David Holwick G Thanksgiving
Boothbay Baptist Church
Boothbay, Maine
November 21, 2021
Deuteronomy 28:1-8
1 Timothy 6:17-19
PROVISIONING THE PILGRIMS
I. There would be no Thanksgiving without Boothbay.
Most of us are familiar with the story.
The Pilgrims left England and arrived in Massachusetts in 1620.
Maybe you've been to the rock that they alleged stepped on.
They had plenty of religious zeal, but no fishing gear, terrible
hunting ability, and not much skill at farming.
By the next autumn, half of them had starved to death.
But local Indians taught them some basic farming skills and helped
them with food so the survivors celebrated a big thanksgiving
feast with the Indians in 1621.
The rarely-told story is that a few months later they were
starving again.
They sent out a boat to look for food and found a small fishing
community on Damariscove Island.
Those fishermen provided them with enough salted cod to survive,
and they did it for free.
That is why the sign on Route 27 at the boundary of our town
proclaims, "Pelegrinis cibum dedimus," or, "We provisioned the
Pilgrims."
It's a good thing we did, too - my wife Celeste is a Mayflower
descendant.
If they had all starved to death, I would be eating Thanksgiving
dinner all by myself! [1]
II. The other side of the Thanksgiving coin.
A. The Pilgrims thanked God because he had first provided for them.
1) Experiencing hardship and starvation made their thanksgiving
much more pointed.
2) They recognized they couldn't do it on their own and needed
God's help.
B. This has been God's promise to believers since the beginning.
1) When God provided Abraham with a ram so he wouldn't have
to sacrifice his son, Abraham called the place Jehovah-
Jireh - "The Lord will provide." Gen 22:14
2) When the Jews wandered in the wilderness with Moses, God
supernaturally provided them with manna.
3) When the Jews entered the land of Israel, God promised them
abundant crops and livestock - as long as they were
obedient to him.
4) In the New Testament, Paul reminds even the pagan Lyconians
that God has provided them with abundant food and joy.
Acts 14:17
III. How God provides.
A. He can provide materially.
1) This is the idea behind Deuteronomy 28, which lists the
blessings Israel will receive when they obey God.
2) They are practical things like childbirth and livestock
and victory over enemies.
3) God can give you the things you need, in ways that you
can't anticipate.
Years ago I received a letter from Nancy Bartolec, a Campus
Crusade missionary at Indiana University.
She entitled the letter, "God is just so ... Nice!!!!"
A week before Valentine's Day, some of her friends called from
Kentucky and asked Nancy to come down for the weekend.
They told Nancy if she'd drive down they'd pay for everything
once she got there.
When Nancy got off the phone and began to figure out how much
it would cost in gas to get there and back, it came to $40.
Then she began to realize not only did she not have money to
spend when she got there but she didn't even know where
the money would come from to get down there at all.
Nancy began to pray and ask God to provide the money.
After a while she just decided that she'd have to swallow her
pride and tell her friends she couldn't afford to come.
That night Nancy got a phone call from Visa.
They called to tell her they wanted to communicate to her that
she was a VALUED customer...
(Immediately her cynical side figured they just wanted to coax
her to use the card more often!)
But then they made their appreciation a little more concrete.
To show their sincerity they were sending her gift certificates
to a gas station of her choice for the amount of $40!!!!
Not just plain gift certificates to be used anywhere, but
specifically for gasoline.
And not for $25 dollars or $50 ... but $40!!!
Nancy was so thrilled she told the Visa guy he was part of a
miracle.
#4342
Have you ever had God provide for you like this - an EXACT
amount just when you needed it?
It is not an every-day thing but praise God when it happens!
As Ephesians 3:20 says, God is able to do far more abundantly
than all we ask or think.
B. God can provide abundantly.
1) Abraham started out with nothing but a promise from God.
In Genesis 24:35 his servant sums up Abraham's situation
this way:
"The LORD has greatly blessed my master, and he has become
great.
He has given him flocks and herds, silver and gold, male
servants and female servants, camels and donkeys."
All this didn't happen overnight but built up steadily.
I am convinced if you commit your way to God, he can do
the same to you.
2) Jesus teaches about God's generosity in Luke 6:38, and it
interesting how he hinges it on our own generosity:
"Give, and it will be given to you.
Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over,
will be put in your lap.
