two places, Leviticus Chapter 7 and Colossians Chapter 1. Leviticus Chapter 7, Colossians Chapter 1. Leviticus, third book of the Bible. Colossians way past it. Leviticus 7, Colossians 1. All right, let's pray. Father, we do come to you this morning with joy and rejoicing. Lord, it's good to be saved. It's good to be in the house of God. Good to be with God's people. Good to be in a position where you can minister to us. Lord, I pray this morning, Spirit of God, that you would move amongst us. And yes, walk up and down the aisles, sit next to us in the pew. We're here and we're ready to hear from heaven. We desire to be ministered to by the Holy Spirit of God. You don't have much to work with, but a piece of dirt. Spirit of God, I pray you take this piece of dirt. and fill it with your spirit and your power, your passion, your wisdom. Fill it with words that will speak to our hearts and minister to us. This is your service. We are your people. This is your day. So Father, I pray you administer to your people in a wonderful way this morning. We thank you in Christ's name. Amen. Leviticus chapter 7, we'll start reading there at verse 11. It says, and this is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings which he shall offer unto the Lord. And if he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer it with the sacrifice of thanksgiving, unleavened cakes mingled with oil, unleavened wafers anointed with oil, cakes mingled with oil of fine flour fried. And you got me right there where the word fried shows up. I'm in it. I'm ready. Verse 13, besides the cakes, he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offerings. And of it, he shall offer one out of the whole oblation for a heave offering unto the Lord, and it shall be the priest that sprinkleth the blood of the peace offerings, and the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day that it is offered. He shall not leave any of it until the morning. But if the sacrifice of his offering be a vow or a voluntary offering, it shall be eaten the same day that he offered his sacrifice, and on the morrow also the remainder of it shall be eaten, but the remainder of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burnt with fire." Now go to Colossians chapter 1. Colossians chapter 1. And looking at verse 12, starting at verse 12. And so I'm going to take my suit coat off this morning because I don't know if you've heard about the guy in California. They want to shut people down in California, but they didn't shut down the strip joints. So it was a contemporary church, I understand that, and they played a little burlesque music as the guy came out and took off his tie. Because that's all you had to do, to qualify as a strip joint. So if anybody wonders if you went to church, then they say, no, we went to a strip joint. You know, there's always a way around something. It's amazing what people come up with. Anyway, we read the text in Leviticus chapter 7, and God gave to Moses the book of Leviticus in a very unique way. If you keep your finger on Leviticus 7, but go back to the end of the book of Exodus, Exodus chapter 40, we'll see how this all comes together. In Exodus chapter 40, God had given Moses the instruction and the plans and all that on how to put together the tabernacle. And so in verse 33 of Exodus chapter 40, it says, He reared up the court round about the tabernacle and the altar. set up the hanging of the court gate so Moses finished the work. So the whole thing is put together. We're talking about the tabernacle in the wilderness. We're talking about the fence, what would you call it? It's like a fence but it's made out of material all the way around it. You're talking about the tabernacle itself with the holy of holies and the holy place and what have you. And the burnt offering, the brazen, the labor for the water and what have you, all that stuff has now been set up. Then in verse 34 it says this, then a cloud covered the tent of the congregation and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. So imagine that. Moses has set all this stuff up and he's probably wondering, okay, now what's next? And here comes the cloud, which is the glory of God, and just covers that thing. In fact, in verse 35, it says that Moses was not able to enter into the tent of the congregation because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Verse 38 tells us that for the cloud of the Lord was upon the tabernacle by day, and the fire was on it by night in the sight of all the house of Israel throughout all their journeys. And this is where this began right here. This is where the cloud first shows up at the tabernacle, and Moses cannot go in until he's requested. So go back to Leviticus and look at Leviticus chapter 1. Leviticus chapter 1. and verse 1. Now get the picture here. There's the tabernacle. There's the cloud. Moses thinking, I can't even get in there. Leviticus 1 and verse 1, and the Lord called unto Moses and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation, saying, and he's going to begin to give him all kinds of words that will be put down in the book of Leviticus, God has to invite Moses into that, and Moses goes in. And that's where the book of Leviticus comes from. Now, a lot of times I have kidded about the book of Leviticus. You know, it's that book in your Bible reading that, you know, Genesis is pretty cool and Exodus has some cool stuff, and then you hit Leviticus. And you get through it just to discipline yourself to get through it. And yet there's more to it than that. This is how it came