Bill Johnson - The Sanctifying Power of a Thankful Heart
Thankfulness sanctifies, so when you’re in the middle of a horrific situation, thankfulness in the midst of that is not about chasing the devil; it’s simply about turning our hearts towards celebrating who God is in every situation. It anchors our souls into the absolute victory that has been promised to each one of us. Now, if ever there was a weird metaphor in the Bible, it’s that a pearl is a gate. A pearl is a gate; we have these gigantic pearls—twelve of them—for the city of Jerusalem. Those pearls are gates. You have to stop and think, «All right, how are pearls formed?» They’re formed out of irritation.
Ah, so the gate of praise isn’t formed simply because I gave praise for a raise at work; it’s that in the middle of difficulty, I gave praise. Then you start pondering the nature of this gate. First of all, we’re talking about safety now. We have this walled city with these gates in place, called gates of praise. Those gates of praise serve two purposes: number one, they provide protection from the onslaught of the enemy. What he intends to use against us is now removed from his hands. The weapons of the enemy are destroyed through thankfulness; it actually removes the tool he was going to use to destroy us because now we’re playing with God’s tools. We’re playing with God’s instruments at that gate. Psalms 24 says, «Lift up your heads, O ye gates, that the King of Glory may enter.» Here’s a gate through which the Lord can come in, and the enemy cannot. The same gate invites one and repels the other.
Praise: go with me to 1 Thessalonians 5, and we’ll spend the rest of our time in this chapter. That last statement I made about thanksgiving, thankfulness—I kind of butchered it, and I’m going to butcher it just a little bit more, but I want to give that statement context because if you understand this, I didn’t prepare to have these scriptures ready, so you can look them up on your own. There’s this interesting dialogue that Paul has on two occasions about food and what we’re to eat. In one of those occasions, he says, «Hey, if your neighbor is sacrificing an animal to this demon god, and you know they sacrificed that meat to the demon god, and they know that you know, don’t eat the meat.» He says it’s not because it will harm you; it’s because it will violate their conscience. But then he goes on and says, «But if they don’t know, then eat it.» For Paul says all foods received with prayer and thankfulness are sanctified.
Follow the logic here: so here’s this big chunk of meat my neighbor just offered to some god. He doesn’t know that I know, but I watched, and then he invited me over for dinner. I saw these demon powers surround him as he made this offering, and I know that the enemy wants to destroy me through what I’m about to eat. I receive it into my life and give thanks. My thankfulness just sanctified what was previously empowered by the enemy to bring destruction to my life. Did that make sense? Thankfulness sanctifies. So when you’re in the middle of a horrific situation, thankfulness in the middle of that is not about chasing the devil around; it’s simply about turning our hearts toward celebrating who God is in every situation, and it anchors our souls into that absolute victory that has been promised to each one of us.
Thankfulness. Here we have this portion of scripture that—well, I remember, just look at verse 16: «Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.» I remember reading that as a young pastor in Weaverville days. I remember reading that verse and thinking, «Man, I could spend the rest of my life, every day, the rest of my life on those three verses, and I would have my hands full. I would have a full-time job just learning those three simple statements.» Say it with me: «Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.» Let’s say it together: «Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.» Say it again: «Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.» I’m not sure we see the effect of thankfulness on the human heart or on the spiritual atmosphere surrounding our lives. There is a sanctifying, cleansing, purifying work that takes place simply through thankfulness. Why? Number one, thankfulness is automatically a position of humility.
Thankfulness is not us dictating something to God or to somebody else; it’s coming in low and honoring Him for what He has done. Thankfulness is connected to the acts of God, the works of God. It says of Israel and Moses that Israel was acquainted with the acts of God, but Moses was acquainted with His ways. There’s an interesting graduation in perception and experience in those two areas. Many people experience the works of God but don’t know anything about His nature or His person. All the revelations or experiences of the works of God are invitations to discover who He is. Moses prayed this prayer in Exodus: «Let me know Your ways; let me know Your works, that I might know You.»
In other words, «God, I want to see what You’re like because I want to follow that invitation into relationship, into encounter.» In other words, we’re not gathering information for a test or quiz; we’re seeing glimpses of what He’s like so we can take each glimpse as the invitation or open door opportunity to come into a relationship. When He revealed Himself to Abraham as the provider, Jehovah Jireh, it wasn’t to make him more well-rounded in his theological approach to God’s resource; He was revealing Himself as the one who was about to provide for him. Instead of him sacrificing Isaac, there was a ram caught in the thicket. The point was, God has provided. He revealed Himself, and that provision was to be experienced.
Thanksgiving will take you places nothing else can take you. It will take you places in God. So here, He says, «Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.»