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I am thankful for...
Amen? Amen! Good stuff. There is so much for which we
have to be thankful. And I will add one more to the list. I am
exceedingly thankful this week that my college student son is
studying at UNC-Charlotte rather than Texas A&M because, knowing,
him, he would have been out there with his friends working on
that bonfire when it collapsed. As those logs came crashing
down, my world would have tumbled in as well.
My heart goes out to the parents of the twelve young men and
women who died. I cannot imagine their grief. I cannot imagine
the feeling around the Thanksgiving tables in those homes where
there is now one extra empty chair. The Psalmist sings, "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." But, for some devastated families, those words may
choke on the way out this year.
What can we say to those folks? Or to any for whom a Day of
Thanksgiving rings hollow? Perhaps there is some comfort in
remembering the event we commemorate, that first Thanksgiving
celebrated by the pilgrims. Those folks had had an exceedingly
difficult time.
For starters, they had begun their journey full of hope for
a new life of religious freedom in a warm and welcoming land -
Virginia. Oops. Instead they landed at Plymouth Rock on
December 21, 1620, not the best time of year in Massachusetts.
Until such time as they could build houses and establish
themselves on the land, they made their home on board the
Mayflower, the vessel in which they had sailed.(2) The men went
ashore every morning to work, returning to the little ship at
night. They built a "common house" to which the sick and dying
were transferred, placed their four little cannon in a fort,
which they built on a hill close by, built two rows of houses
with a wide street between and finally landed their stores and
provisions. Then the whole company came ashore toward the last
of March, and in April the Mayflower sailed away.
The winter was hard and bitter. At one time all but six or
seven of the Pilgrims were sick. Eighteen women denied
themselves food so that their children could eat. Thirteen of
them died. Half of the 102 Pilgrims died of malnourishment,
disease, and exposure. Only about 30 of those who survived were
over the age of 16. Those who died were buried in unmarked
graves because the pilgrims did not want the natives to know how
small their numbers had become.
In the spring they planted three crops; English Peas,
Barley, and Indian Corn. The peas were planted too late - though
they came up beautifully, the hot sun parched the blossoms and
the plants died. One of the Pilgrims described their barley
crops as "indifferent." Apparently the barley was not worth
harvesting either. Only the corn survived. Of course, not the
corn we are used to with big, plump yellow kernels; this was
"Indian Corn" with ears only two to three inches long and kernels
of different colors. The Pilgrims harvested only twenty acres.
And to top it all off, a second shipload of thirty-five settlers
arrived without any provisions because they expected to live off
the crops the first settlers had raised. By the end of their
second winter in Plymouth, food had to be rationed again: five
kernels of corn for each person per day.(3)
A hard life. In fact, some proposed a Day of Mourning to
honor all those who had perished. But the others said no, a Day
of Thanksgiving would be more appropriate. After all, even
though half had died, half had NOT. Reason to give thanks. Good
for them.
As time went on, a Day of national Thanksgiving was
occasionally observed. In 1789, President George Washington
declared in the flourishing idiom of his day,
For whatever reason, a Thanksgiving observance in our nation
did not become an annual event until a most persistent lady,
Sarah Josepha Hale, the editor of a prominent magazine for women,
the author of the poem, "Mary Had a Little Lamb, a widow with
five children, began a campaign in 1846. It took seventeen years
for her dream to be realized, but in 1863, in the midst of the
most devastating war our nation has ever encountered, President
Abraham Lincoln issued the following:
Now, with that as background, try to put yourself in the
place of a parent of one of those Texas A&M students. Is that
what you need to hear this Thanksgiving? Be thankful even in the
midst of adversity? As the Pilgrims did, look at the glass as
half full rather than half empty? Get real. If I were one of
them, I doubt that I would be hearing much of anything. What I
would hope is that, somehow, someone, something could cut through
the fog of my grief and touch my "faith nerve."