about. So it's a very special, very special book, especially for the Jew. And we know it was written by Moses. Now that's not a shock to you, but there are some people out there that just can't figure it out. They think it was a Q document or a J document or something like that. And a bunch of people later put this all together and what have you and said Moses wrote it. We know Moses wrote it. How do we know? Jesus Christ said he did. And remember the adage, if Jesus Christ said he was going to die and rise again from the dead, and he died and he did rise again from the dead, then we can trust anything else that he says. And in Matthew chapter eight, he referenced the book of Leviticus as written by Moses. That's good enough with me. Now, if you have to be educated to not figure that out, you know, spend your money on your education. All I have a chance to do is read the book, see what it says. I get it. It's named the book of Leviticus because it was given to the tribe of Levi. That's God's chosen tribe to be the priests of the Lord. And it's no coincidence that Leviticus stands in the middle of the Pentateuch. So what's the Pentateuch? Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Penta, five. It's referred to as the Pentateuch, the first five books of Moses. And right smack dab in the middle is the book of Leviticus. And it's very important for the Jew, their legislative rituals of the priesthood and all that. Somebody said one time, we would never understand Greek history if we didn't understand their culture and their philosophy. We wouldn't understand Roman history if we didn't understand Roman philosophy and beliefs and culture and what have you. And honestly, you would never understand Jewish history without understanding something about the book of Leviticus and the priesthood and the sacrifices and all that. The book of Leviticus always puts God in the correct position so that you would always know what God was like and where he should be, not where would be the right word, his elevated position. And it shows the people how to approach God through sacrifice. Because you didn't approach God in the Old Testament without some kind of sacrifice. And all of that then pictures in type what Christ accomplished at Calvary. So if you really want to understand what Jesus Christ did at the cross and all the ramifications of redemption and salvation and sanctification and atonement and all that stuff, the more you understand the book of Leviticus, the more you'll understand what Jesus Christ did. The book of Leviticus as a structure. The first seven chapters have to do with the offerings and the laws. Chapters 8-10 have to do with the priesthood. 11-15 have to do with the ceremonial laws. Chapter 16 has to do with the Day of Atonement. Chapter 17, the offerings and their requirements. Chapter 18-20 has to do with the laws and the penalties for violating the laws. Chapter 21 through 23 has to do with the priesthood. 23 through 25, the feasts of the Lord. And 26 and 27, their offerings and so on and so forth. So it is a very important book for the Jew. And it is a very important book for the Christian. But what I want to do this morning Let's concentrate on that one aspect that we read about in Leviticus chapter 7, and that is the sacrifice of thanksgiving. We just went through the holiday, and we missed our Tuesday night, so I'm going to cover a little bit about that this morning. We look at the sacrifice of thanksgiving. By the way, the first time the word shows up, thanksgiving, is in the book of Leviticus. It's interesting that in the law, now the sacrifice of Thanksgiving is mentioned on another occasion, but it's not given in a specific order. In the law, in what we just read in Leviticus chapter 7 and what have you, in the law of the offerings, the peace offerings come last. And this is because it has to do with the communion of the offer, the communion with God. And this follows at the end, it shows the communion is based on and must flow from a full knowledge of all which the types for show. So what are you trying to say? They had to take care of the sin offering and the trespass offering before they could have the peace offering. You have to take care of sin before you find any peace with God. That's the order. And that's the way it is for us. We found no peace in our lives until we dealt with the sin. You have no communion with Jesus Christ until you deal with your sin and get that thing straightened out. If you're in here this morning and you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, you're not going to find peace. You'll find a high, you'll find a drunk, but you're not going to find peace. You only find peace when sin is taken care of. Now, let me give you quickly this morning what led in part, and what we read in Leviticus, led in part to the pilgrim's observance of a day of thanks. They understood the book of Leviticus, they understood the sacrifice of praise. It was one of the things that influenced them as far as the idea of a day of thanks is concerned. But I'd like to set the record straight first, if I could. I have a quote here from MSNBC. Now, I don't watch MSNBC. I don't watch ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN. I don't watch any of that nonsense. And if you do, you're wasting your time. You need a different source of where you get your information from because these people are not journalists anymore. They're used to be journalists. I remember Walter Cronkite. I remember, goodnight Chet, goodnight David. That's when journalists were journalists, for the