National Day of Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Eve

November 23, 2016

Text: 1 Tim. 2:1-4

            Thanksgiving Day is a National Holiday, not a Church Year Holiday, but in no way does that make it an insignificant day for Christians.  Historically, beginning with George Washington, presidents have called upon the citizens of our nation to give thanks to God for His manifold blessings and pray for His continued help.  Needless to say, Christians ought to be eager to oblige.  Prayer is our God-given duty, and our God is the only true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  He alone has poured out these blessings, and He alone can help in time of need.  So we observe the day with rejoicing and feasting, gathering around our God’s Word and Supper, singing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, and basking in the joy around our family tables.  There are two possibilities appointed as the Epistle for the National Day of Thanksgiving, both of them rich with divine wisdom and life.  The first is from Philippians 4, which is always a favorite about rejoicing in all circumstances and with thanksgiving making your requests known to God.  But pastoral decisions have to be made, and this text from 1 Timothy is especially important in the wake of a contentious election (and incidentally, I picked this text before we knew what would unfold). 

            “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions” (1 Tim. 2:1-2; ESV).  Did you hear that?  It is the vocation of the Christian to pray and give thanks for all people, but in particular for those in authority.  Whether you voted for Donald Trump, or not, and regardless of how you feel about him.  Whether you voted for Barak Obama, or not, and regardless of how you feel about him.  There is a certain sense in which Christians are outside of the political party system.  We work within it, to be sure.  Each of us votes and participates according to conscience and God-given reason.  But we recognize something that others, outside the Church, do not.  Jesus is Lord.  That is the first Christian Creed.  The Creeds that came after are essentially an unpacking of that.  Jesus is King.  God is our Father.  The Spirit dwells within us and enlightens us and lifts our prayers before the Father, through the Son, with groans that words cannot express.  So we know that whatever man or woman may sit in the Oval Office, our God is really in charge.  And we are His ambassadors, His salt and light in the world, to season it, to preserve it, to speak the truth of God in love, and to testify with our blood, if necessary, to the salvation that is ours in Christ Jesus.  We have a priestly duty, every one of us, therefore, to pray.  The Greek words St. Paul uses in our text all have their nuance.  Supplication: Placing a need before God for His action.  Prayer: A general word for communication with God, in response to His speaking to us in His Word, a word often used to indicate a more formal kind of prayer, such as the Collects or the General Prayer of the Church or the liturgy itself.  Intercession: Petition on behalf of another person.  Thanksgiving: The Greek word is “eucharist.”  We should give thanks for all people, those we love to love and those we struggle to love, and even for kings and for presidents. 

            We should thank God for them, and we should pray for them, St. Paul says, “that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (v. 2).  That is to say, that we would be unhindered in preaching the Gospel and living according to God’s Word.  That is why we pray for peace and quiet.  So that God’s Word may have free course and be preached to the joy and edifying of Christ’s holy people, and that more may come to believe it and possess the salvation that belongs to them in Christ Jesus.  God wants all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (v. 4).  Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ (Rom. 10:17).  This is why God preserves the world, why He delays the Day of Judgment, so that more people can hear the saving Word of Christ and believe in Him for salvation.  So we pray for our nation and for our government and for all people, that this may be the case.  And God in heaven hears our prayers for the sake of Christ, and He answers, for that is the Promise.

            So once again our nation has called upon the Church to do our priestly duty, to gather together and give thanks to God as the source of all that is good, and entreat His continued blessing upon our land and our people.  As mentioned, the Greek word for Thanksgiving is “eucharist,” and it is no accident that Eucharist is one name for the Lord’s Supper.  Some of my colleagues get all hot and bothered about the word “Eucharist” as a name for the Sacrament, because it implies that somehow the Sacrament is our work, our action of giving thanks, rather than God’s action in giving us His Son’s true body and blood for the forgiveness of our sins.  They may have a point, and undoubtedly the word “Eucharist” has been thus misconstrued, misused, and abused.  But there is also a point to be made in calling the Sacrament a “Eucharist.”  The chief way of giving thanks to God is to gather around His gifts and receive them with joy.  That is what you will do around your family tables tomorrow.  You will praise the fine food set before you tomorrow for its quality and quantity, the colors, the smells, the textures, the tastes.  And in so praising the repast, you will praise the love of the one who set it before you: your wife, your mother, your grandmother, whoever it may be.  And do you know what will be most gratifying to her?  When you just have to have another helping, because it is so good.  It is truly good, right, and salutary that we should at all times and in all places give thanks unto our God, but especially around the Table He sets before us here.  Gathered before Him as one, we come with all our sins and struggles and heartaches, our supplications and prayers and petitions, our worries for our loved ones, our worries for our nation, our worries for our Church.  We come with hearts full of joy and sorrow, conflict and peace.  And we eucharist.  Which is to say, we receive the fruits of our Lord’s cross, His body, His blood, His death, His resurrection, for the forgiveness of it all.  And we do it with thanksgiving and a song of praise.  Here we are most the priests God has called us to be, the salt of the earth and the light of the world.  For here we are filled with Jesus and given the right to be sons of God.  This is our response to the Thanksgiving Day proclamation.  We come to Church, we pray, and we eat. This is the great Thanksgiving Feast.  And this is God’s answer to our prayers.  Jesus comes and gives us Himself.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.