For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you."
Luke 6:38
The image is of a man sitting in a market and having a
bushel of grain poured into his lap.
3) God's abundance is not a magic formula.
a) TV evangelists who tell you to send in $50 and God will
multiply it by Friday are teaching a twisted gospel.
b) But God does want us to have good things, materially
and spiritually. He wants to bless you.
C. God can provide spiritually.
1) Jesus taught that people don't live by bread alone.
a) We all have a spiritual component whether we
acknowledge it or not.
b) If you truly seek God, he can put a joy in your heart
that is beyond anything the world can provide.
c) Our earthly possessions will rust and decay but your
spiritual treasure will last forever.
2) God's material provision to us should awaken our gratitude
for all he offers, and draw us closer to him.
a) Are you grateful for what God has given you?
IV. God's provision requires our trust.
A. God provided manna, but withheld it on the Sabbath.
1) Friday's amount was sufficient for two days but they
had to have faith in that. Exod 16:26
2) Those who didn't have faith found that the excess they
gathered would turn rotten right away.
B. How much do you really trust God?
1) Our Thanksgiving meal can be taken for granted.
a) Many of us could have a Thanksgiving feast every day,
if we wanted to.
b) We expect it to be a great meal because we are a
prosperous country.
1> Even poor families have a big meal that day.
2) Other parts of the world don't have this luxury, and
perhaps treasure what God gives them a little more.
Haiti has been in the news a lot lately, from earthquakes
to immigrants rounded up at our borders to American
missionaries being kidnapped and held for ransom.
It is a desperately poor country.
But it has produced a special faith there.
Stephen Sorenson asked a visiting missionary from Haiti
how American Christians differed from Haitian Christians.
The missionary told him, "Most American Christians don't
need God.
American Christians have everything they need.
If they don't pray or read the Bible for weeks, it makes
little difference in their daily lives.
They still have food to eat, a place to sleep, regular
income.
They don't need to practice their faith every day."
For most Christians in America, this is absolutely true.
This missionary lived among some of the most impoverished
people in our hemisphere.
It seemed to give her a deeper understanding of how God
provides.
Sorenson was impressed with this missionary's firm trust in
God to supply what she and her villagers needed for
daily living. #3854
C. Our trust must be ongoing.
1) In effect, when we are thanking God for his provision, we
are also saying, "Do it again!"
2) And God keeps saying, keep trusting and obeying me.
V. God's provision should enlist our cooperation.
A. Our obedience is a pre-condition.
1) You don't HAVE to be obedient.
a) As Jesus himself noted, God sends his rain on the just
and the unjust. Matt 5:45
b) God can be nice to anybody if he wants to be.
2) Even so, he can also withdraw that niceness if he chooses.
a) Our disobedience can make him choose this.
b) Many of the Bible's promises of God's blessing are
hinged on whether we are obeying God, or not.
B. God's provision is not magical - our effort matters.
1) Note that the Pilgrims were blessed enough to have a
thanksgiving feast but almost starved again months later.
2) Martin Luther: "God wants nothing to do with lazy,
gluttonous bellies who are neither concerned nor busy;
they act as if they just have to sit and wait for God
to drop a roasted goose into their mouth." #945
3) He's done that before - when the Israelites complained about
a lack of meat, God provided quail that inundated them
until it came out of their noses.
Num 11:18-20
C. You cannot force God's material blessing.
1) A check from the Almighty.
Kevin Russell went to his bank in Hobart, Indiana, and
tried to cash a check.
It was made out for $50,000.
It was signed, "King Savior, King of Kings, Lord of Lords,
Servant."
For some reason, they wouldn't cash it.
Instead, they arrested him.
The police officer said, "I've heard about God giving out
eternal life, but this is the first time I've heard of
him giving out cash."
#34223
2) I personally think God CAN give out cash. Just ask Nancy
Bartolec. But don't try forging his name.
D. Don't presume upon God's provision.
1) You should do more than nothing.
Estelle Walker told the Times Square Church in New York
that she needed to escape an alcoholic husband.
The church moved her and her five children out of New York
to an idyllic cabin on a lake in northern New Jersey.
They gave her financial support that ranged from $700 to
$1,000 every month.
A year later she refused to leave so the church cut off
her support and began eviction proceedings.
Three of her children testified that their mother never
looked for work or provided for them.
