In the name of God- Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Happy Thanksgiving! I am so glad that you all have come out this morning for this service. You all know the history of today. Thanksgiving, of course, is one type of prayer, and the early European immigrants to this land were prayerful people. Services of thanksgiving were commonplace. The formalizing of Thanksgiving began in Jamestown in 1607, where the charter mandated that on the anniversary of their ship’s safe arrival, they would have a yearly service of thanksgiving. What we have come to call the "first Thanksgiving" happened in Plymouth in 1621 and really was more of a harvest celebration than a thanksgiving meal. The European settlers had insufficient food supplies to make it, and with the help of the native Americans, they were able to have a successful harvest, for which they were thankful. In 1777, George Washington declared a day of Thanksgiving in December after a victory at the Battle of Saratoga. And days of thanksgiving were called for every handful of years thereafter. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared that the final Thursday in November should be a yearly day of thanks, and hence the modern tradition began. Roosevelt in 1942 then made the holiday an official and legal US holiday. And slowly the traditions of feasts, football and parades crept into this annual day of thanks.
I give you this history not to bore you, but to put into perspective the reasons why we are gathered here today. Thanksgiving is a largely secular holiday; most people will only devote 15 seconds in a pre-meal prayer to actually giving thanks to God. But as Christians, it is our duty and honor to put more thought and meaning into this day. So first of all, thank you all for being here. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, right up there with Easter- for one, I think that we too often forget the power of being thankful; and to be honest, I really like stuffing and gravy, the football and the family. I won't keep you long, but I'd like to reflect on the two necessary movements for this day- remembering and giving thanks.
In our reading from Deuteronomy, we see the seeds of a religious thanksgiving. Moses is speaking to the Hebrew people, they are on the precipice of entering the Holy Land, the land to which they have been journeying for a generation, a land that they have been promised, a land which they will finally be able to call home. He recounts what God has done for them and how God has blessed them. Moses then says "But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today." The operative word here is "remember."
“Remember” is a rich word. It means to consider, to bring to mind, to reflect on, and in the Hebrew language, it means to make present; to remember is to recall the past to be present again in the now. November, I think, is a great time for Thanksgiving. We have had the harvest, we have just about finished up another year, and we are preparing to enter the season of Advent on Sunday- the season of hope. This is a great time to take stock of our lives, to be mindful of our needs and our blessings before we consider what it is we need and want going forward, and I'm talking about something deeper than a Christmas shopping list. We began this month with the Feast of All Saints', a day in which we call into presence all the saints who have gone before us, where we remember those loved ones who have died. In England, November is the time when Remembrance Day is celebrated; the day when World War I ended and the bombs stopped dropping.
So let us take some time today to remember, to recollect, to ponder. Between the parades and the touchdowns, take a few moments to think. Maybe take some time at dinner, whether you eat alone or at a large gathering, and remember. Talk about the year- its blessings and its disappointments; I'm serious, do this.
Remembering is important because it is so easy to not. It is too easy to let the past stay in the past. It is too easy to not think about how we have been loved, how we have been kept in God's hand, how we have been supported. And in remembering, we gain perspective. We can stop and breathe, we can be not anxious about the global economy or politics; we can refocus on our attention on what truly matters, we can relax and take the higher view of life to gain some perspective. But you have to slow down and be intentional about doing this. Take sometime today to remember.
One theologian said that the language of thanks is not natural for us, it is learned behavior. That's why you hear so many parents reminding their children to say "thank you." Being thankful is a habit, something we must practice. A writer once said that the hardest arithmetic is that which allows us to count our blessings. In counting our blessings, we must remember. And you and I know, sometimes remembering is a painful process. When we remember, we do recall those good things- but we will also remember the bad. We will remember the pains of rejection, of sickness, of job loss, of the reality of the economic downturn, of betrayal, of disappointment, of death. I've said it before, but it bears repeating today: what God offers us is maximum support, with minimum protection. Being blessed does not mean that curses will not follow. Sometimes it is easier to forget the blessings than it is to remember the curses.
