April 13, 2023 … Gratitude and Praise - ALWAYS!

Berry Patch Devotions in 2023 - Day 103 

Devotional Song: ... GO TO THIS LINK ...  Please take the time to take in song and lyrics from Brandon Lake singing … Gratitude … poignantly and powerfully singing of how we Christians need to expresser gratitude and praise to our Lord ALWAYS for what He has done to save those who believe in His finished work on the cross for our salvation. 

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Highlight Passage: … Psalms 30:4 [NLT] … 

4 Sing to the LORD, all you Godly ones!  Praise His Holy Name.  

… David, as he often did, sings of his gratitude and praise to the LORD.      

Highlight Passage (Context): …  Psalms 30 [NLT] …  USE THIS LINK …  

… King David expresses his gratitude and praise to for delivering and saving him as he, the King, dedicated the building of a Temple built to honor God.                           .                     

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Reference Passage: … 1Chronicles 1:34-36 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK … 

… King David as God’s Arc of the Covenant was brought back into God’s Temple leads God’s people in singing their praise and thanks to God.         

Reference Passage: … Matthew 6:21 [NLT] … 

21 Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.. 

… Jesus teaches His followers that our gratitude and praise to God is found in what we treasure in life.   

Reference Passage: … Ephesians 1:16-18 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK … 

… Paul shows his commitment to pray, with a thankful heart, for his fellow Christians in Ephesus … so that they might grow in their knowledge of God to praise His Name forever.   

Reference Passage: … Colossians 3:15-17 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK … 

… Paul also exhorts other Christians (and us) to always be thankful and do all things out of gratitude and praise to/for our Lord.  

Reference Passage: … Hebrews 13:15 [NLT] … 

15 Therefore, let us offer through Jesus a continual sacrifice of praise to God, proclaiming our allegiance to his name. 

… God’s Spirit, thru the author of Hebrews, calls on God’s chosen people (i.e. that’s us Christians) to continual offer up our grateful praise to our God. 

                                                                                                                        

My Devotional Journal: Today's Our Daily Bread author, Xochitl Dixon … AT THIS LINK … tells how, in taking care of her mother in hospice care, felt guilty about about wanting and praying to God to take her mother home to be with Him in glory; … but then, the ODB author recognized her desire was actually praise, in gratitude for God’s mercy and saving grace.  

And today I am feeling an extra dose of gratitude and praise to my Lord, Who, on this date, 41 years ago, broke thru my stubborn and selfish sinful nature and showed me He was calling me to follow Jesus rather than myself (too long a story for today).  But because of this date (i.e. 4/13), I’m so gratefully praising my god as the linked song and Scriptures above declare.  

Will you join me today to lift up our prayers of gratitude and praise to our Lord for His enabling and empowering grace which has saved all of us who know King Jesus as our LORD?     

My THANKFULNESS: ... Oh, Abba Father, thank You, King Jesus, … for calling me 41 years ago, dear LORD, to follow You to glory.      

My Prayer Today: Oh Abba Father, ... King Jesus, ... . I pray that all reading here will join me, … to lift up our our grateful and humble praises to You, Lord, for being our Lord and Savior.     …  Amen               . 

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Blogger Note:  Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled “Our Daily Bread,” distributed online via email by RBC Ministries.  If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.