Perhaps there is something providential in this Sunday
occurring as it does. On our national calendar, this is
Thanksgiving Sunday. Other nations have Thanksgiving Days at
other times. But all around in world, in churches everywhere,
the liturgical calendar notes this as Christ the King Sunday. It
is the climax of the church year, the culmination of all we have
learned in the birth, life, ministry, death, resurrection and
ascension to glory of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Today we remind
ourselves that JESUS IS LORD, in charge, in control, and a day
will come when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess
it. That is why Paul could write to the church at Colossae, and
through them to you and me and all those devastated by the
tragedy in Texas or disasters anywhere, "let the peace of Christ
rule in your hearts...and be THANKFUL. Let the word of Christ
dwell in you richly...with GRATITUDE in your hearts sing psalms,
hymns, and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word
or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving
THANKS to God the Father through him.(6)
Gratitude. Not for all the awfulness in the world, but for
the fact that we know in our heart of hearts that awfulness is
not the end of the story. I like the way our friend Al Winn,
who, after a long and distinguished pastoral career, has now
retired to Winston-Salem, deals with the issue.(7) He notes that
at the heart of biblical faith we do not find air-tight arguments
sealed with a "therefore" - all is right with the world,
therefore, let us have faith; therefore, let us praise God;
therefore, let us give thanks. Rather at the heart of biblical
faith we find things that do not logically follow at all, sealed
with a "nevertheless." Much is wrong with the world, the mystery
of evil is great, terrible accidents happen, NEVERTHELESS let us
have faith, NEVERTHELESS let us praise God, NEVERTHELESS, let us
give thanks. Perhaps we can better deal with the miseries of
life if we remember NEVERTHELESS.
Jesus Christ is Lord. Jesus Christ is in control. We
continue to preach it and teach it. We do well to remember it in
the face of tragedies such as happened in College Station on
Thursday.
Night before last, some 14,000 A&M students gathered in Reed
Arena on the University campus to reflect on the tragic event.(8) With tears of sadness and disbelief, they stood arm-in-arm with
friends, families and faculty. The school President, Dr. Ray
Bowen, said the day was one of unspeakable grief and sorrow. "No
matter how predictable we think life is, none of us knows what
the next hour may bring," he said. "When we went to bed last
evening, none of us thought that tonight we would be consumed
with the grief that now confronts all of us."
Among those who spoke was the Rev. Larry Krueger of the
Campus Ministers Association who offered his condolences and
described the path the Aggies need to take to overcome grief of
such magnitude. "May God help us all," Krueger said, "because it
is a time to mourn, a time to cry, a time to care and a time to
pray."
The "faith nerve" had been touched. Before solemnly
departing from the arena, a soft hush fell over the crowd, and
the distant humming of "Amazing Grace" overtook the audience.
Shoulder-to-shoulder, they sang togther, remembering their fallen
friends...and remembering their faith.
Thanksgiving Day, 1999. I am thankful for so much; there is
so much for which to be thankful. And I am thankful most of all,
in the face of all that life can throw at us, for the faith that
sustains us. I am thankful that, despite all the evidence to the
contrary and everything that would seem to deny it...I am
thankful that I know who is in charge; I am thankful that JESUS
CHRIST IS LORD!
Happy Thanksgiving.
Amen!
1. Carlos Wilton, via PresbyNet, "Bottom Drawer," #4004, 11/18/99 originally found in
Family Circle Magazine 2. "Thanksgiving in America" by May Lowe from the book, Thanksgiving, Copyright (c)
1907 by Dodd, Mead, & Company 3. Graham Fowler, sermon via PresbyNet, "In Everything Give Thanks," 11/25/92 4. Excerpt from Presidential Proclamation, October 3, 1789 5. Abraham Lincoln, October 3, 1863 6. Colossians 3:15-17 7. Albert Curry Winn, A Christian Primer, (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1990),
pp. 79-80 8. Brady Creel & Stuart Hutson, "Thousands meet in Reed to begin healing," The Battalion,
11/20/99 (http://battalion.tamu.edu/)
"Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign
Thursday, the twenty-sixth day of November next, to be
devoted by the people of these States to the service of
that great and glorious Being, who is the Beneficent
Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will
be, that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him
our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and
protection of the people of this country, previous to
their becoming a nation, for the signal and manifold
mercies, and the favorable interpositions of His
providence, in the course and conclusion of the late
war; for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and
plenty, which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable
and rational manner in which we have been enabled to
establish constitutions of government for our safety
and happiness, and particularly the national one now
lately instituted; for the civil and religious liberty
with which we are blessed, and the means we have of
acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, In
general, for all the great and various favors, which He
has been pleased to confer upon us."(4)
"...I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every
part of the United States, and also those who are at
sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to
set apart and observe the last Thursday of November
next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our
benficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I
recommend to them that while offering up the
ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular
deliverances and blessings they do also, with humble
penitence for our national perverseness and
disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who
have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in
the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably
engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the
Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to
restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the
divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace,
harmony, tranquillity, and union..."(5)
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