Thanking God for His Goodness

Thanking God for His Goodness

The scene opens with 70 (maybe 72) disciples from Jesus who have come back from a trip. They have witnessed God work tremendous miracles in their journey. They said that they say demons submit to the power of Jesus. They had gone out and preached that the cities should repent and follow God (Mark 6:10-13). So in the name of Jesus, they saw God work tremendous miracles and powerful events. People were healed from sickness and people who were encountering dark thoughts (that came from demons) – they received comfort, peace and freedom.

Apparently Jesus wanted his disciples to go out in the cities and tell them about Him, and tell the people in the city that they must change and come back to God. But Jesus also knew that it would be hard. He knew that the people in the cities may not listen to His disciples. So Jesus gives the disciples clear instruction on how to witness to the people.

The disciples come back and report to Jesus all that had happened in the cities. The testimonies are amazing. God has done much work in the lives of people. Jesus begins to thank God. What is Jesus thanking God for? Why is He even thanking God? Jesus tells us why He thanks God. He says that He thanks God for God’s goodness. It was a good idea, Jesus said, for you God to reveal this power to your disciples. It was a good idea, Father God, that you showed them how you work in their lives. It was a good idea, Dad, that you let them see you work.

Why was this such a good idea? Because these disciples can learn. They were not so holy to think that they can’t learn how to talk to others about Jesus. They risked their lives going to people they don’t know and telling them about Me. These disciples are teachable.

I think Jesus was listening to these reports and thinking – “That is so cool. These disciples are going out there in their lives to other people they don’t know and they are trusting You God in faith.” Guess what? God, you came in and You showed these disciples that You can change people. God, you showed these disciples that you really do love them and that you want to do them good. God, you showed them that when they trust You, You really are faithful.

Jesus spent at least an hour happy as He could be, in the Holy Spirit praising God because His Dad was doing some great stuff in the lives of these disciples and these disciples got to see it. These disciples saw God work in their lives and they got fired up. They wanted to see God do more miracles and more healings and more works of faith.

This is how Jesus thanks God. He looked back at what the disciples said God did, and He thanks God. Of course, I think Jesus thanked God so that the disciples would learn to thank God too. And here is where we can learn. We are going to spend some time praying later this evening. We are going to spend some time thanking God for His goodness. Each of us has a miracle that God has done this year. Each of us has seen something happen that was extraordinary. We need to share it. We also need to thank God for it. Think about it before we go to prayer tonight. God has done something good in your life this year. Take time to reflect on it and be ready to share. God is good – all the time. God has been good – all this year.