November 23, 2021 – Thanksgiving Service

Thanksgiving is a spiritual practice

Before it was a noun, “thanksgiving” was a verb. The difference matters.

A desert father once said: “If you have a chest full of oranges, and leave it for a long time, the fruit will rot inside of it. It is the same with the thoughts in our heart. If we do not carry them out by physical action, after a while they will spoil and turn bad.”

Living thankfully is not about feeling thankful or even being thankful. Living thankfully is about acting differently day by day because the Spirit compels us to participate in the generous life of God being with us, constantly practicing thanks-giving.

We know Thanksgiving as a day that has been well established to observe. It’s a milestone in the year – the inauguration of the holiday season. We’re told it’s a “high holy day” for retailers, and a bellwether of our nation’s economic health.

It’s a time for families and wider communities to gather; a day for starting to write our holiday shopping lists. It’s a day for watching football. It’s a day for eating, eating, and eating some more. And then sitting on the couch and eating some more. And for many, it’s a time when attention is given to those who live in deep need throughout the year.

We say, “Have a good Thanksgiving!” We ask afterwards, “How was your Thanksgiving?” assuming the word to be a noun. But as a verb, as a spiritual practice, what is thanksgiving all about?

Giving thanks is essential to our Christian practices, and really to most religious and spiritual practices. It is a golden thread, woven through and uniting everything we do as Christians. To the Wampanoag, every day of living is a day to give thanks to the Great Spirit, whom they call Kitanitowit . For the Haudenosaunee, her name was Ataensic, or sometimes Grandmother Moon, and she is an ancestor of Good Spirit and Bad Spirit. Every day, she is thanked for creating the earth.

At Thanksgiving time, we celebrate the gift of the harvest. We do so actively. As Charles Winters put in his wonderful prayer: “We make, O Lord, our glorious exchanges. What you have given us, we now offer you, that in turn, we may receive yourself.”

To harvest is an act of faith, confidence in God’s continuing providence. When it has been a good year, it is evident that God is providing for us in abundance. But the very act of cutting the stalk and gathering the crops from the field leaves the field barren. To harvest is an active response to all that God has given to us. Without the harvest, what has been given will rot and be ruined and will be of no benefit to anyone. In harvesting, we give thanks by stepping forward to collect what God has provided us and we use it to provide for our needs and for others’ needs, trusting that in the cycle of nature, more will be provided in the next growing season.

There is an ancient tradition in the Bible (Lv 19:9; Lv 23:22; Dt 24:19) of farmers not reaping all the way to the edges of their fields so that the poor and strangers could glean some if they should need it. (Dt 24:19 says, “When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it; it shall be left for the alien, the orphan, and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all your undertakings.”) Part of the joy of the harvest is found in encouraging the gleaning of that part of the crop by others. So the practice of giving thanks at harvest time is connected with participating in the generosity of God, who provides the harvest.

The harvest is only possible when we join with God in the dance of abundance. We act as stewards of God’s bounty, taking charge, taking responsibility for that which we do not own, for God’s property. And in so doing, we find ourselves giving thanks by sharing generously of the gifts we ourselves have received.

It is common practice at Thanksgiving for congregations and other community groups to gather food for food shelves, or to assist at soup kitchens, perhaps even offering Thanksgiving dinner to those who are hungry or alone at this special time. I think it’s an admirable tradition. Unfortunately, for some, this is motivated by a sense of guilt – that we have so much and are feasting excessively – so maybe if we remember those who have less than we do, it will soothe our consciences to some extent.

But as a Christian spiritual practice, we understand this work of feeding others to be a natural consequence of participating in the dance of abundance with God. Compassion and acts of charity flow naturally as a way of giving thanks to God. Because in giving, we receive so very much, and the blessing flows both ways.

Practicing compassion and seeking to give ourselves away is a form of prayer. It is an activity that lies at the heart of all spiritual traditions, and therefore naturally catches the imagination of our neighbors in every community.

Friends, Thanksgiving isn’t about “feeling” thankful. In many homes, before the turkey is carved or the food is eaten, people take turns sharing what they “feel thankful for” that year. It’s a nice custom, but as practicing Christians, we are called to move beyond “feeling” thankful. We are called to give thanks by practicing very specific actions: hospitality, generosity, stewardship, compassion.

Thanksgiving is a verb. It is a spiritual practice. It runs like a gold thread that is woven through all we do and all we are as Christians. If Christians praised God more, perhaps the world would doubt God less. Maybe it does help to set aside one day in the year when we have the attention of everyone in the country to rehearse the importance of being thankful. But we are even more effective in sharing the Gospel, the Good News, when we use Thanksgiving to act thankfully, with God – our God of abundance – who in this harvest festival, as every day, rejoices to invite us to join in returning the gifts we have received to God’s honor and glory and purpose.