The What and Why of Thanksgiving

Sermon Title: The What and Why of Thanksgiving

Good News Statement: God blesses us with showers of blessings

Preached: Sunday, November 19, 2023 at Dogwood Prairie UMC & Seed Chapel UMC

Pastor Daniel G. Skelton, M.Div.

 

Scripture (NKJV): Psalm 100:1-5 Today’s scripture reading comes from the words of the Psalmist who encourages us to experience and live out God’s blessings in our life as we give thanks for those blessings that have been gifted upon us. Our reading comes from Psalm one-hundred verses one thru five.

Psalm 100: A Psalm of Thanksgiving.

¹ Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth.
²     Serve the Lord with gladness; come into his presence with singing.

³ Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him; bless his name.

⁵ For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever and his faithfulness to all generations.

 

This is the Word of God for the People of God; And all God’s people said, “Thanks be to God.”

 

 

Introduction:

-Why did Mom’s turkey seasoning taste a little off last year? She ran out of thyme.

-What’s the official dance of Thanksgiving called? The turkey trot.

-What’s a running turkey called? Fast food

Thanksgiving, a holiday with such an exciting and beautiful meaningful: people gathered around a table possibly with family, loved ones, friends, and/or neighbors surrounded by food that is special and unique for the season all while decorations of pumpkins and Fall leaves catch our eyes and the aroma of pumpkin spiced candles fill the air. Thanksgiving is more than just a holiday. Thanksgiving is more than just a few days in November. Thanksgiving is an everyday, yearlong and lifelong, reminder to give thanks, to give thanks with a grateful heart. But would you believe me if I told you that our nation has lost sight of what it truly means to give thanks on Thanksgiving? Maybe you have found yourself realizing this also? Maybe you have realized that it is time to give Thanksgiving back its proper practice of giving thanks…

According to the New York Daily News, “New research reveals [that the average person will] say thank you 2,000 times a year…but more than half of the time [they] don’t actually mean it.” If I did my math correctly, this equates to having the average person saying thank you 5.5 times a day but only meaning it about 2.75 times per day. Now that’s a pretty small amount when considering that the average person will speak anywhere from 7,000 to 20,000 words per day.

The time has come, as the Psalmist proclaims, to give thanks to our LORD eternally (Psalm 30:12). The time has come to be the thanksgiving disciple that Christ needs us to be which says “thank you” more than 5.5 times a day. The time has come to know what and why we celebrate Thanksgiving. The time has come to live out the meaning of Thanksgiving in our daily life. The time has come to sing our hymn of grateful praise. Thanksgiving is an exciting time, but it is also a meaningful time, and the Psalmist helps us understand that in Psalm 100.

 

Body:

I was a freshman in High School when I was allowed to eat at the adult table for family holidays. It was Thanksgiving when I ventured from downstairs to the upstairs. You see, for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter, my mother’s side of the family would get together at my grandmother’s house to celebrate the holiday. Salads were spread out across the kitchen table, ham, turkey, mashed potatoes, and homemade macaroni-and-cheese were scattered from one end of the counter to the other, and desserts were placed so tightly together on the kitchen bar that there was no need for a decorative table cloth because it wouldn’t have been seen. And just like how the food was separated, so was the family. The adults ate in the living room and dining room while all the kids gathered in the basement.

For the first time in my life, I got to sit upstairs in the dining room: specifically, I sat in a chair where I could see all the deserts out of the corner of my eye. I was overjoyed! I got to use glass plates and real silverware instead of plastic utensils. Rolls were placed on the tables in baskets. The table clothes weren’t plastic but cloth. (It’s no wonder the adults liked to sit upstairs!) As I sat at the table taking everything in and realizing what I have been missing out on my whole life and listening to enriching conversations and getting the scoop on some family gossip, I quickly learned and experienced what many of you experience during the holidays sometimes. I learned that there is always going to be one person who sits in silence waiting for the opportunity to say something that stirs the pot.

