THANKSGIVING JOHN M. BUCHANAN

_Déuterenomy 26:1-11 BETHANY PRESBYTERIAN Ct}
/ 1 TheSsalonians 5:16-18 NOVEMBER 18, 1973
rr i
“ Two magazine covers set me to thinking recently: ne ia cl ssue of A.D. showed the

iol of the church on which had been placed a baket of corn jand a decorative ribbon bearing
ae

‘tie words “THANK YOU".

The most recent issue of Newsweek, on the other hand, adorned its

cover with a cornocopia, empty except for an ‘cycle, uncte Sam is looking forlonly at this
=. =
sight and the caption reads: “RUNNING OUT OF EVERYTHING."

A.D. had the following to say about its cover: W'since aj harvest of corn in 1621,got

red and white Americans together for the first time, Thanksgiving has grown into a display

and feast of the fruits of the land. \ We fwe come from 102 British exiles (Half of whom
died during the first winter) and a few hundred friendly Indians to a federation of more
than 200,000,000 citizens of every color, tongue and raitn\ | We have spread from near

starvation to fatness, from a few men arching arrows in a Ma$sachusetts field to a few men

arching footballs for millions of armchair spectators.\ Too often we forget to say, ‘Thank
eee?

e and | wes

“Too of
to the good God from whom the bounty flows.)

e van

: eas, ht “@ in "ee. =lour amir
teu tre Deere’ : Been deivig Yarn

“Ed. De Eyre aud weuer ga AA wiles eh core WeGer

——p Newsweek commented on its @ver by identify ing the sullen mood of the nation as it

slowly comes to grips with the fact and prospect of shortages \ The fact is that most

Americans have known nothing except economic growth, confidence and abundance.\ The

a

majority of Americans are well under 35 years of age.\ That means they know the depression

== SSS sey

only as history.\ Even the rationing during World War II is just a story out of the past.

Married in the late_50's and 60's they have come of age in the greatest period of sustained

economic growth in the history of the world.\ And so the cornocopia looks empty and the mood
pecoun wart of us Wor wan lal ww deal Tree sherkcies oF aunty:

ne Linavone-wisiyansy else in ie-nbide| iat do you do on Thanksgiving when, in Newsweeks'
ea 2s
words, we're running out of everything? d he» ol aes
2 an pee

te=meddtbten the giving of thanks to God in the autumn of) the year is ” ae an

egricultural mental ty.| And that just doesn't pertain to many Americans today - or to many
Sa,

people here for that natter\ Fifty ye ars ago Reinhold urs perhaps the greatest

theologian this country has ever produced was a pastor in betroit.\ In his d§gry he wrote,

|" wonder if it is really possib @ to have an honest Thanksgiving Celebration in an industrial

THANKSGIVING -2- NOVEMBER 18, 1973
civitization.| Harvest festivals were natural enough in peasant cormunities.\ The agrarian

feels himself dependent. upon nature's beneficence and anxious about nature's caprice's.

When the autumnal harvest is finally safe in the barns there arise, with the sigh of relief,
natural emotions of gratitude that must express themselues religiously, DRC Ouheecagdet y

COR Ebs,
All that is different in an industrial civilization in which so much wealth ts piled

up by the ingenuity of the machine, and, at Teast seemingly. by the diligence of man.

CS
Thanksgiving becomes increasingly the business of congratulating the Almighty upon his most
excellent co-workers, ourselves, ( Lege easemshpen element errors sama: weEameiae |)

He was right. The harvest may or may not be in - most of us don't really know.\ Our
forefathers may have heaved great sighs of relief when the barns were full for the winter.

You and 1 simply assume that they are, and our closest contact with the process by which they

get full begins and ends at the supermarket cash register.