Estelle had told them God would provide for them.
As they grew weaker and hungrier, she made no effort to
feed them.
At one point they went 11 days without food.
By the time a neighbor called police, an 8-year-old daughter
was down to 34 pounds.
At the trial, her defense lawyer claimed Estelle was not
responsible for her actions because of her strict belief
in an extreme dependence on God.
The prosecutor said the woman was a cunning, evil person
who used her religion as excuse to get a rent-free cabin
at the expense of her children's health.
She had never asked family or friends to help.
The prosecutor concluded, "Instead, she did nothing."
The jury convicted Estelle Walker of child endangerment.
She displayed no emotion when the sentence was read.
#36112
2) The Apostle Paul taught that if we want to eat, we should
work and earn enough to buy food. 2 Thess 3:10
3) Do what you can do, and God will do what he chooses to do.
a) We can trust him to do right for us.
VI. You may be God's provision for someone else.
A. Tony Campolo's awkward challenge.
Tony Campolo was once invited to speak at a ladies meeting.
There were 300 women there.
Before he spoke the president of the organization read a letter
from a missionary.
It was a very moving letter.
In the letter the missionary expressed a need for $4,000 to take
care of an emergency that had cropped up.
So the president of the organization said, "We need to pray that
God will provide the resources to meet the need of this
missionary.
Brother Campolo, will you please pray for us?"
Tony Campolo said, "No."
He has always been rather outspoken.
Startled, she said, "I beg your pardon?"
He said, "No, I won't pray for that."
He went on: "I believe that God has already provided the
resources and that all we need to do is give.
Tell you what I'm going to do.
I'm going to step up to this table and give every bit of cash I
have in my pocket.
And if all of you will do the same thing, I think God has
already provided the resources."
The president of the organization chuckled a little bit and
said, "Well, I guess we get the point.
He is trying to teach us that we all need to give
sacrificially."
Campolo said, "No, that is not what I am trying to teach you.
I'm trying to teach you that God has already provided for this
missionary.
All we need to do is give it.
Here, I'm going to put down all of my money I have with me."
Campolo wasn't too worried because he knew he had only $15 in
his pocket, but he put it in the plate and looked at the
president of the organization.
Reluctantly, she opened her purse and took out all of her money,
which was about $40, and put it on the table.
One by one the rest of the ladies filed by and put their money
on the table, too.
When the money was counted they had collected more than $4,000.
Tony Campolo said, "Now, here's the lesson.
God always supplies for our needs, and he supplied for this
missionary, too.
The only problem was we were keeping it for ourselves.
NOW let's pray and thank God for His provision."
#30410
B. This is the principle behind 1 Timothy 6:17-19.
1) Put your hope in God, and he will provide for you.
2) If he gives you a lot, share it with others.
a) Like the Damariscove fishermen shared with the Pilgrims.
b) Who is God going to bless through YOU?
C. We all have much to be thankful for.
1) We have enough to eat.
2) We are blessed to live in a land of abundance and
opportunity.
3) We have a God who loves us and wants to give us good things.
a) Have you accepted his BEST thing?
b) He wants to save you, turn your life around and give
you eternity. Will you accept it?
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
[1] Boothbay’s motto was coined in the 1990s by Latin teacher and First
Baptist Church member Becky Roberts. The island of Damariscove is
now an uninhabited nature preserve.
# 945 “Wait For God To Drop a Roasted Goose,” by Martin Luther, taken
from my 1985 sermon on Worry.
# 3854 “Give Us Today Our Daily Bread,” by Stephen W. Sorenson,
Discipleship Journal, #62, March 1991, page 29.
# 4342 “God Is Just So ... Nice!” by Nancy Bartolec, Campus Crusade
missionary to Indiana University newsletter, March 1998.
#30410 “He Wouldn't Pray, But He Would Give,” attributed To Melvin
Newland in Kerux Sermon #22082, “Can You Give Too Much?” by
Rev. Mark Hensley.
#34223 “Cashing A Check From God,” Associated Press, February 28, 2007.
#36112 “An Extreme Dependence On God,” by Joe Moszczynski (edited by
Rev. David Holwick), Star Ledger Newspaper of Newark, New
Jersey, January 22, 2010, page 16.
These and 35,000 others are part of the Kerux database that can be
downloaded, absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
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