But we are all here because we realize that to be a faithful people, we must be a thankful people, and thereby a remembering people. So that is the first part of today, remembering. Moving on, we do something with these memories and that is to give thanks. Karl Barth said that the basic human response to God is that of gratitude. It is dangerous to not be thankful. If you cannot give thanks then you either are utilitarian in your outlook, meaning that we just do whatever is best, so good outcomes are to be expected; or you are entitled, meaning that you think that you deserve whatever good comes your way by your virtue. Being thankful is different- being thankful sometimes means accepting curses along with blessings, it means realizing that you are not the agent of your own success, that you aren't always the one to get the credit, or the blame. Being thankful keeps us grounded.
In giving thanks, it is important also to remember the object of our thanks- God. Pick up a newspaper and read some of the columns about today. You'll find history lessons, notions of how we are blessed to be Americans, and other nice reflections on thanks. But you won't find God. I'm not sure if has to do with being politically correct, or what the reason is, but people are trying to be thankful in the abstract, without an object. And we all know that dog just won't hunt. It's like trying to be loving without dealing with other people; it can't happen. If we are to be thankful, we must give thanks to someone, and as Christians, to God.
It's what is going on in our reading from Luke today. Nine are healed, one is thankful. Now, I don't want to condemn the nine, they did what they were told, and there were likely ecstatic to be healed. But one gave thanks. And in giving thanks, he received an even greater blessing. When I was in seminary, about a month into my first semester both my friend and I received a care package from a church in this diocese. Neither of us had any connections to this church, but this church made it part of their mission to support seminarians by sending care packages. I immediately wrote a thank you note to the church; my friend never got around to it. It was the last package he received from them in his three years of seminary; for me, it was the first of nearly a dozen more. I tell this story not to toot my own thankful horn, but instead to say that often in being thankful, we set ourselves up for greater joy and continued blessings. Receiving a gift or grace is easy, anyone can receive and it is one way. But in giving thanks we come into relationship.
It was easy for me to give thanks, after all, I got a gift. But we are called, as people of faith, to, as the Psalmist writes, give thanks to God in all things. So do we give God thanks for losing a job? For a fight with a loved one? For the death of a close relative? For the things in our life that we would give anything to change? I find it interesting that Lincoln began the tradition of a yearly day of Thanksgiving during the Civil War. How in the world could he be thankful?
For one, Lincoln counted his blessings. He said that though we had a bitter military war happening, the rest of life was good. He didn't let the cloud of darkness, even if it was a huge cloud, overshadow the whole sky. He wrote "[these gifts] are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people."
He might not have known it, but Lincoln was expressing the idea of living a Eucharistic life. Eucharist is the Greek word for thanks, so when the one leper gave thanks, he eucharist-ed. This is what today is all about- the Eucharist. The Eucharist we will share here, around this altar, as we remember and give thanks to the giver and redeemer of all things; the Eucharist we will share over meals today; the Eucharist we will share in smiles, in giving money to charity, in stopping and recalling that we are loved, and we are blessed, no matter what the world might say otherwise.
Happy Thanksgiving. Take some time today to remember- remember that you are the beloved child of God, nothing can change that. Remember the ways that you have been blessed and nourished. Remember the lessons you have learned from falling down. Remember the victory of Easter that shows us that there is no darkness that can overcome all light; no sadness so deep that there cannot be joy; no curse so profound that blessing cannot come; no war so fierce that there cannot be peace; no death that there can't be resurrection. Remember these things today. And having called them to mind, give thanks- live the Eucharist by thanking God in words, in actions, in love, in dedication. Thank God publicly at dinner tonight, at work, at church. And in remembering and giving thanks, we will continue to be upheld and blessed by God. And for that there is only one thing left to say- thanks be to God!