How to celebrate Thanksgiving they, when we haven't even worried about the success

af the crops:/when we have been weaned on a confidence in ever increasing economic growth:
a ii ui]

when our mood is sullen and depressed about our future?” I'd suggest that we take a

pilgrimage through the past to rediscover those basic religious emotions all men have felt

as the harvest was gathered:| that we stop along the way to Took again at how those

remarkable Englishmen celebrated and why they did and how they passed on to succeeding

generations a rather supecial and unique religious sensitiyity:\ and finally that we put

it all in the context of our faith - a faith which holds up seaivee as the duty of man-
kind tn all seasons. :

Let's go back ~ to the earliest times - to the Fuphrates valley and the tribes of
semitic people who began it ait. \ They were not very sophicated intellectually, but they

knew that there was something essentially different between life and non-Life-\ between

a worm and a rock.|jThey knew that if you put a X¥&M# rock in the ground nothing happened,

but a seed would grow. \ They knew that there was life around them and in them - and religious

ry

sensitivity was awakened as they attributed that mysterious life force to a being beyond

themselves. :
In any case they deduced that life belonged to the Peiy - he owned it att:\to claim or

THANKSGIVING -3- NOVEMBER 18, 1973

to use a living thing was to violate the rights of the diety. And so partly in reverence

put mmo
ang-paeely in fear ar they devised a way of ceremonially giving ‘thanks and at the same time
| eS

claiming for their use - growing, living things \ The First and best part_of the harvest -
eee,

or the flock was sacrificed - offered_up to the deity - otVE back to its rightful owner.

For some, . the first born too was offered

These elemental religious sentiments and practices were assumed by Israel \ the Fe: Feast
oT Weeks - including the we ng of First Fruits in described in detail in the Old

&
Testament. | eee; the beginning of the, harvest Sethe: First shock, or eee, of

bariey was brought to the Temp te awe Lt was illegal for harvesting to. commence WAXK until

this offering was made.\ Then, seven weeks later, at the conclusign of the harvest, the

ade a elie

Feast was held.\ All work ceased:| two ewes of bread and two ‘amb wre brought to the Temple.

ET eee

All the males present#y danced an “altar dance" singing the Halle, Psalms 113-118 \ God

was thanked for the success of the crops\ Then came the feast a communal meal to which

eal

were invited the poor and the traveler.\ After all_of that First Fruits were offered, and

it seems to have been an individual matter.\ When the cereal : or animal was brought to the
ee

priest the worshipper recited a moving confession of faith that described God's mighty

act of delivering his people from slavery.

Notice how the Jews changed and expanded the pagean custom,| In the first place, the

el

The ancient law carefully

te

welfare of the neecy yas made a part of giving thanks to God.

stipulateg.that the ppor are to be invited to the feast.\ In ‘the second place, God is given

Sore

thanks, in the offering of First Fruite, not for the success .of the harvest - but for

being Go God: \ror being the power that freed the people from Egyptian oppression and that

X84A Tegd them into the_land land \ The emphasis Us| on him ~ what she did.

That's where it begins, and yet for eenturies this second idea - the giving of praise
aaa re

and thanks to God for being God ~ has wever been as prominent as the celebration of Gad's
|e geldontans Wor. ber~ otenss sivte RE Begin. oS seeitieks Uae sis

bounty in nature. » middie agesmlusty,
el

rollicking

seit ations involving food and ale and 1 srt 1 i) fact ct they were so popular
and exhuberant™ that Henry VIII had to passa law stipulating. that could not begin until

Scewr No sore ree wale ho gan \esere “a wer) We alge

Not until the Pilgrims, on the rocky shores of New England, in the year 1621, were the

two ideas brought back together - God the giver of life and food - and God who calls his

= Pees tevsesce vk Sorat —_—

the harvest was complete.
al

THANKSGIVING -4- _ NOVEMBER BS, 1973

pilgrim pe people to a new land, lun abides with them, [who wilt be in their future, and who
—_—— noe

provides s! something more necessary than food and drink, namely himself.
‘After all, the Pilgrem Fathers, did their celebrating in the midst of what was a near ™

cisester\\ Half of them were dead \en but three families had lost someone: one:| the barley
aed —eEeeme Lien imamneial
they planted had done very poorly the peas had failed al together: \it was the corn -
bc]