most part. But we don't have journalists anymore. We have propaganda people. We have socialists, propagandists, with the help of the Democrat Party, that are feeding us a bunch of trash. So let me try to help you set the record straight this morning. MSNBC's AM Joy is a program, and I know this because I read it from somebody, a trusted source. AM Joy on Saturday, which was this time guest hosted by Jason Johnson, whoever that is, as the Media Research Center reported, Johnson called Thanksgiving, here's the term, Colonizer Christmas. How many have ever heard that term? Colonizer Christmas. Because their concept of Thanksgiving was a bunch of white guys coming over and going where the Indians were and stealing all their stuff. And then they had the panel, you know, the Zoom pictures, the talking heads. And they addressed one person. And by the way, this kind of thinking comes from the New York Times 1619 Project. How many have heard of that? Okay, Newt Gingrich, who is an incredible historian. You say, wait a minute, Preacher, Gingrich is a politician. No, he's an historian, and he's top shelf historian. He was a politician. He was one of the best speakers of the House this country ever had, brought the contract with America, and was able to work with, of all people, Bill Clinton when he was the president. but Gingrich is an historian beyond that, and when questioned what his opinion was as an historian of the New York Times 1619 Project, he summed it up by saying this, it's a lie. Now, that's coming from a top-shelf, top-tier historian that knows the facts, who read their stuff and said it's a lie, just in case you didn't know. But this kind of thinking comes from the 1619 Project, or Howard Zinn wrote a book called A People's History of the United States, which is absolute nonsense. So anyway, Johnson is gonna ask one of the panelists, one of the talking heads, Jelena Cobb, not sure if I'm saying that right. Could care less if I say it right. Jelani Cobb about how Thanksgiving has evolved in America. This is his question. Just like Christmas, right? At one point, Christmas was a time for rich people to open up their houses for people to come in and get stuff. What? Are we talking about looting? That's what Christmas was at one time? Well, maybe where she lives, I don't know, or he lives. So Cobb, a writer with the New Yorker, well that tells you the problem right there. Anybody realize how arrogant New York is? Now there are good Christians in New York, I'm not talking about them. I'm going to get in big trouble with my in-laws, or my son-in-law, what have you, not my in-laws. But New York is just an arrogant. I mean, that New York City stuff is just arrogant. That New England stuff is just arrogant. They think they know so much for the rest of the country. Anyway, the New Yorkers sent it and delivered more information about the holiday. And here's what her problem was. She placed the origins of an English colony in Virginia rather than the much better known Massachusetts settlement. There was a settlement in Virginia. It was called Jamestown. Jamestown was an absolute disaster. Here's her statement. She says, or even think about it, the original Thanksgiving, you know, where the colony was starving and you know, let's stop right there. I have talked to intelligent people. I have read intelligent people. I have listened to intelligent people. You know what intelligent people don't say? Well, you know, it's like, and you know, and you know, that's not an intelligent person speaking. That's somebody that may think they're intelligent because they work for the New Yorker. She may have a degree, but she's not intelligent. I still remember what Sam Gibson said about, how many remember Scarecrow and the Wizard of Oz? And Scarecrow wanted a brain, if I only had a brain. Remember Scarecrow? And when he finally met the wizard, the wizard never gave him a brain. He gave him a diploma. Suffice it to say, there are a lot of people out there that have diplomas that really don't have any brains. She's one of them. Anyway, here's what she says, or even think about it, the original Thanksgiving, you know, where the colony was starving and, you know, anthropological research suggests it was in such dire conditions they had to resort to cannibalism to remain alive. And, you know, it's always been kind of awkward to say that you commemorate that by stuffing yourself with as much food as you can, and maybe perhaps people have to actually think about a small sacrifice of befitting and keeping with this day, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. She has no idea of what she's talking about. Media Research Center's Mark Finkelstein also noted that there is some evidence of isolated incidents of cannibalism among the Jamestown colonists during the harsh winter of 1609 to 1610. Nobody's arguing that. It was very, very minor. That's not where we got Thanksgiving from. You know why they went to Jamestown? They went to Jamestown, these adventurers. We talked about that a couple of weeks ago. These adventurers went to Jamestown. They were venture capitalists because they had heard that the Indians had chamber pots, toilets, made out of gold with jewels on them and they were going to steal them from the Indians. And the ones that went to Jamestown, many of them were what we call the aristocrats. You know what aristocrats were? People that thought manual labor wasn't for them. So you have this mess happening in Jamestown. You have people there that don't want to work. You have people there that are trying to bargain with the