Thanksgiving is an awesome holiday. You eat amazing food (and lots of it). You get together with family and friends. It starts the Christmas season. It’s just great.
In the midst of all the eating and the planning for Christmas, it’s easy to bypass Thanksgiving. It can so easily get overlooked, but it’s so important. Thanksgiving is a holiday where we give thanks for what God has provided for us. That was actually its original intent when the Pilgrims celebrated it in the 17th century. So often though, Thanksgiving just becomes a change to get together with family and friends. That’s great, but’s it not what I think God would have us do on that day.
Thanksgiving: An American Holiday with Biblical Purpose
Yes, I realize that Thanksgiving is an American holiday. It’s not in the Bible anywhere. I am not saying that God has ordained we should all celebrate Thanksgiving the American way. However, the concept of Thanksgiving in very biblical. Therefore, it’s worth celebrating and celebrating right. God gives us a framework for this in the Bible.
If we look back at the Old Testament, God didn’t just give his people a bunch of laws through Moses. He also gave them a bunch of holidays. Some of them are pretty awesome.
Succoth: The Israelite Thanksgiving
I think Succoth might be my favorite. It’s a holiday where the Israelites were to live in tents or booths they made instead of in their homes for a bit. They did this to commemorate the time they were wandering in the wilderness and God provided for them.
They were to live in these temporary shelters for a week. During that week, they were to cut down branches from trees, wave them around and praise God for all he had done for them. They praised him for the past, when he brought them out of Egypt. They were also to praise him for the present, that the harvest had been brought in. Additionally, looking at how God provided in the past and present was a constant reminder to them that God would provide for them in the future.
God wanted his people to have rhythms of praise, celebration, and thanksgiving. While we might not follow the Jewish holidays set out in the Old Testament, we should establish our own rhythms that accomplish the same things. Thanksgiving might not be a biblical holiday, but it can definitely be used for this biblical purpose.
How to Honor God at Thanksgiving
How can we do that? It doesn’t mean that we have to make Thanksgiving all stuffy and formal and “religious.” We just have to make sure that we actually take time to gives thanks to God for all that he has given us. That could be as simple as going around the table at some point during the Thanksgiving meal and sharing something you’re thankful for. It could mean keeping a gratitude journal where you write down at least one thing you’re thankful for everyday. It could means all sorts of things. Do something that fits you and help you to give praise to God for all he’s done for you.
Be thankful for the little things. I did something on my Instagram for awhile that I want to start doing again. I called it Thankful Thursdays. Every Thursday, I would post a picture of something I’m thankful for. That’s something that I want to start doing again to help develop a better attitude of gratitude. A lot of the things I was thankful for were little things, but they were still things that I was grateful for. If you start with thankfulness for the little things, often gratitude for big things will naturally follow.
Thanksgiving in the Midst of Heartbreak
This can feel hard if you’re in a difficult time in your life or if things just haven’t turned out like you thought they would. If that’s the case, sometimes it’s hard for us to find things to be grateful for when we feel like our world is falling down around us. However, you can always find something to be grateful for. If nothing else, God has given you the air you breathe. He’s promises that he will never leave you or forsake you. There’s a place in heaven being prepared for you. Those are all things that every person can be grateful for.
Thanksgiving Is Good for You!
The truth is being thankful and celebrating all that God has done for us does several things for us. Just like with the Succoth festival, It gives us hope as we look back at all God has done in the past and reminds us that he will do similar things for us in the future. It helps us to keep our focus in the right place. We can so easily loose ourselves in our circumstances, but thankfulness helps us to keep our eyes where they belong: on the Father who loves us and cares for us.
Happy Thanksgiving to you all!