When that person spoke up, the “cloud-nine-feeling” of being upstairs quickly descended. I wanted to go back to the basement where darts were played, the SEGA was on the TV showcasing Sonic the Hedgehog, and bowls of candy were placed on the tables. I was grateful to be upstairs but I didn’t know if my gratefulness and gratitude were genuine, were real and authentic. I didn’t know if the thanks that God blessed me with was the thanks that truly filled my heart.

I begin our message with this experience in my life to highlight, yes that there will be people gathered around the table whom you don’t agree with, but that sometimes in life we find ourselves allowing the excitement of the holiday to take away from the meaning of the holiday. I was excited to be upstairs, but the meaning of Thanksgiving was taking place down stairs: togetherness, unity, acceptance, peace, joy, and love. With Thanksgiving just a few days away, and as the excitement builds, may we take a few minutes to remember what Thanksgiving is all about: it’s about giving thanks to God for the blessings He has given you, it’s about being thankful for the people and moments in your life, it’s about giving thanks in all circumstances, and it’s about showing others what it means to be thankful. Thanksgiving is a lifelong experience that encourages us to be thankful in our life. And we live in a society, where being thankful is no longer important.

Returning to the New York Daily News, Merci Chocolates polled 2,000 Americans to better understand what “thank you” really means and the ways in which we show gratitude in our fast-moving modern lives. Results showed that “40% of those questioned said they often don’t show any gratitude at all for things they know they are actually thankful for.” Sometimes in life we allow the excitement of the holiday to trump the importance of the holiday. When was the last time you said “thank you” and you meant it?

The practice of giving thanks is nothing new to us. It’s part of our life and it’s part of what it means to follow in the footsteps of Christ. Depending on the translation that you read from, the word “thanks” appears approximately 143 times in the Bible. And of those 143 times, the word “thanks” appears in the Psalms 55 times. For example, Psalm 95:2 “Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!” and Psalm 92:1, “It is good to give thanks to the LORD…” and Psalm 100:4-5 “Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him, bless his name. For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and faithfulness to all generations.” If the Psalmist, King David, practices giving thanks in his writings, then what is holding us back from doing the same thing in our life? Maybe, we need to know what it is that we are actually saying when we say “thank you.”

In the Hebrew language, “thanks” is often translated as ‘toda’ (toe-dah) which means confession or blessing. When we confess something, more often than not, we are either publicaly or privately acknowledging that something in our life deserves attention. It is good to confess to the LORD that we need Him in our life. I don’t know about you, but I certainly need God in my life. I don’t want to imagine a life without Him. When we say thank you, we are confessing before God and those in our life that we are grateful for them, that at that particular moment in time we needed them, and that because of them our life just became a little more blessed. Saying thank you is an act of confession that sends a blessing to the one receiving the thank you.

Now in Greek, the word “thanks” takes on several meanings. For example, “thank you” is pronounced eucharisto which is often translated as pardon, and is another word used to say Holy Communion. “Eucharisto” is a pardon—a thank you—to God for the blessings in our life that we have failed to be grateful for. Furthermore, the root word of eucharisto is the word charis. Charis has several meanings: grace, favor, and kindness, all of which define “thank you” in their own right.

When we say “thank you” from the same heart that we have accepted Jesus Christ with, we allow ourselves to confess before God letting Him know we need Him in our life; we receive a pardon through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ; we are able to live a life knowing that from our blessings we are able to be a blessing for someone else; and by the grace, favor, and kindness found within the Holy Spirit, we practice a way of living that exemplifies the true meaning of “Thank you.” There is excitement and joy in the season of Thanksgiving, but there is also a meaning of thanksgiving that goes unpracticed because we don’t take to heart what it is that we are saying when we say, “I am thankful for…”

When you give thanks on Thanksgiving, you are giving those around you a piece of Christ that lives within you: you are offering a confession, administering a pardon, offering grace, being kind, and showing favor. Essentially, when you give thanks, you are letting others know, just like Christ does for you, that you see them and are thankful for them in your life. But what and why do we need to give thanks?

