Thankfulness is more than a seasonal sentiment — it’s a life-shaping attitude that determines how you see God, yourself, and the world around you. As we enter another Thanksgiving season, Scripture calls us to give thanks always and to recognize that gratitude reflects the condition of our hearts. Ephesians 5:20 reminds us that thankfulness isn’t circumstantial; it’s a posture of faith rooted in God’s goodness. In this episode, we explore why thankfulness must be taught, reinforced, protected, and practiced — and how your value system is revealed in what you celebrate and what you grieve. Gratitude changes everything because it keeps your heart aligned with God.
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You can view a basic transcript of this podcast at the bottom of this section.
Accept the Challenge
Each week’s podcast contains a call to action. The Word of God will not produce in your life unless you put into operation.
This weeks call is:
Choose Gratitude Daily
Thankfulness isn’t automatic — it’s intentional. Today, choose to practice gratitude on purpose, not just in moments that feel easy.
You can’t always choose your circumstances, but you can choose the attitude you bring to them — and gratitude is the attitude that keeps you aligned with God.
Join the Conversation
Each week’s podcast also contains a question designed to encourage testimony. Testimony is vital to a believers life. We overcome by it (Rev. 12:11).
This week’s question is:
Question:
What’s one specific thing God has done for you this year that you want to intentionally give thanks for?
Share:
Share your gratitude — your testimony may encourage someone else to see God’s goodness in their own story.
Remember:
Gratitude strengthens faith — and we grow stronger when we give thanks together.
Episode Resources
You can find more information on the subject of Divine Healing and Miracles by clicking on the links above.
♦ Post: – What is a Thankful Heart?
About Emery
Emery committed his life to the Lord Jesus Christ over 49 years ago and has served as both a full-time pastor and an itinerant minister. Both he and his wife Sharon of 44 years emphasize personal growth and development through the Word of God. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is both the focus and the hallmark of their mission. Read more about them here.
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Podcast Notes:
Ephesians 5:20 (KJV)
20 Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;
If Thankfulness is Anything – Its Attitude.
- There is a danger of things becoming commonplace.
- There is a danger of things being taken for granted.
- There is a danger in thinking that people owe you.
- I don’t have to say thank you because they ought to do such and so for me.
- Thankfulness is an attitude.
- Someone years ago coined this phrase ‘An Attitude of Gratitude’
What We Know about Attitude
Attitude can be taught
- Which means if your not good at it, you can school yourself into having one.
- Remember this, anything that you have learned must be reinforced constantly. Things, by reason of disuse, get foggy in the memory.
- How many of you remember the Algebra that you were taught in school.
- Trust me I have forgotten whole years of things that I was taught.
- It’s easy to forget to be thankful unless you reinforce this attitude in your life.
[Tweet “Attitude can be taught which means you can school yourself into having one.”]
Attitude can be caught
- Which means if you’re not good at it – get around somebody that is – because a good attitude is contagious.
- The most positive person you can be around is God.
- God will never tell you can’t achieve.
- He will never tell you can’t make it.
- He will never tell you it’s the other guy’s fault.
- He has the best attitude of anybody you’ll ever meet.
- All of which leads me to the next point.
Thankfulness Is Having Your Value System Intact
- What a person is thankful for and what a person gets mad about or grieved about is a litmus test for where you are in this area.
- How many of you would have been mad about…
- The money that was lost.
- The car that got destroyed in the accident (you walked away but the car didn’t)
- Do you remember the story of Lot and Sodom and Gomorrah?
- Do you remember how he made a choice to go down into that city?
- And how that choice turned out to be a bad choice?
- Did you notice how the Lord was merciful to him and sent angels to get him out?
- Did you notice how Lot lingered when the angels told him to leave and how the angels (Genesis 19) literally grabbed him by the hand and lead him out of town?
- Did you notice how he was lead out but his stuff, his possessions; his wealth was all left behind?
- How many of you would have been grieved about the stuff and not been thankful for your life?
- What is it that ticks you off? What is it that you are thankful for? Whatever it is, is an indicator of your value system.
- Notice this other point on this whole Sodom and Gomorrah theme with Lot.
- There are some things in your life that need to be destroyed and you ought to be thankful about those things being removed from your life.
- Lot was headed straight down the tubes – Him and his whole family.
John 12:24 (KJV)
Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.
- In order for you to have harvested, in order for you to have flowers, there has to be a seed that dies.
- And many times when a negative thing happens to us, we get upset and our thanksgiving unto God falls off. It happens when we are grieved over the death of something in our life or when something was taken away from us.
- Maybe the burning that is in your life now is simply a smoke signal to blessing?
- Also, there is the other side of this. Sometimes bad thing’s do happen to good people.
- This is a sinful world we live in.
- Sharon had an aneurysm, fifteen years ago. I didn’t thank God she had it – a bad thing happening to a good person – I thank God every day that he brought her out of it.
- Even in the midst of adversity, you can find something to be thankful for.
[Tweet “Even in the midst of adversity you can find something to be thankful for.”]
What Are You Thanking God For?
Here’s my Top Ten List of What I am Thankful For:
- The Godhead
- My heavenly Father who loved me
- My Savior Jesus who died for me that I might be saved.
- The Holy Spirit, my friend and my helper in life.
- He has constantly directed me to the right way to go.
- The Bible
- A book God left behind, prepared especially for me, that I might not be confused.
- That I might learn to appreciate and prize and value what is really important in life.
- My Family
- My wife Sharon who, after 35 years of marriage, is still sweet on me.
- My children, Jessica, Tami, E.J., and Kristi who put up with my idiosyncrasies.
- My three grandchildren, Halen, Lana, and soon to be named.
- My dog Kobalt who is happy to see me every day of his life.
- My bird Reggie, a 2-pound pile of feathers, who thinks he owns me (it’s true, he does :))
- The Will of God
- That there is a plan for me. And that that plan is constantly unfolding.
- Simplicity
- The longer I live – the more I understand that the things that really count are the simple things.
- Like Loving God and loving my neighbor
- Second Chances
- I Thank God we get one
- I Thank God we get more than one.
- Where would you be if God didn’t give you a second chance?
- Things Money Can Buy
- Home
- Cars
- Clothes
- Food
- I remember when I didn’t have some of them.
- Things Money Can’t Buy
- Life
- Health
- Strength
- Spiritual Gifts
- Personality
- The Future
- That I have one and that it’s good.
- Heaven and all that comes with it.
- The great unknown.
- The Good, the Bad & the Ugly
- The Good that God has brought me and is yet bringing me into.
- The Bad that God has gotten me out of.
- The Ugly that He is yet keeping me from.
ILLUSTRATION: One Man’s Top Ten List
This Thanksgiving I’m thankful …
- That there aren’t twice as many Congressman and half as many doctors.
- That grass doesn’t grow through snow, necessitating winter mowing as well as shoveling.
- That there are only twenty-four hours available each day for TV programming.
- That teenagers ultimately will have children who will become teenagers.
- That I’m not a turkey.
- That houses still cost more than cars.
- That the space available for messages on T-shirts and bumpers is limited.
- That snow covers unraked leaves.
- That hugs and kisses don’t add weight or cause cancer.
- That record players and radios and TV sets and washers and mixers and lights can be turned off but that no one can turn off the moon and stars.
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