Deuteronomy 26:1-11/2 Corinthians 9:6-15/St Luke 12:13-21
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
We didn’t attend Thanksgiving service when I was a kid. Maybe it was because my home congregation had service at 9 am on Thanksgiving Day and by that time mom had been up for three hours already preparing the various foods and so we just forgot. Its more likely that we just didn’t want to interrupt the morning duties to make the drive in the cold and snow to church on a day off of school. That’s not meant to be a transgression against the 4th commandment.
But as we grew older the question was asked - how come we never went to church on Thanksgiving? It was often answered, “Because its not a religious holiday.” That’s also not meant to be a transgression against the 4th commandment. I’m sure if I had asked my parents would have taken me. And even when I could drive I could have taken myself. I didn’t. If anything that’s a 3rd commandment issue. That is my own sin.
But it’s true - Thanksgiving is not a religious, that is to say, a church holiday. At least not anymore. Whatever religious significance Thanksgiving has or had would have come from the Pilgrims and the Puritans who tended the read the Old Testament with more fervor than the New and who sometimes followed the Old Testament as if the New Testament had never been written. The pilgrims not only went to the New World to turn an old England into a new England, but to find a promised land that they thought God had promised them. They thought they were the New Israel and set off to find a land flowing with milk and honey.
Of course you know the rest of the story. Many died off that first winter. Whatever crops did grow it wasn’t enough to feed the rest. It’s likely all of them would have perished had the Native Americans not come to their aid. Perhaps its a lesson in the providence our Lord provides and the unlikely ways and means He uses to do so. The Puritans celebrated the day with preaching, hymn singing, prayer and feasting. Thoroughly acquainted with the Old Testament it is quite likely they made use of the Deuteronomy text for this evening.
It bears saying first of all that these texts are not the texts assigned for a Day of Thanksgiving according to the lectionary, but those for a Harvest Observance. Not being a church holiday - and having the Gospel freedom to do so - it is our prerogative to read the lessons for a Harvest Observance which seem to more closely align with the intent of the national holiday anyway.
The writing from the Torah of Moses is the second installment of the liturgical order for the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles. In Hebrew it is known as Sukkot. It was a harvest festival usually falling around late September or October. The Jewish lunar calendar more closely aligns with the Church Year than our Gregorian solar calendar. This Sunday is the New Year. The First Sunday in Advent. Anyway, Sukkoth was meant to be the last Festival of the Hebrew year. I suppose for us this year, falling between the Last Sunday and Advent I, Thanksgiving is just that.
Booths were built. Temporary dwellings without permanent roofs, meant to remind the Israelites of their sojourn in the wilderness when they lived in dwellings made of skins and lived off the merciful bounty of the Lord who provided manna and quail each day for 40 years. The Sukkoth was decorated with plants and produce, the bounty of the harvest. As this was one of the three main feasts of the year, all Israelite males were required to travel to Jerusalem. They constructed the booths there, lived and ate in them for eight days, and went up to the Temple - the place that the Lord your God choose to make His Name to dwell there. In the Temple they took the required basket filled with some of the first fruits of the harvest, handed it to the priest, and together the layman and the priest swung or waved the basket as an offering as the proper liturgical creed was spoken in Hebrew, A wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, etc.
Now here’s the thing - this feast, Sukkoth, along with Passover and Pentecost, could only be rightly celebrated by the Israelites within vicinity of the Temple. In addition to the wave offering of thanksgiving, animal sacrifices were required, which could only be offered there. Since the destruction of the Temple in AD 70, the Jews continue to observe this feast at home, constructing booths outside their houses, minus the animal sacrifices.
But like Passover and Pentecost, the Feast of Booths has been fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. He did not come to be an Arbitrator of mammon, but a Giver of heavenly treasure. The Gospel reading for a Day of Thanksgiving is the healing of the ten lepers. Jesus commanded them to go to the Temple, while going they were healed. One returned to give thanks to Jesus. The other nine presumably went to the Temple to offer the appropriate sacrifice. If we make that reading simply into an obligation to give thanks - the way your mother always told you to send thank you cards when receiving a gift - we miss the point.
The Samaritan leper who returned to Jesus and fell down on his face in worship before Him, in fact went to the true Temple, the One made without hands. He went to God in the flesh, to Jesus the very instantiation of the glory of the Father. Who has distributed freely to us of His grace and mercy. He has given to we poor, miserable sinners, of His own righteousness which endures forever. St John writes, The Word became flesh and εσκηνοσεν - that is, enskinned Himself, tabernacled - among us. Jesus is Himself, in His person, the fulfillment and fruition of the Old Testament Feast of Booths. He is the very Temple, the High Priest, and the Once-For-All Sacrifice making perfect atonement by His blood. As it is written, He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by His will we have been sanctified through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all (Heb 10:9-10).
