Our Litany of Thanks

Leviticus 23:39-43; Isaiah 29:13-16; Matthew 15:1-9

Piney River Baptist Church, Lowesville, VA
Community Thanksgiving Service

22 November 2006

Thanksgiving is perhaps the religiously purest of our holidays. We gather with family and friends in November to express thankfulness. We go through our litanies and prepare lists of things for which we should be grateful. It has become an institutionalized reminder to pause amid preoccupation with self to offer thanks for God’s blessings. This tradition also carries a sacred duty. If we are not careful, our expressions of thanks become empty rituals—litanies devoid of meaningful substance. Can we ensure the character of our thanks finds appropriate expression? Beyond recalling God’s blessings in words, will thankfulness somehow transform our lives?

We learned that Thanksgiving began as a feast celebrating God’s provision through an act of friendship. It is a reminder that our survival depends upon God’s intervention. We know the story of that historic event whereby a native people shared their provisions in order that newcomers might survive a New England winter. The pilgrims would never have made it without Squanto’s initiative to care for this unprepared band of encroaching foreigners. Are we willing to take that same initiative?

We live today in a prosperous nation. While we are prosperous, we are certainly not very generous. On a mission trip to Brazil, friends invited us to stay with them. The couple was living on very meager resources. Sixty dollars a month supported this family of three. What they had, however, they offered graciously. They offered their shelter, their food, and their friendship. The little girl had half a cup of milk per day, with a small portion of beans, rice, and fruit. Meat was available once a week. That did not hold them back from giving to us out of their thankfulness and friendship.

We like to think Thanksgiving was first celebrated as a national holiday in the United States, but thousands of years before, it was an established feast among the Hebrews. Succoth, described in Leviticus as the Feast of Booths, has long been celebrated as a festival of thankfulness for God’s care and blessing. Succoth was also an autumnal festival, recalling the wilderness wandering and celebrating the harvest of God’s provision in the Promised Land. God instructed the Hebrews to pause, reflect, and give thanks—the purported reason for today’s gathering. Do we understand the extent of God’s blessings?

Central Baptist just collected thirty-some shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child. These gifts will be sent around the world as a small expression of God’s love. During the same week, family asked what to buy us for Christmas. It would be easy to picture our family receiving as many gifts as our whole church gave through Operation Christmas Child. If we understood the extent of God’s blessings, would we amass so much for ourselves while giving so little to those in real need? We come from celebrating thankfulness for survival to virtually ignoring a world struggling for one more day of life. Is this true thankfulness?

Jesus was surrounded by people talking a good talk and going through the accepted motions of following God. They were zealous and detailed in their actions. They had their religious routines and rituals down to a practiced art. Even so, Jesus was not impressed with the character of their lives. Everything that could be quantified and witnessed had been codified to make a good presentation before God. They were having trouble codifying matters of heart and character. In the process, traditions and interpretations took the place of heartfelt worship. They placed more emphasis on regulations and rules of righteous living than on righteousness itself. How different are we?

Fifty years ago, picking up a hitchhiker was considered normal. Now we view it with fear. We have surrounded the concept with concerns over safety that hinder recognizing another’s need. It is easy to rationalize why it is dangerous to give a ride to a stranger. It is a simple thing to look the other way and ignore the reality of another’s plight. We look at our own issues and needs, ignoring what some other person experiences. In so doing, we fail to love the neighbor and stranger, invalidating God’s command to love and thankfulness. We ignore the Bible’s injunction to trust God as we serve in faith. I cannot express thanks to God and ignore my responsibility to meet the need of another.

Jesus picked on a couple of examples of legalized impropriety. Looking to God’s instruction as a lawyer analyzes a contract, tradition circumvented God’s instructions while following the letter by established precedence. How easy that is to do, often without recognizing our failure! Traditions about the Sabbath were not bent on violation, but as aids to fulfilling God’s command. Regardless, they missed the point of rest and recognition of God’s care. It is so easy to go through the rites and motions and miss the purpose of our actions. We thank God for bounty, blessings, and provision through words and rituals, but how does thankfulness impact our daily living?

Ethos water bottler was begun with the purpose of addressing needs in the world. This is not a Christian organization. It is a for-profit company recognizing a responsibility for others. Goodsearch is an arm of Yahoo, recognizing that people yearn to make a difference through actions as simple as web-searches. Other companies are arising who focus on fair trade and social responsibility as well as profit. The business world is learning that there is greater fulfillment in business than turning a profit. We would think the Church would be setting the course of responsible thanksgiving.

Leviticus called the Hebrews to remember their wilderness wandering. They were to connect yearly with their history of that time before they had fields, vineyards, houses, or towns. As they remembered their heritage, they were to give thanks for God’s provision. They were to rejoice in the way God had met their needs and proven faithful. This memorial of God’s sustenance and provision in the past was to encourage them to trust God into the future.

As government began accepting a larger role looking after the needy, the church backed away. Recently there has been growing criticism of a “welfare state”. This attitude is worrisome, for it points to a larger problem. Whether or not government defends the powerless and needy is not the issue. The question is, will we? At heart, the drive to get government out of the business of caring for the needy is motivated by our selfishness and greed. We, as the Church, the Body of Christ, have mostly turned a blind eye to the needs around us. We relinquished our responsibility to government agencies. On the other hand, we became so immersed in our growing material comfort that we do not see beyond the needs of our immediate circle of family and friends.

Even heartfelt thanks sounds shallow when it has no repercussion in our actions. Our litanies of thanks for God’s blessings are meaningless if they are not accompanied by living expressions of our thankfulness to, dependence on, and trust in God. How can we express thankfulness in our daily routines? Will the thankfulness we express in words find means to transform our interaction with the world around us? Will we fill hollow sounding words with the deeds befitting thankfulness? May our litanies of thanks transform our lives, providing hope for a world in need.

—©2006 Christopher B. Harbin