given to them by the Indians which made life posssible:enough te provide two pounds of

ground meal per person per day for the winter \ Abd so it was: something less than a celebra-~
tion of nature's kindness - because nature had not been kind.\ Or better said, it was

something more Ait was a celebration of God's presence ~ the power that gave them strength $

beeen aaa

the tand they felt leading them into the unknown \theassurance that no matter what happened

he would not abandom them in the future.
That's what's special about an American Thanksgiving, even though we have forgotten
it, sod is to be -temignmex thanked for things to be surei\for fi food, and clothing and shelter

and comfort. \ But mostly he is to be thanked for being God | and for being soe us| To To the

early Christian Church in Thessalonica St. Paul wrote:
Ce

. five thanks PA all circum-
er saimnianenaill a

stances:| for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you 2" Goodspeed translates it

Th

even more plainly: ("Thank God whatever happens.
Jeu=eee

That is what the Pilgrims were able to do. {And that is precisely what makes Thanks-~
a al Senet -

giving, rightly undertood, radically different from Harvest festivals down through history.

Of course we are grateful to God for the food on the t taibe - for health and well a1] being -

for children and loved ones \ robert_Lou's Stevenson noted one time that [The man who has
recrmmeTnE

forgotten to be thankful has falien asleep in tife."\ Of course we are grateful for the

Eee

beneficence of the natural world But it goes deeper than that for us. \ The first American

bn el

Thanksgiving was celebrated in the midst of adversity, not sbundance.\ And I always like

to remember that Thanksgiving was first proclaimed a National Holiday by Abraham Lincotn.
i al

At that moment in time Lincoln was heart-broken n.\ Hi young @ and beloved son had recently
died:|his wife was obviously neuratic, Willified by the press. and society Apna the n nation

was split right down the middle in a bloody civil war. \ In his message to the nation

Lincoln called all Americans to give thanks to God for his bountiful goodness. What

goodness - when you son_is dead, your wife sick and the whole world falling apart?

THANKSGIVING ~5- NOVEMBER 18, 1973
The whole trouble with Harvest Festivals, you see, is that sometimes the harvest
ce a aa] EAA
fails. \ the whole e trouble with building a celebration on full; li larders, or good health or
Fl

prosperous families is that sometimes the larder jis wots ent is failing or your son
deme cea TET a enamel

just got fived\ And the enigma of Thanksgiving 1973, is that’ there isn't enough fuel, and

that perhaps | we are in for a major adjustment in our definition of the good life, and that

eal

perhaps we have reached the outer limit of abundance - which & the stock phrase of the
economists.

——y "Thank God whatever pappers."\ rt is just now ~ that the Christian digs in.| It is just

7a

now that the Christian remembers the wordsnothing in all creation shall separate us from
the Toe of God in Jesus Christ our Lord.) And beyond that, a lonely man, on his way to
die, breaking bread with his friends and giving thanks.

Countless times people have told me that their deepest oer jence of gratitude came

" tic casa
Ww at a time of difficulty) At the death of a loved one we find ourselves rateful for the love

Weg and support of friends ‘Ain sick sickness ~- in the he hespital ~ tt is a near ly universal experience
ne —
vw to look around and give thanks for the degree of health one has.

ant

Thanksgiving is an opportunity, for all ofus to do some quiet accourting \ 0 take

stock of our lives and all that _we_have been given: Ato gives profound thanks for the people

ad

who Tove us ~- who support us, who make life worthwhile. \ it is an opportunity to take

a

quiet stock of what it means to be alive in 1973.\ But most of ail, it is an opportunity

ot thank the God who has Mast us into Life|uno has walked with us in the past\and whose
PP

firmest promise is that he will be with us in the future.

i eel

So let us raise our song ofi Harvest Home

twith heart and hand and voices

QO may this bounteous God

Through all our life be near us,

with ever joyful hearts
And blessed peace to cheer us. AMEN

Father, hear our words of Thanksgiving. And this wa@k as we sit at table with our families,

make us newly sensitive to your presence: through Jesus Christ our Lord. AMEN