Why We Are Thankful

Thanksgiving is certainly many people’s favorite holiday - and for good reason. The well-cooked turkey (this year I’m having deep-fried turkey for the first time), the delectable sides (including my favorite: sweet potato casserole), family seated around a common table, and football. But the reason we celebrate this holiday is rooted in a biblical concept: the giving of thanks.

Obviously with a name like “Pilgrim”, I grew up with mixed feelings about Thanksgiving. In kindergarten our coloring sheets were the prototypical male and female pilgrims dressed in Puritan attire - and when I wrote my name at the top of the page the teacher got a nice sarcastic chuckle out of my artistic masterpiece.

It was in 1863 that Abraham Lincoln heeded the request of magazine editor and writer Sarah Josepha Hale (the author of “Mary Had a Little Lamb”) to establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday. Because this was during the height of the Civil War, Lincoln made the proclamation exhorting all Americans to turn to God, in order to “commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife” and to “heal the wounds of the nation.”

But the original roots of Thanksgiving go back several more centuries. In November, 1621, Governor William Bradford called for a celebratory feast after the Pilgrims’ first successful corn harvest. Members of the colony’s Native American allies - the Wampanoag tribe - were invited to join them. This celebration lasted three days.

Edward Winslow wrote these words describing that first Thanksgiving:

“Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruits of our labors; they four in one day killed as much fowl, as with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week, at which time amongst other Recreations, we exercised our Arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five Deer, which they brought to the Plantation and bestowed on our Governor, and upon the Captain and others. And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty." 1

“Thanksgiving” as a day may have occurred in 1621, but its roots go back farther still. In the Scriptures, the word “thanks” is mentioned well over 100x, with at least 70 of those references in the New Testament. “Giving thanks” was a part of the Levitical sacrificial system (Lev 7:11-15) and was commonly associated with meals and worship. Why are we to take time - not just on a day in late November but every day and without ceasing - to thank God?

I see at least three reasons:

We give thanks because of who God is.

We read in Psalm 95:1-2:

“Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!”

When we come into God’s presence - whether that meant into the temple in the Old Testament or among God’s covenantal people each Sunday, we are to approach Him with thanksgiving. Why? Because He is “the rock of our salvation”. The bedrock of our faith - of our justification - is not our worthiness but His character. When we come to Him, we come thankful for who He is.

Psalm 100:4-5 says, “Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him; bless his name! For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.” Why are we to give thanks and bless his name? Because “the Lord is good”. Because His covenantal love that can’t be shaken will endure into eternity. Because each and every generation has experienced His faithful grace. There is much to thank God for - and we start with who He is as the holy, gracious, sovereign, eternal Creator.

Secondly,

We are thankful because we are in a right relationship with Him.

In Romans 1 we learn that the unregenerate, unrepentant, ungodly world suppresses the knowledge of God with unrighteousness. Verse 21 says, “For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.” Notice that unbelievers “knew God” - but chose instead to dishonor and disregard God by not thanking Him. This led to futility of mind and darkness of heart. Every unbeliever is seeking to suppress their knowledge of God like a child straining to hold a fully-inflated beach ball under the water - and then ask you defiantly to convince them that there is a god.

Rather than look at the world and have gratitude for creation--for the exact spot that Earth revolves around the sun and how just a bit closer or further would be unsuitable for life--there is no gratitude. There is no thanksgiving for homeostasis--the delicate balance of life in our bodies, for appropriate gravity, for an atmosphere mixed at sustainable levels of oxygen, nitrogen, argon, and carbon dioxide. I don't hear unbelievers thanking God that there are only trace elements of neon, helium, methane, krypton, hydrogen, and water vapor so that we can actually breathe every day!

When we are in a right relationship with God, we will seek to honor Him as God and give Him thanks. When living in enmity with Him, we will question and challenge His character and defy, ridicule, and disparage Him, not bring gratitude and thanks. A right relationship with Him cannot be according to our terms - as sinful creatures who are in lawless rebellion against Him. It must be according to His terms - and His holiness demands that His wrath be poured out upon sin. But thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:25).

Romans 5:8-10 says, “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.”

Finally, because of the finished work of Christ, we join an assembly of the appreciative, a group of the grateful, a people who praise.

We give thanks because this is a mark of who we are now as God’s covenantal people.

Paul wrote to the church in Colosse, describing what the church is to look like:

“Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful” (Col 3:12–15). A chosen, holy, beloved people who experience the peace of Christ and sincere love for one another in the body of Christ will be a thankful people.

In a parallel passage to the church in Ephesus, immediately after describing the church gathering, Paul says: “giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Eph 5:20). A hallmark of our church gatherings should be a time of gratitude, naming why we are thankful for God and His wondrous mercies. But thanksgiving should also mark each of our lives - always and for everything - not just the good.

Paul told the Thessalonians: “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thess 5:16–18). Three things should perpetually mark the Christian’s life: rejoicing, prayer, and thanksgiving. Do we take the time every day to glorify God for the little and unnoticeable blessings He has given to all people--but especially the riches of Christ that we have bestowed upon us as believers?

John Baillie said, “A true Christian is a man who never for a moment forgets what God has done for him in Christ, and whose whole comportment and whole activity have their root in the sentiment of gratitude”2. May we celebrate God’s character, our right relationship to Him because of the cross of Christ, and together with His people “give thanks to the Lord, for He is good”(Psalm 136:1)! This Thanksgiving holiday, take the time to eat with and enjoy the company of friends and family. But don’t neglect the most important thing: giving God thanks for who He is, what He’s done, and who we are now in light of His finished work on our behalf.

Sources:

1 https://www.history.com/topics/thanksgiving/history-of-thanksgiving

2 https://www.giffordlectures.org/books/sense-presence-god/chapter-xii-grace-and-gratitude