4. The fourth reason that requires us to come before God with thanksgiving and with a grateful heart is that thanksgiving is a specific offering required of any child of God. Every Christian believer is required by God that whenever you worship God you offer Him your thanksgiving with a grateful heart.

There are many incidents where we learn how thanksgiving is required by God. To mention some remember when Nehemiah arranged for…the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem they sought out the Levites in all their places, to bring them to Jerusalem to celebrate the dedication with gladness, both with thanksgivings and singing, with cymbals and stringed instruments and harps.

Thanksgiving as a requirement for every child of God enables the worshipper to acknowledge God as The Sovereign One worthy of worship. Thanksgiving goes beyond saying thank you Jesus for every true Christian believer even to the point of giving gifts to God in reverence. When king Solomon had finished building the temple, just before dedicating it he knew that it was YET required of him by God to worship with sacrifice or offerings…Then the king and all the people offered sacrifices before the LORD. King Solomon offered a sacrifice of twenty-two thousand bulls and one hundred and twenty thousand sheep. So the king and all the people dedicated the house of God.

Thanksgiving is worship and worship is required of every one who worships God to worship God in spirit and truth.

Jesus taught us about giving our thanksgiving sacrifice to God when He offered His body for our sins at the cross. Jesus gave the ultimate thanksgiving offering that could ever satisfy God with His body. That’s why we read when Jesus was instituting the Holy communion.. Then He took the cup, and gave thanks…And He took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.”

When Jesus was instituting the Holy communion, He gave thanks to God for His blood that was to be shed at the cross and Jesus similarly gave thanks to God for His Own which was to be bruised for our iniquity and was later to be HANGED at the cross.

Jesus was teaching us to acknowledge God’s Sovereignty with thanksgiving.

Thanks be to God now we no longer have to physically die in order to physically offer our mortal body as a sacrifice like Jesus did. Romans 12 Paul urges, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

All in all one reason why we should always remember to come before God with thanksgiving is that thanksgiving is a required form of offering of every child of God while we are worshipping our Heavenly Father.

Thank You Father!