Remember and Be Grateful (1 Timothy 2:1-6)
Gary McManus, 11/20/2022Part of the God's Word is Life series, preached at a Sunday Morning service
November 20, 2022 Thanksgiving Sunday
1 Timothy 2:1-6
Captain Obvious asks: To whom do you say:
“Kids, eat your vegetables,” ?
Kids who have not eaten their vegetables.
To which congregations do the Apostles write,
“Live at peace,”?
Those having trouble living at peace!
[1 Corinthians 7:15, 2 Corinthians 13:11, 1 Thessalonians 5:13, Hebrews 12:14]
The Timothy letter addresses (1 Timothy 3:15):
“how one ought to conduct one’s life in the household of God”
Peace is prayed for in administration and peace is desired for the lifestyle of the Christian.
Jesus taught THAT prayer!
The Pilgrims demonstrated in America that they could live at peace with their neighbors for fifty years. How did they do that?
Excellent question.
“How to live peacefully with illegal aliens for fifty years.” The illegal aliens were the Pilgrims.
Some conclude: living in peace for very long would
never be a workable goal.
But the Pilgrims did it. How?
1. The Mayflower Compact: God X 3, Christian faith X 1.
2. The Pilgrims came to America for the Englis
worshiping from it and living it!
See the book, “Mayflower” (2006) by Nathaniel Philbrick “Plymouth Colony. . .an [opera] in which vibrant, tragic, self-serving, and heroic figure
precarious peace. . . “
Pastor puts it this way:
Good human relationships are hard—even Christian ones. Usually you have to work at those relationships frequently. Example: neighbors.
Pastor hasn’t read everything. But we read the same Bible in English the Pilgrims read.
AND we know that the Pilgrims were thankful to God.
They saw that God was at work through the natives
--the heathen natives!
The Pilgrims who survived the first New England winter would always remember the help that the heathen natives showed
to them The surviving Pilgrims would always remember to be grateful to God for their neighbors.
The Pequod War of 1637-8 was twenty years after 1620. Not really a war against the natives, but against the Dutch. The war was about trade. Peace was restored, but it would
never be the same.
--not the same Pilgrims
--not the same Indians
--not the same leadership in either group
--not the same memories!
Pastor states: “Everyone seems to have forgotten
to be grateful.” God’s Word contains such a warning, Deuteronomy 8:10! Especially Deuteronomy 8:12!
The first generation of Pilgrims in England wanted to be left alone with their Bibles. The second generation of Pilgrims had other hopes and ambitions.
Relationships take work.
Even fences often require a lot of maintenance.
There is a lesson here for all of us from the Bible—the same Bible that the Pilgrims gave up everything to read and study.
Lessons in prayer. Lessons in living. Lessons in Thanksgiving. See Hebrews 12:14, 1 Timothy 2:1-2.
Amen.
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