It seems counterintuitive to say that those who fear God are most thankful. How can you feel thankfulness for God and fear God at the same time? Joel Beeke speaks of how thankfulness and the fear of God are friends. The people who are most thankful in this world are those who fear God. 1 John 3:1 declares, "behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us. that we should be called the sons of God."

When you fear God, you're really, really thankful because the people who are most thankful in this world are the people who realize they deserve nothing. Think about it this way. If you worked hard all day long and your employer said, I'm gonna give you $100 at the end of the day, you're thankful to get it. And you might say thank you. But if someone gave you a task and you did the opposite and you sinned.

And they came along and said, you know what? I'm going to have grace. I'm still going to give you $100, though you accomplish nothing. You're like, wow, this is amazing. I'm very grateful to this person.

But You're most grateful if someone comes along and says, you know what, you were supposed to do this and you didn't have the ability to do it. And so I'm gonna come along and do it for you and then I'm gonna give you $100 because I'm just doing it out of love for you. You say, What in the world is this? You're suspicious. What kind of motivation is this?

What kind of love is this? And you see, that's how John feels in 1 John 3. What kind of love is this that the Father should give His Son for me that I could become a child of God? And so what Jesus does, He stands in the fear of His own Father and He comes and obeys His Father, but not for Himself, but for us as sinners who put our trust in Him. And so The primary place in the world where we learn the fear of God is at the cross.

Because we look at the cross and we say, what manner of love is this that Jesus would do this for me when I'm so unworthy, when I've never done anything but sin.