Thanksgiving

1. Thanksgiving “A Closer Look”

2. Give Thanks to the Lord! 1 Chron. 16:8 (NIV) Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. 1 Chron. 16:34-35 (NIV) Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever. [35] Cry out, "Save us, O God our Savior; gather us and deliver us from the nations that we may give thanks to your holy name, that we may glory in your praise."

3. Who Were These Pilgrims? • The Pilgrims were a group of English religious separatists who sailed from Europe to North America in the early 17th century, in search of a home where they could freely practice their style of religion. • The various members of the group had broken away from the Church of England, feeling that the Church had not completed the task begun by the Reformation.

4. Puritans • The Pilgrims/Puritans attempted through church reform in England to make their own lifestyle of moral and religious earnestness a pattern for the nation; thus they influenced the religious, social, moral, economic, political, literary, artistic, and intellectual institutions of their day. Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury

5. Calvinists • These Puritans were Calvinists, a term of abuse in England, who sought to exert Godly influence upon their environment. So when they prayed prayers of thanksgiving in the New World, those prayers were unequivocally prayed to Jesus Christ.

6. Some History • Most people recognize the first Thanksgiving as taking place on an unremembered date, sometime in the autumn of 1621, when the Pilgrims held a three-day feast to celebrate the bountiful harvest they reaped following their first winter in North America. Squanto, came with Massasoit and 90 of their people to the celebration.

7. Failing the Test Galatians 6:7-10 (NIV) Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. [8] The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. [9] Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. [10] Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

8. Those who fled tyranny in some sense became the tyrannical.

9. The Facts • 1621 is not the first Thanksgiving. It is one of the early celebrations in America of the harvest festivals of Europe. • Thanksgiving for the Puritans was religious and involved church and Sabbath. • Thanksgiving, as we know it today, is an invented holiday consisting of several traditions. • Thanksgiving as celebrated by the Puritans has been substituted with a secular celebration that leans more and more from Jesus Christ to a celebration of family and community.

10. The First Thanksgiving ProclamationCouncil of Charlestown, MassachusettsEdward RawsonJune 20, 1676 June 20, 1676           "The Holy God having by a long and Continual Series of his Afflictive dispensations in and by the present Warr with the Heathen Natives of this land, written and brought to pass bitter things against his own Covenant people in this wilderness, yet so that we evidently discern that in the midst of his judgements he hath remembered mercy, having remembered his Footstool in the day of his sore displeasure against us for our sins, with many singular Intimations of his Fatherly Compassion, and regard; reserving many of our Towns from Desolation Threatened, and attempted by the Enemy, and giving us especially of late with many of our Confederates many signal Advantages against them, without such Disadvantage to ourselves as formerly we have been sensible of, if it be the Lord's mercy that we are not consumed, It certainly bespeaks our positive Thankfulness, when our Enemies are in any measure disappointed or destroyed; and fearing the Lord should take notice under so many Intimations of his returning mercy, we should be found an Insensible people, as not standing before Him with Thanksgiving, as well as lading him with our Complaints in the time of pressing Afflictions:

11. Council of Charlestown, MassachusettsEdward RawsonJune 20, 1676           The Council has thought meet to appoint and set apart the 29th day of this instant June, as a day of Solemn Thanksgiving and praise to God for such his Goodness and Favour, many Particulars of which mercy might be Instanced, but we doubt not those who are sensible of God's Afflictions, have been as diligent to espy him returning to us; and that the Lord may behold us as a People offering Praise and thereby glorifying Him; the Council doth commend it to the Respective Ministers, Elders and people of this Jurisdiction; Solemnly and seriously to keep the same Beseeching that being perswaded by the mercies of God we may all, even this whole people offer up our bodies and soulds as a living and acceptable Service unto God by Jesus Christ."

12. Righteousness Exalts a Nation Proverbs 14:34-35 (NIV) Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people. [35] A king delights in a wise servant, but a shameful servant incurs his wrath.

13. Abraham Lincoln’s Proclamation Washington, D.C.October 3, 1863 By the President of the United States of America. A Proclamation. The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.

14. Washington, D.C.October 3, 1863 Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They 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 one voice by the whole American People.

15. 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 beneficent 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. In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.