Thanksgiving

from wikipedia

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  I really love Thanksgiving.  I love the purpose, the festivities, the intention, and the meaning.  For in my mind, there is so much more than what is on the surface.  It is more than wonderful, yummy food – more than great soul-warming people.  To me it is even more than being thankful for what I have been given – though, indeed, I am extremely thankful to the great many blessings the Lord has seen fit to flood my way.  No, to get the true meaning, I want to take you on a little trip.

I want you to think back to a year before the first Thanksgiving.  A group of men, women, and children came across the great ocean, and even though it still had not been successfully done as yet, they committed to establish a settlement.  These people were poor, destitute and desperate to make it work because they could not return to the religious persecution they faced back home!

They had little provisions.  They had even less knowledge of the area, the climate, the terrain or what it took to survive there.  But what they lacked in knowledge, they made up for in faith.  They knew God.  They knew He was a loving God, and they knew they would serve Him to the end.

Still they arrived too late in the year to do much good.  They had been blown many, many miles off course and they landed too far north to even erect proper homes, let alone grow any food before the bite of winter was upon them.  And did it bite with a vengeance!  Never had these simple people known the harshness which they faced that winter.  Between the lack of food, the freezing cold, and the despair of their afflictions thus far, it is no wonder it was referred to as ‘the dying time.’

But there was a reason God blew them off course.  There was a reason they landed so far north.  There were people, the original inhabitants, who could help.  Miles down the coast, the natives were hardened in their hearts against the ‘white man’ and the terrible, unjust crimes they had issued against their people and their lands – and rightly so.

But here … these people had amongst them a man who was grateful to be home, who had a knowledge of the English language, and who had an understanding that not all white men were led by greed.  This man softened the hearts of his people and extended the hand of friendship to their new neighbors who were suffering beyond they could bare.

The natives taught them about their land – a land that was rich and abundant, but entirely different from what the pilgrims were used to.  They worked together for a common cause and a common good.  They bent their backs together to plant, to grow, to fish, to hunt, to thrive.

At harvest time, I can see the pride and accomplishment in their eyes as they survey the bounteous fruits of their labors.  I can see them laughing joyously as they clap each other on the backs around cribs full of corn.  The women rolling their eyes, but can’t contain their own smiles as they go back to laying out strips of fish and meat to dry.  Children giggling as they chase away the dogs trying to steal a strip or two.

When I think of Thanksgiving, I see people coming together despite their differences.  I see people putting aside their prejudices, and working for a common good.  I see delight and pride in a job well done.  I see joy and gratitude for the bounteous blessings granted to those who humbly follow Christ’s teaching to love one another.

Is there any wonder that this is the gateway through which we enter into the Christmas season?