Indians and trying to rip them off and have bad relationships with the Indians to the point where they are massacred on one or two occasions. This thing in Jamestown, it took like 20 years for that thing to get going, all right? That's not where we got Thanksgiving from. And by the way, the very first Thanksgiving was not in Plymouth. The very first Thanksgiving happened on December 4th of 1619, according to Mary Outlaw, who's the head curator at Jamestown. She might know some things. And it had nothing to do with cannibalism either. Outlaw told the Norfolk, Virginia pilot in 2016, that's their newspaper, that it was precipitated by new arrivals at a place called Berkeley 100. How many have ever heard of Berkeley 100? Berkeley 100, a settlement 20 miles upstream from Jamestown. And we have a record of what one of the new settlers said. He said this, quote, this day of our ship's arrival shall be yearly and perpetually kept holy as a day of thanksgiving to Almighty God. So here are these people that are going past Jamestown, 20 miles past up the James River, and they settle on this open area alongside the river. You can Google it to this day, it's still an open area. And that was their place of settlement. However, they were massacred by the Indians after three years. Why? Because the Indians probably thought these are the same as those guys. So when our country chose the Thanksgiving origin story, we went with one that involved submission not only to God, but also to the advice of the Wampanoag, which was the Native Americans of that era. Not the one involving the struggle against Native Americans that more colonizers showed up to bring better provisions. So get that straight. Thanksgiving didn't start at Jamestown. Jamestown was a disaster. Thanksgiving started at the Plymouth area, like you were taught in school. And how they arrived too late to plant their crops. And many of them, almost half of them, died that first winter. And it wasn't until the Wampanoags, with the help of a guy named Squanto, who befriended them and taught them. And the chief Massasoit and the Wampanoag Indians taught them how to plant, taught them what corn was, taught them how to hunt for deer, taught them how to fish. And by the next year, in the fall, they were able to have a big celebration with the Wampanoag Indians and enjoy a great time. In fact, there were 50 years. of peace between the Pilgrim and the Wampanoags. The relationship with them was great. They accomplished the first Thanksgiving within a year of their arrival. Jamestown, 20 years and they're still struggling. But what influenced the Pilgrims as far as Thanksgiving is concerned? Well, they, you know they didn't leave from England, they left from Holland. And the Dutch citizens there in the city called Leiden or Leiden, depending what your accent is, Leiden or Leiden-Holland actually gave thanks to God. They had a special day of thanksgiving to God for William of Orange, who in 1574 ended the bloody Spanish Furies where Spain's Iron Duke of Alba had butchered tens of thousands of them. William of Orange finally defeated the Spanish. And because of that, they had an annual yearly thing. Jan Orlers, who was a friend of William Brewster, one of the pilgrims, made this statement. Every year throughout the city, a general day of prayer and thanksgiving held and celebrated on the 3rd of October to thank and praise God Almighty that he so mercifully has saved the city from her enemies. So that was what their day of thanksgiving about was in Leiden or Leiden, Holland. Also in that community there was a group of persecuted Jews that had fled from Spain that are now living in Leiden. Pilgrims would have observed them keeping Sukkot, which is the Jewish holiday of the Feast of Tabernacles, which is all about Thanksgiving. So the pilgrims are seeing this. They know what the Bible says about Thanksgiving. They see a day commemorated by the Dutch for their deliverance from the Spanish. They see the Jew celebrating the Sukkot or the Feast of Tabernacles. Again, a thing of Thanksgiving. So our knowledge of the 1621 Thanksgiving comes from Winslow and Bradford. Both of them are familiar with the situation. Winslow's choice of words understood by his contemporaries implies to us that the pilgrims gave thanks to God for their preservation and for the plenty that gave hope for the future. Winslow specifically tells us that the colonists sat down with their native neighbors and enjoyed several days, several days. Boy, that's a thought, isn't it? several days of eating, several days of peaceful rejoicing together. It's a history with potent symbolism and needs neither apology nor distortion, but that's what's going on. To understand more about the pilgrims two years later, In 1623, Winslow, as recorded in Alexander Young's Chronicles, stated, quote, drought and the like consideration moved not only every good man privately to enter into examination with his own estate before God and his conscience, and so to humiliation before him, but also to humble ourselves together before the Lord by fasting and prayer. What did he just say? He said it got bad. So when it got bad, you know what the people did? They got alone and they got with God and said, what's wrong with me? Show me my sin that I might confess it. It's stuff like that that brings about revival, by the way. When you don't have to have a church meeting to get alone with God and say, what's wrong with me? And I'm all ears. And you let God start showing you what's wrong with you. And you start confessing it. You start getting things