Gloria Deo

To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.

Thanksgiving is here, and hopefully not without your taking time to give thanks. Of course, our thanksgiving should not be limited to one day of the year, duly set aside and observed. Every day should be a day for thanksgiving (I Thes 5:18; Heb 13:15). Nor should a single day end without our taking note of the many reasons we have for giving of thanks.

Are we not blessed in the simple fact that we have someone to thank? We have so many blessings, both simple and grand. Who do we thank? To God only wise, be glory. We would glorify Him as God, and we would be thankful. We need not wonder whom to thank, as if we received an anonymous gift. God gave the gift, and He put His name on the tag. We know Whom to thank, and that is a blessing.

But we should also note that God is glorified through Jesus Christ. God filled the earth with all things to delight the senses, and for that we thank Him as Creator. But Creation is not the greatest gift given by God to man. Creation, in the grand scheme of things, is sort of the “stocking stuffer;” the preliminary gift. Creation is indeed a grand gift, chock full of good things. But our deepest gratitude is reserved for God’s unspeakable gift (2 Cor 9:15). And thus we glorify God through Jesus Christ.

It is through Jesus Christ that we are able to glorify God. Apart from Christ, we were God’s enemies, alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that was in us, because of the blindness of our heart. And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight: Through Christ we are reconciled. Through Christ, fellowship with the Father is possible, for Christ is our mediator. Through Christ, we can please God. Through Christ, God is glorified.

For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell; And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.

May our praise never cease. May our thanksgiving only increase. May God be continually glorified through Jesus Christ for ever.

AMEN!