Influenced by this practice at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, I encourage our church members to memorize and meditate on a “Fighter Verse” each week. In light of Thanksgiving, our Fighter Verse for this week is Psalm 69:30, “I will praise the name of God with a song; I will magnify him with thanksgiving.”

For my sermon this past Sunday, I purposed for us to reflect on the wondrous glories of God in praise and to remind us of the numerous blessings we enjoy in order to refresh a humble, grateful spirit among us for thanksgiving. We do grow so accustomed to the thousands of graces lavished on us that we take them for granted and fail to recognize that many of our comforts, such as status, income, health, and daily provisions, are fleeting and could disappear overnight!

The many blessings God has given us in Christ range from the physical and material to temporal, relational, spiritual, and eternal! Our thanks as believers is unending because His goodnesses toward us in Christ are beyond number and endless! In short, we have a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.

But allow me if you would to probe even deeper. Beyond the blessings in which we enjoy, see, or grasp by faith, there are two other categories of blessings that we often are unaware of or miss embracing as a blessing altogether.

Blessings unaware. The Lord brought to my mind to be thankful not only for the blessings which we have, hold, and cherish, but for the hundreds of unseen, unknown blessings. Only the Lord knows the zillion accidents, tragedies, mistakes, and failures that his preventative grace allowed us to avoid this year! What about all that we could have experienced that we did not experience - because of his grace and mercy? There is a world of activity beyond what we can see and common graces surrounding us daily that we are not even aware exist. But they are there, and many trials are withheld by the merciful hand of our heavenly Father. And each and every one of these items, which number in the millions for us all, are provisions of grace purchased by Christ and granted by God!

Blessings Hidden. There is another category that deserves our thanks but seldom if ever hears a note of thanksgiving from our lips. It is our heartaches, troubles, and trials to which I am referring. Thanksgiving is not the normal response to bad news, tragic news, the loss of neglected blessings, or terrible circumstances. We are human. We are emotional. We do operate on feelings. And there is nothing inherently wrong with that! Hearts should break under heart-wrenching trials! However, for the believer, we have an uplifting hope and promise in the Lord Jesus Christ for which a hint of hope and joy remain even in the worst of times. For he does promise to work all things for the good of those who love him! (Rom 8:28) I just read an insightful quote in a Spurgeon sermon this morning. The great preacher said, “To the righteous man every providence is a blessing. A blessing wrapped up in all our curses and in all our crosses. Our cups are sometimes bitter, but they are always healthful.” Amen! There is somewhere underneath the pain and disappointment you experienced this year, a hidden blessing. God is looking out for you even on the days when it appears to you that he is nowhere is sight! It will all turn out for his glory and for your good.

Give great thanks dear child of God. Make a long list of the things and people and experiences and promises of faith that you posses! And worship God through this list. And then, list two more items before you head to the Turkey feast. Thank God for the things for which you cannot make a list, that is, the many ways he blessed you and you were unaware. Thank him then for the upsets and low times in which he was working good for us, and we just failed to thank him for it.