right. That's what they were doing. These are not here to steal golden toilets. These people were here because of freedom. They were here to be able to worship God. They loved God and they had a relationship with Him. Their attitude was one, when things are bad, they would have days of prayer. Two, when things were real bad, they would have days of fasting. And three, when things turned around, they would have days of thanksgiving. In that particular year, according to Bradford, he said this, afterwards, after the prayer and the fasting and self-examination, he said afterwards, the Lord sent them seasonable showers. with interchange of fair warm weather as through his blessing caused a fruitful and liberal harvest to their no small comfort and rejoicing. God answered their prayer. That's the kind of people these were. Bradford says they shook off the yoke of anti-Christian bondage. And as ye, Lord's free people, joined themselves by a covenant of the Lord into a church estate, in ye fellowship of ye gospel, to walk in all his ways, make known, or to be made known unto them according to their best endeavors, whatsoever it would cost them the Lord assisting them. That's the kind of people these were. You know what these people would have done? They would have sat in these seats right here and would have been great friends with us. That's the kind of people these were. Now I don't know what MSNBC, where they get their information from, they certainly don't get it from history. You look at the lives of the pilgrims being surrounded by the Native American, and you read Proverbs 16, verse 7, when a man's pleased the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him. It wasn't normal for the Indians to treat the white men like that. And this verse in historical record in comparison with the Jamestown mess, you've got to be kidding. So, why are they being attacked? Why are the pilgrims being attacked every year? Why is Pilgrim Rock being defaced? Why is that going on? Well, I kind of have an idea. Somebody a long time ago said this, take away the heritage of a people and they're easily conquered. Any idea who said that? Karl Marx said that. So who was Karl Marx? I think he was at the DNC convention last year. Here's what's going on, and I'm just about done with this part, but here's what's going on. Socialist infiltration tactics utilized a process called deconstruction. This is Howard Zinn's stuff, it's the 1619 Project. Deconstruction is where the old identity is removed and replaced with a new identity. So when they were rioting all across this country, what were they pulling down? They were pulling down statues. They were pulling down memorials of our past, of our heritage, trying to destroy it. And we don't know what they're going to try to replace it with next, but they had to start. And they had to start by destroying our heritage, which is why our president said, I'm going to have a park, and I'm going to have statues built that represent all the good things about America. And I still call our president, Trump, our president. Until January 20th or until the Supreme Court says, wait a minute. Let's talk about the sacrifice of Thanksgiving. When you compare today's celebration of Thanksgiving with that of the pilgrims, the founding fathers, many Americans throughout the years, things have changed a little bit. Things have changed a little bit. You know, we talk about football on Thanksgiving. I remember it was in the 60s, I believe, when John Madden, remember John Madden? He used to broadcast the Thanksgiving Day NFL game. Nothing wrong with that. And Madden was a unique guy. Madden would go after the game into his motor coach. I've been in the motor coach. My wife and I were in that motor coach when we were looking, trying to figure out how to design a couch that became a bunk bed. And there was a founder of that company, was named Kerwin. I can't remember the last name. But he took us in and he showed us this hinge that they had made and they had patented that. And I looked at it and I thought, eh, I don't like that. I don't care for that idea. But he said, this is the motor coach that John Madden would come in. You'd see him at the end of every game sitting there with his big turkey. And then they made this turkey that had six drumsticks. I remember that. He'd sit there with a turkey with six drumsticks and he'd eat away. That was Thanksgiving, man, football and food. My wife and I took a little one-day trip up to Verde Canyon Friday. And traveling along, you know, on 202 and 101, 17, you know, how they got the signs across the way. Normally it says, you know, if you're sick, stay home, you know, stop the spread of COVID. But I saw throughout the trip on those signs the statement, let's give thanks to designated drivers. Now I understand the thought behind that. I'm thankful there are designated drivers who will drive for drunken people so they don't kill me when they're on the road. I get that, I understand that. But I'm thinking, really? That's what Thanksgiving has become, where we need to give thanks to designated drivers? Things have changed a little bit. So I want to go back to Leviticus chapter 7. And let's look at some things about this thanksgiving, the sacrifice of thanksgiving. In fact, Colossians 1 is where I want to go first. So go to Colossians 1. I mentioned earlier that the peace offering can only be offered after the sin offering is made. There's no peace until sin has been dealt with. Colossians 1, verse 12, we've read it earlier. But look what it says, giving thanks unto the Father. Okay, that's good. Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. How did that happen? How did we get to partake with the saints? Verse 13, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son. How did that happen? How did that happen? Look at verse 14, "...and whom I have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins." Listen, I can give thanks unto the Father because I have been redeemed by the precious blood of Jesus Christ as of a lamb slain without precious blood of the lamb. Listen, that's how I can give thanks to the Father. I have been translated from this world into the kingdom of His Son. I have been delivered from the darkness of this world. I can walk in light, and because of that, I can truly give thanksgiving to the Father. And that's where it begins. Any celebration of Thanksgiving has got to begin right there. I know there's Thanksgiving celebrations all over of every kind, but for us and for the God we worship, the only acceptable Thanksgiving is done by His children who have been washed in the blood of the Lamb. You know, the word thankful, it's kind of like the word faith. People say, have faith, like faith in itself has some virtue. Listen, the virtue is not in the act, but in the object. People would say, oh, have faith. In what? You say that in Saudi Arabia, we know what they're talking about. Faith is no good unless it's in the right object. Repentance toward God, the Bible says, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. Not Allah, not Buddha, not Confucius, not anything else. And thankfulness is the same way. You know, an atheist would have woke up Thursday morning and said, thank God, I'm not a believer, right? That's what an atheist would say. The drug addict would say, oh, I'm so thankful, I got some real good dope last night, right? They're being thankful, but there's no virtue in that. The virtue in Thanksgiving is to whom you're giving Thanksgiving to. Nehemiah chapter 12, you don't have to turn there, but Nehemiah chapter 12, they've returned from Babylon, they've built the temple, they've built the city, nothing like the first one, but they want to reenact the days of David. So it says in verse 46, for in the days of David and Asaph of old, they were chief of the singers and songs of praise, excuse me, songs of praise and thanksgiving unto God. Because that's where it goes, unto God. They didn't just sing, they sang unto God. Boy, I hope when you sing your hymns you're thinking that. I love congregational singing, but listen to me. When you sing, you're supposed to be singing unto God. So yeah, I'm gonna worship God. You know, you go in and sing, a lot of times you go in and sing just to hear your own voice. Boy, I'm pretty good. No, we sing and hear unto God. It is well with my soul, one peace like a river." Man, that's unto God. That's unto God. I'm on the winning side. That's unto God. You ought to have your worship service a little better. You don't need a band up here. You don't need this, you know. What we need are people whose heart is right with God, who sing hymns like they're singing it to Jesus Christ. That's when you'll start to worship. Psalms 50. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It's not Psalms. It's palms. How many heard about our wonderful, almost kind of president-elect who gave a speech Thursday? How many saw the speech? You know what, they estimate that 1,000 people viewed that. After a while, you know, big tech put in more hits on it, what have you. But originally it had 1,000 people that watched it. 80 million people voted for the guy, and 1,000 people watch it. Come on, give me a break. Give me a break. But he wants to be biblical. He's a devout Catholic. He knows the Bible. So he's going to quote from the book of Palms. He talks about the palmist, and the palmist said, Exactly. Yeah. So now I'm thinking, is Palm Sunday now Psalm Sunday? So we'll have Psalm Sunday and we'll quote from the palms. I said, preacher, why didn't you listen to his speech? If I wanted to hear senile people talk, I would go to the nursing home. Palms 50 verse 14. Offer unto God thanksgiving and pay thy vows unto the Most High. Palm 6930, I will praise the name of God with a song and will magnify Him with thanksgiving. Palm 10722, let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving and declare His works with rejoicing. Jonah in the whale's belly just before he's gonna go through the ceremony of regurgitation. is praying in the whale's belly, repenting, getting right with God. And he says this in verse nine, I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that I have vowed salvations of the Lord. He said, I will sacrifice unto thee. You know how you know he's getting his heart right? Because he wants to sacrifice unto God. He wants to praise God. So Thanksgiving should be all about him and for the Christian it's about Jesus Christ and Calvary. That's what it should be. Now I enjoy the football, don't get me wrong. I enjoy the food, don't get me wrong. But there should be some segment in there if we want to do it like the pilgrims did it. And I'm studying this and I'm thinking maybe we should have a Thanksgiving morning service. That would blow everybody's day. Now, we're trying to cook. We got pies in the oven. We got turkey in the oven. We can't have it, but I'm thinking that would be a wonderful thing to do on a Thanksgiving morning if we want to do it right and just get together and thank God, have a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving unto Him. We'll think about that. So that's number one. If we're