It’s that time of year again where many in the United States will prepare to gather around table with family & loved ones commemorating different traditions of displaying a day of thanksgiving. Those in Canada and elsewhere already celebrated. Such a day recalls the thankfulness from those early pilgrim people settlers for being blessed with the hospitality of the Wampanoag tribe for they knew all too well what it was like to be grateful for the bountiful rewards from mother earth. Such a tradition of giving thanks was done in many households with an agrarian society for those seasons of life where peoples were grateful for a bountiful harvest. It wasn’t until 1863 in which President Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday of November as a national day of Thanksgiving and the day becoming a federal holiday under President Franklin Roosevelt.
Such a tradition of giving thanks and having an attitude of gratitude reminds us of our own calling as Christian disciples in which being grateful permeates our call to discipleship. President Lincoln, in issuing the proclamation in the midst of a civil war stated “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” (https://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/speeches/thanks.htm). Lincoln put his trust in God’s providence and acknowledged that even the most hardest of hearts could be grateful.
It’s so easy to be negative & curse our condition and the way our life turned out. We may complain that we weren’t gifted with certain possessions or a lifestyle we think we should have had compared to others. Perhaps, we are dealing with infirmities, financial distress, family issues or something we wish wouldn’t have occurred for us. Nevertheless, such a mindset does no good. We should take solace in knowing we were knitted in our mother’s womb and made in His image (Ps 139) as unique beings. We are ensouled beings on a mission to go out and be grateful while spreading the good news of Jesus to prepare others for His kingdom. Being grateful for that great prize awaiting us with the choirs of angels & saints with such a loving and wonderful paradise awaiting us should make any heart grateful.
Before Jesus asked for His Father’s help in the raising of his friend Lazarus, he reached out to Father God and proclaimed “Father, I thank you for hearing me” (Jn. 11:41) How often do we give thanks to God each morning we are blessed with another day? Is our daily prayer simply one of petitioning God to remove those crosses without being grateful for the graces He has bestowed on us?
The Hymn of Thanksgiving for God’s Everlasting Love from Psalm 136 should remind us of the necessity for us living the Christian lifestyle to be grateful:
1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
His love endures forever.
2 Give thanks to the God of gods.
His love endures forever.
3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
His love endures forever.
To give God thanks is akin to recalling our most favorite Christmas present or birthday present received. God’s grace is a gift that we should all be thankful for because it is a gift multiplied to a magnitude that is beyond reason for God’s love, God’s mercy and God’s grace for His creation endures forever.
Within the Catholic milieu we are reminded that the word Eucharist comes from the Greek for thanksgiving. We give thanks each and every time within the holy liturgy in which the Spirit turns the bread and wine into the body and blood of our Lord Jesus. We give thanks for those gifts we receive from the Holy Spirit in the sacramental life.
Being able to be thankful for not only the thorns in life, but the beautiful flowers that God gives us epitomizes the Christian life. Turn to the Lord God this day and give thanks. Being grateful not only changes our mindset, but gives us a spiritual demeanor that transforms others around us despite any crosses that might come our way.
A good thanksviging prayer that you might pray this day is the following from the Hallow site (https://hallow.com/blog/thanksgiving-prayer/):
Today, let our attitude be one of gratitude for God’s love endures forever.
StreetEvangelist 