From our scripture reading, we learn the importance of giving thanks. Not only do we learn about the importance of giving thanks but we also learn the “what and why” of giving thanks. Psalm 100 is simply titled A Psalm of Thanksgiving¸ and it is the only psalm in the collection to bear this title. It speaks of an invitation to the whole earth to know and to worship God. According to G. Campbell Morgan, “It is jubilant with confidence for the whole earth, as it contemplates the glory of that earth, when all its people are submitted to the reign of Jehovah.”[1]

The Psalm begins with what we are to do when we give praise and gratitude. We are to give God praise. Psalm 100:1-2 assert, “Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness; come into his presence with singing.” Remember, giving thanks should be exciting; it should be something that uplifts our spirits, fills our hearts with gladness, and gives us a cheerful mind and heart. When we give thanks, we should be making a joyful noise to the Lord by which the whole earth, all the lands, hear and respond to. In Job 38:1, the angels shout with joy. Paul tells us in 1 Thessalonians to “rejoice always” (5:16). Again Paul encourages us, in Philippians 4:4, “Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say rejoice.” When you say thank you and give thanks, do so with joy and praise, do so with excitement, and do so with meaning and purpose. Your thank you could be exactly what you need to say to feel joyed and it might be what the person receiving that thanks needs to hear to feel noticed.

As you make a joyful noise of gratitude, remember to do so knowing that you are serving the LORD. Paul writes to the people of Colossae, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart…” (Colossians 3:23). Essentially, whatever you do, whatever you say, wherever you go, serve the Lord, your God, with all your heart. When you say “thank you” or give thanks, do so knowing that you are serving the Lord, that what you are doing is a reflection of your heart, a mirror image of who God is to you. I invite you to turn to your neighbor with excitement and joy, and say “Thank you!” When you think about what you are thankful for on Thanksgiving, be thankful that the Lord has chosen you to serve him and that he has a plan for you. What are we supposed to do when we give thanks? Make a joyful noise and serve the Lord with gladness.

So, we make a joyful noise and serve the Lord, now what? Why do we make a joyful noise and praise the Lord? Psalm 100:3 states, “Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.” We make a joyful noise because the Lord is God: God is loving, God is caring, God is compassionate, and God is always there.  God is good all the time and all the time God is good. Give thanks knowing that the God of creation is the God of your heart, that the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and Jesus is your God; and remember he made you in His image and you belong to Him. Make a joyful noise, shout “AMEN.” Give thanks because He has claimed you as His people, that you are the sheep of His pasture, just the way that you are—imperfect and joyful. We make a joyful noise, give him praise, and serve him because we belong to him: “we are God’s children now” are the words to the beginning of 1 John 3. We give praise and thanksgiving because we belong to the Lord. As you think about what you are thankful for, give thanks to the Lord for claiming you as one of his children. Why do we make a joyful noise and serve the Lord, because we are so thankful to belong to Him.

Moving forward, what else are we supposed to do when we give thanks? the Psalmist gives us something else to do as we give thanks. Psalm 100:4 states,  “Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him; bless his name.” Remember, in the Hebrew language the phrase “thank you” can be translated to mean “blessing.” When we give thanks, we are to bless his holy name, to lift up his name in reverence and awe. When was the last time you blessed his name? When you gave the Lord the respect and honor that he deserves and you meant it? As we bless his name, we are encouraged, no we are invited, to enter his gates with thanksgiving in our heart and his courts with praise. We are invited to enter the holy temple with a cheerful heart, with joy in our step, and with love on our mind. Once we step through those gates with thanksgiving in our heart—letting the Lord know how thankful we are to be in his presence—then we will enter his courts with praise.

When I read these reads, I am reminded of the song and scripture from Psalm 118:24 that says, “This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Let us be glad, let us be thankful, knowing that today is the day that the Lord has made. The beauty of the day is not that it is new, but that we are being made new. The glory of the day is not that it marks a change, but that we are being changed. When we enter his gates with thanksgiving in our heart and his courts with praise, we are made new and we are being changed. When you give thanks or say thank you, something is changing in your life and something is being made new. Maybe, like the Grinch, your heart is growing three sizes! When we give thanks this Thanksgiving for what we are thankful for, may we do so knowing that we are being made new because we belong to the Lord.