going to offer Thanksgiving, sacrifice of thanksgiving, it's got to be to God. So don't tell me how you thanked the Lord as you were getting drunk. Don't tell me that. Don't tell me how you were partying and carousing and catting around and all that, but you're thankful. That means absolutely nothing. Absolutely nothing. Secondly, thanksgiving is, the sacrifice of thanksgiving was a multiple offering. Now go back to Leviticus chapter 7. Leviticus chapter 7, and look at verse 12. If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, that's one, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, that's two, and cakes mingled with oil of fine flour fried. That's three different things. Now what are you going to pick? Well, here's the thing. These weren't options. These were commands. You didn't pick one and say, I like that fried stuff. I'm going to offer that. No, no. It's all three. It's all three. Well, I don't like them unleavened cakes mingled with oil. I'm sorry. That's part of it. I know that isn't the way we do it when we have our Thanksgiving dinner. We don't do it that way. I mean, at our house, we have the precursor to the meal with all the snacks and stuff like that. That's one of my favorite parts. And they'll take this round piece of bread and they cut out the middle and they got the spinach dip and they put it in there. And sometimes we have homemade hummus and pita bread and what have you, and blue cheese ball. I'm going to tell you where I had right away, I had right to the blue cheese ball. And I eat as much of that as I can. You know what? And if we run out of crackers, it doesn't matter. I'll just cut slices of it and eat it. Listen, blue cheese bowl is good with coffee, it's good with Coke, you name it, I mean, it's good. And I don't even get near the other stuff that much. But this sacrifice right here, this offering right here wasn't optional. They had to offer all three. Ephesians chapter five and verse 20 says this, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. If we're going to give thanks, we have to give God thanks for everything. You say, well, there's some things in my life I don't really care for, and there's some things you complain about, and there's some things you don't complain about, some things you don't like, some things you like, some things you prefer over other things, what have you. Hey, when it comes to Thanksgiving, you thank God for everything. You thank God for everything. Which leads to the third point. And it's this in verse 13 of Leviticus chapter 7. This Thanksgiving offering is atypical. What in the world is atypical? You put a in front of a word, it means not. Atheist. I'm not atheist. Atypical. It's not typical. So what's not typical about it? Look at verse 13. Beside the cakes he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offering." Leavened bread. Anybody know the problem with leaven? Leaven in scripture pictures what is false, impure, sinful. It is consistently negative. And normally, typically, leaven is kept away from anything holy. But in this sacrifice, he says, you put 11 and a 2. You know what he's saying? It's one thing to be thankful for all the good stuff, all the mediocre stuff, or all the things that aren't trouble. It's another thing to be thankful for the trouble, thankful for that which is negative. It's kind of tough. Romans 8.28, very familiar text, we know that all things work together for good. It doesn't say all things are good, it says all things work together for good to them that love God. What does that mean? That means the leaven that comes into our lives can still be used for good by God. The negative that comes into our lives still can be used by God. Romans 5 and verse 3, he says, not only so, but we glory in tribulations also. In the tribulation work of patience. What is tribulation? It's trouble. And we spend our days doing everything we can to avoid trouble. The trouble comes. You have trouble. The apostle Paul talked about his thorn in the flesh, and he said this in 2 Corinthians 12 and verse 10, therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecution, in distresses. That's trouble. And when we offer this sacrifice to God along with the good stuff, we offer to him the leaven, we offer to him the trouble, and we say thank you for the trouble. See, it's more than football and turkey. We thank him for the problems. We thank him for the trouble. We thank him for the injustices. We thank him for the evil. Which leads us to the fourth point. Go to verse 14. This offering was part of a heave offering. And of it he shall offer one out of the whole oblation for a heave offering unto the Lord. It shall be the priests that sprinkle the blood of the peace offerings. You know what a heave offering was? You took the offering and if it was big, you'd have to heave it up to God. That's a heave offering. That's an offering where you not only have it, but you say, God, here it is. Here's my offering. It's thankful for the good stuff. It's thankful for the bad stuff. I'm offering it to you. And it's not offered to any man. It's not given to the priest. It's offered to God. Hebrews chapter 13 verse 15 says, by him therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually. That is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name, but to do good and communicate, forget not for with such sacrifices, God is well pleased. There's a lot we can do for Jesus Christ. There's a lot of activity we can do for him, which normally would be pleasing, but you know what is well pleased. We take that sacrifice. Lord, I'm