Thanksgiving:The Way it Should Be

Thanksgiving has rolled around again. It like all holidays has a way of repeating themselves year after year albeit each time is a new incarnation of the occasion the holiday represents. 

When I was a child Thanksgiving was a happy family holiday. It was the one day of the year when my mom would take out the best table cloth and set out our best dishes. There would be turkey and ham and mashed potatoes . . . plenty of mashed potatoes . . . . and desserts , . . . lots of deserts.  Everything was home cooked. No sir, no precooked or store-bought stuff at our table. 

Then it was gathering at one of our relatives homes where we kids (cousins) would entertain ourselves outside while the grownups spent the day inside talking, singing and finishing off the leftovers. Sometime during all the "goings on" we would start taking photos . . . out would come the old Brownie Box and we'd arrange ourselves in all sorts of family groupings for pictures. 

Then, sometime late in the evening we would all gather and share with each other that for which we were thankful since last we celebrated this holiday.  

There was thanksgiving for God's blessings and his meeting our needs for the previous year and how it encouraged our faith that He would do so in the coming year. There was thanksgiving for family . . .  both immediate and extended. Somewhere along the way we touched all the bases and then we'd finish up with someone offering a benedictory prayer after which we all drifted off to our own homes.  

The sharing of this gratitude with one another served a larger purpose . . . a purpose which I think has been lost in our modern times. It reinforced our commitment to family and it strengthened our sense of self-worth. It strengthened our sense of not only being the Appleby clan but also God's family. 

There were three holidays that we looked forward to above all others. One was Easter. That was a holiday where we focused on our Spiritual commitments and values. It was a time dedicated to attending public worship and then spending the day as family enjoying our shared faith. The other was this holiday, Thanksgiving, where as I said previously we expressed gratitude to God and one another for what we had experienced  since that last Thanksgiving on which we gathered. Lastly, there was Christmas. For us Christmas was both a spiritual and secular occasion.  Our focus was on the gift of God in Christ Jesus and the expressing of our own love for family through exchanging material gifts. 

I suppose the big difference between then and now is that we have to be reminded what the Holiday is about. For too many Thanksgiving in nothing more than the day before the real holiday . . . Black Friday. Now its buy you dinner already prepared, eat it in a hurry and head out to the stores. All I can say to this is, "It is wrong, wrong, wrong."  Have we become so materialistic and impersonal that we cannot have one day out of 365 where we are not thinking about things. 

Our mindset seems to be, "Lord help me get through this Thanksgiving thing so I can start my shopping for Christmas,"  We have succumbed to our lesser lights and caste off the real value that both holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) afforded us. Instead of expressing gratitude to God for family, heritage and provision we are scheming our Black Friday strategy. Instead of enjoying home and hearth we are doing battle with our neighbors over some item marked off 1/2 in some box store.    

Somehow I can't get past the fact that the way we as a society generally celebrate these holidays is an example of the Truth of God being turned into a lie. That somehow we have taken a string of divine pearls given to us by our forefathers and trampled them under foot.  

Sadly, the change in our holidays has been so gradual that we, like the frog in the pan of water being heated, didn't realize that it would end in death . . . death for the frog and death for the holiday. Today, all of our holidays are nothing more than merchandising opportunities devoid of real significance and meaning. 

I know I can't change that but I also know I don't have to participate in it. Thanksgiving for me will not be the kick-off for Christmas shopping. It will remain a time for remembering the blessings of God and family and expressing and sharing it with those whom I love. 

Call me old fashioned, call me stubborn, call me hard headed . . .  you'll not be wrong. I am all of those and more.  But as I said in a previous blog entry, "Some things are better the way we used to do it," and Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter are three of those things. 

So lets give thanks with a grateful heart for what the Lord has done in blessing our lives, our families, and our nation. These blessings are so undeserved and yet He, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, extended His holy hand and blessed us. For this we give thanks with a grateful heart in Jesus precious name.