The question now is, “Why do we need to enter his gates and courts”? Psalm 100:5 tells us, “For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever and his faithfulness to all generations.” For the Lord is good: thanks and praise are right in recognition of God’s goodness. He is good in His plans, good in His grace, good in His forgiveness, good in His covenant, good in His love, and good in every aspect of His being. We enter his gates and courts because we long to experience the Lord who is good—a Lord whom we can trust with all our heart (Proverbs 3:5), and a Lord that finds a way, every day, to turn our messes into messages, our temptations into triumphs, and our unworthiness into moments of grace and mercy.

As we experience the Lord who is good, we receive His love that endures forever and His faithfulness that is for all generations. This love is unconditional and conditioning, and it is what Paul describes in his letter to the people of Corinth, “Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance” (Corinthians 13:4-7). So, why do we really enter his gates and courts? Because we seek to receive a love that endures forever and that sees us for who we are. And we should be thankful that we are given the opportunity, every day, to receive that love.

Psalm 100, should be our words of thanksgiving this holiday season. From these words, we make a joyful noise and serve the Lord because we are thankful that we belong to Him, that he made us, that we are His people, that we are His children, and that He is our God today and every day. From these words, we give thanks knowing that we are invited to enter His gates and his courts with praise as we bless His name because He is good and His love, the very love we need to conquer our sins and be made new and allowed to change, endures within us today and every day. Psalm 100 is our hymn of grateful praise.

Conclusion:

As I sat at the table, surrounded by adults, I realized that it doesn’t matter where I sit or what sort of utensils I get to use or whether or not the rolls are in baskets or pans or even how excited I may be to celebrate Thanksgiving. What matters is that I understand the meaning of Thanksgiving. The meaning of Thanksgiving is realizing that we need to mean what we say when we say “thank you,” and that what we are thankful for should reflect what and how God has blessed our lives. We need to be thankful for those people, memories, events, and opportunities that have led us to experience the Lord’s love that endures forever. And so I ask you, “What are you thankful for? And Why?”

The time has come, as the Psalmist proclaims, to give thanks to our LORD eternally (Psalm 30:12). The time has come to be the thanksgiving disciple that Christ needs us to be which says “thank you” more than 5.5 times a day. The time has come to know what and why we celebrate Thanksgiving. The time has come to live out the meaning of Thanksgiving in our daily life. The time has come to sing our hymn of grateful praise: to make a joyful noise, serve the Lord, to enter his gates and courts with praise, and know that we are loved by God. Thanksgiving is an exciting time, but it is also a meaningful time in our life because it reflects who God has made us to be: graceful, kind, and loving persons.

As you celebrate Thanksgiving, from wherever and with whomever, take a moment to really give thanks to God for the blessings that He has so freely given you. Be Thankful. Be an act of Thanksgiving. Be a blessing. And be a source of thanks for all those in your life. Recite Psalm 100 as your prayer because within those words we learn what we need to do and why we need to give thanks to God and for those in our life. For the Lord’s love and blessing is the theme to our hymn of grateful praise. Happy Thanksgiving!

Let it be so…

 

Closing Prayer:

Let us pray: Dear Heavenly Father, we are grateful for the many blessings that you have given us. We are in awe of how you work in our life and how you find ways to claim us as one of your own. O Lord, may we find in our heart this week to really give you thanks and to mean what we say as we give thanks. O Lord, help us to have a hymn of grateful praise in our heart today and every day as we come to experience your love that endures forever. Amen.

 

Benediction:

As you celebrate Thanksgiving this week, really think about what you are thankful for and remember to give God praise for those showers of blessings in your life. May the Lord bless you and keep you; May the Lord make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you; and May the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace (Numbers 6:24-26). In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit go forth living a life of thankfulness. And all God’s people said, Amen. Amen. Amen.

[1] https://enduringword.com/bible-commentary/psalm-100