I don't know how there can be any worship without thanksgiving. As we enter that month where we talk about it, let's do more than talk and eat turkey and dressing.
Our worship must extend beyond the wall of the church into our everyday lives. Our worship touches and affects our homes, our work, our community, and our world through relationships, circumstances and opportunities. The problem is many times we allow worry to replace worship in our hearts when it comes to all of these things.
In verse 6 of Philippians 4 we find the following words, "do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplications with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God." And in the next verse we see that the result of doing that brings the peace of God guarding our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. He is the center of our worship if we approach all of life as Paul challenges us in this passage.
I remember agonizing as a teenager praying about someone who was straying from the Lord. And I read this passage in Philippians over and over until one day I finally saw the words, "with thanksgiving" and it totally changed my perspective in my praying over this one and the circumstances involved. If we are to worship Him in all aspects of our lives, we must learn to lay things at His feet with thanksgiving knowing, knowing, knowing, yes, knowing that He is working and accomplishing His will and way in every circumstance. With thanksgiving is our act of trust and faith in a dependable God. May we worship Him . . . with thanksgiving! mjm