thankful. for the trouble. Listen now, Lord, I'm thankful for the cancer. I'm thankful for the lymphoma. I'm thankful for the COVID. That's serious stuff. That's serious stuff. Say, preacher, just give us football and turkey. There's more to it than that. There's more to it than that. But I'll tell you this, God always hears that. So He hears our prayers all the time. Yeah, I know, but sometimes it's like, Lord, are you getting this? But when you do that, He hears that. Fifthly, look at verse 15 again, or verse 15. The Thanksgiving offering was a time of great fellowship. Verse 15 says, the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings for Thanksgiving shall be eaten. Oh, that's the fun part. You know, normally you would bring your sacrifice, the priest would take it, the priest would do whatever he needed to be done, it'd be over with. This is a sacrifice where the priest said, I'll take this part, you can have that part, and let's sit down and eat it. And so you've got all the people that have come with our sacrifices. They're sitting down and enjoying the fellowship of sitting together and eating, you know, good people, good food, whatever they say. And the priest is there with them in the presence of God. You know why we have churchwide fellowships when we're not all dying of COVID? Because it's a good fellowship. It's good fellowship. It is so good to sit down with God's people and to talk about Jesus Christ, talk about what He's doing in our lives. It is so good. And you know, it's interesting. We're all waiting for the trumpet to blow, amen? And yet we know that as soon as the trumpet blows, the first stop is the judgment seat of Christ. That's not going to be a good time. But then after that, after everything is straightened out, everything is cleared up, after that, what are we going to do? You're going to eat, man. The marriage supper of the Lamb. We're going to eat. Wow. And I don't know where I'm going to sit at that table. I kind of have a hunch the Lord is going to seat us. I kind of have a hunch, you know, written there, one of those little pieces of folded cardboard is going to have your name on it. That's where you're going to sit. I wonder who I'm going to sit next to. I wonder who I'm going to sit across the table from. But it'll be a great time of fellowship. Great time of fellowship. Finally, look at verse 15 again. The flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings for Thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day that it was offered. He shall not leave any of it until the morning. You know what he just said there? No leftovers. Well, we live on the leftovers, amen? It's so great to have that big turkey, because the next day, I can have me a turkey sandwich, a lot of mayonnaise on it, and then at night, we can buy some of that turkey gravy in the jar, heat it up, and put that turkey on a piece of bread, pour that hot gravy over it, man, eat us a hot turkey sandwich with some horseradish or some pickle relish, something like that. We could eat the drumsticks, because it's not cooth to sit at the Thanksgiving table and eat a drumstick. So how do you know? I have been told. I love the drumstick. But you know what? I like to grab that drumstick the next day, stick it in the microwave, heat it up a little bit and tear into it. This is a meal where there's no leftovers. So why didn't they allow them to have leftovers? I think the answer is this, that yesterday's thankful heart is not going to work for today. And today's thankful heart doesn't carry over to tomorrow. Christianity is a daily thing. Twenty-two times in the New Testament, Christianity is a daily life, a daily way of living. We thank God today. It's not going to carry over until tomorrow. We've got to be able to thank God every day. Every day must have its own expression of thanksgiving, or that day's opportunity is lost forever. So we're thankful for today. Yesterday is over. We're not guaranteed tomorrow. We're thankful today. So here's the idea. The importance of the sacrifice of Thanksgiving is laid out in the book of Leviticus. The pilgrims got it. The pilgrims figured it out because, you know what, there was no football. I take that back. They did play some, had some games they played with the Indians. But you know where that spirit of Thanksgiving came from? Half of the people dying the first winter, and the struggle, and the hardship that they went through, and it all came together, and they could be thankful. There's an unsubstantiated attack upon the pilgrims in our heritage, which I'm tired of hearing. But listen, Thanksgiving, number one, is to God. And it's for everything. The good things in your life, the mediocre things in your life, the bad things in your life. So the next time we do Thanksgiving, which should be today, keep these things in mind. We're not going to relegate the sacrifice of Thanksgiving to one day out of the year. we practice the sacrifice of Thanksgiving every day. Every day. No matter what your wife's attitude is, no matter what your husband's attitude is, no matter how bad the kids are that day, every day needs to be an offering up of Thanksgiving to God. Thank you, God. That's Thanksgiving. Father, we thank you. We thank you. We offer to you this morning the sacrifice of thanksgiving. It has its unleavened part, it has its leavened part. Lord, we are thankful for your children. We're thankful for each other. Thankful for your word, for your spirit, for the blood of Jesus Christ. We have so much to be thankful for. Thank you. Help us to be a thankful people.