4 tells us that, “For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving.”
That means we are to pray over the meat, and everything is good to go.
What we don’t need to do is be nit picky over what everybody else wants to eat.
Jesus tells us we can choose to eat what we want. In other words, if someone doesn’t want to eat meat for Thanksgiving, it is fine. Let them be. Some choose not to eat meat. That’s fine.
But others enjoy a good turkey or ham on Thanksgiving. Good for them. Let them gobble it up.
The Book of Romans discusses this matter in Romans 14:1-3, which states, “Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one believeth that he may eat all things: another who is weak, eateth herbs. Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him.”
The Bible tells us that Jesus ate meat. He also had meat cooked for His friends.
Jesus always gave thanks for the food, as well. Remember the instance in which the fish and bread were multiplied.
In another verse, Jesus asked his disciples to come and dine.
John 21:9,12, 13 tells us that “As soon as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine…Jesus then cometh, and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise.”
The key for us is to be thankful to God for all things He provides. Praying over the meal is one way to show our gratitude.
We’ve got to realize that God is the Creator of all things. These blessings – our daily bread – come from God, and we should acknowledge that before every meal.
Thanksgiving Day is no different. What a feast! Say a good prayer over that meal.
I didn’t grow up going to church. Sometimes it is difficult to tell my parents about Jesus. But there have been times – such as the Thanksgiving Day meal – that they actually asked me to pray. Wow!
Our prayers of Thanksgiving for our food can provide a terrific opportunity to share Christ.
Paul did just that with the fellow prisoners and officers aboard the ship that was supposedly headed for Rome.
That account is found in Acts 27:33-36 that reads: “And while the day was coming on, Paul besought them all to take meat, saying, This day is the fourteenth day that ye have tarried and continued fasting, haven taking nothing. Wherefore I pray you to take some meat: for this is for your health: for there shall not an hair fall from the head of any of you. And when he had thus spoken, he took bread, and gave thanks to God in the presence of them all: and when he had broken it, he began to eat. Then were they all of good cheer, and they also took some meat.”
Most of those on board the ship were obviously not Christians. But Paul’s prayer of thanksgiving to God in the presence of every one of them was an effective way of revealing truth through gratitude.
We can do the same in our lives through a simple prayer of thanksgiving at a restaurant, in a home, or wherever.
Oh, we have so much to be thankful for every day of the year. At the top of the list is the bread of life that came down from Heaven so that we would never hunger again.