The Author to the Hebrews goes on: Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Holy Places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, and since we have a great Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water (Heb 10:19-22). Though sincere, the Puritans were mistaken about their views of the Old and New Testaments. In the Old Testament the New Testament is concealed. In the New Testament the Old Testament is revealed. Which is to say, Jesus is, in His Person, the very fulfillment of those Old Testament feasts and festivals. In His flesh He tore down the curtain that barred Israel from the Holy of Holies. He is the true Ark, revealing the very radiance and glory of the Father even as He is the Mercy Seat Sacrifice sprinkled atop the Ark, covering the accusations of the Law with His blood and making peace between God and man.
Beloved, your hearts are sprinkled clean from an evil, accusing conscience with the very Blood of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He has washed your bodies with the pure, baptismmal water flowing from His own riven side. And through this priestly bath you have been brought into the very body of Christ, you dwell in Him, your Tabernacle, your Sukkot.
Thanksgiving may not be a church holiday, but in a way the Church lives and breathes in thanksgiving, perpetually offering up thanks and praise to God our Father for the inexpressible gift of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, who by His blood has ransomed and redeemed us and made us His people. He sowed in the bounty of the Father’s sheer love and mercy and has reaped a harvest a hundred fold in the very souls of His dear children, Christ Jesus Himself being the first fruits from the dead.
So it is that you are pilgrims, not like the Mayflower ones, but more like the wandering Aramean, Jacob. You are bound for home, for your eternal dwellings, where you have the amble goods of joy and peace, mercy and love laid up for eternity. And you are the New Israel, that is, the Church of God in Christ Jesus. You sojourn here every eighth day for the Feast of the Eucharist; which, as you know, is the Greek word for thanksgiving; that which the Church has long called to the Sacrament of the Altar; taken from Christ’s own words of institution. Here He takes bread, gives thanks and distributes to you His Body, saying Take and eat. Here He takes the cup, gives thanks and offers to you His Blood of the New Covenant, saying Take and drink for the forgiveness of your sins.
And just like the Israelites of old, the liturgy guides your way, for it is filled with thanksgiving and praise. From the Gloria in Excelsis: Glory be to God on high and on earth peace, good will toward men. We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we worship Thee, we glorify Thee, we give thanks to Thee for Thy great glory. From the collect: as stewards of Your creation, may we receive Your gifts in humble thankfulness and share Your bounty with those in need. The Creed is a thank offering to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, for His works done and continuing. So too the offering. Then the Service of the Sacrament really gets the thanksgiving going: Let us give thanks unto the Lord our God. It is meet and right so do to. It is truly meet, right and salutary that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to You, holy Lord, almighty Father, everlasting God . . . And in the Our Father you pray for daily bread, which our Lord provides in abundance and teaches you to receive with thanksgiving. Then He sets before you the very Bread which is the Body of Christ in His Eucharist. Then, after having received the gift of this heavenly treasure, you sing, O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endureth forever; and you pray, We give thanks to You, almighty God that You have refreshed us through this salutary gift, etc. And finally, Let us bless the Lord. Thanks be to God.
The liturgy just bursts forth and overflows with thanksgiving to God each and every Sunday. Indeed it happens everyday. For you are baptized priests and the liturgy of your daily lives is lived when that which is directed at God is actually turned toward the neighbor in need. God does not need our sacrifices or good deeds, but the world is filled with people who desperately do. This is why He loves a cheerful giver. One who having by faith received in grace and mercy to overflowing, abounds in good works of love and charity to others. As it is written, Through Christ Jesus then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledges His name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God (Heb 13:15-16).
Beloved come, then; and taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him. In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
We didn’t attend Thanksgiving service when I was a kid. Maybe it was because my home congregation had service at 9 am on Thanksgiving Day and by that time mom had been up for three hours already preparing the various foods and so we just forgot. Its more likely that we just didn’t want to interrupt the morning duties to make the drive in the cold and snow to church on a day off of school. That’s not meant to be a transgression against the 4th commandment.
But as we grew older the question was asked - how come we never went to church on Thanksgiving? It was often answered, “Because its not a religious holiday.” That’s also not meant to be a transgression against the 4th commandment. I’m sure if I had asked my parents would have taken me. And even when I could drive I could have taken myself. I didn’t. If anything that’s a 3rd commandment issue. That is my own sin.
But it’s true - Thanksgiving is not a religious, that is to say, a church holiday. At least not anymore. Whatever religious significance Thanksgiving has or had would have come from the Pilgrims and the Puritans who tended the read the Old Testament with more fervor than the New and who sometimes followed the Old Testament as if the New Testament had never been written. The pilgrims not only went to the New World to turn an old England into a new England, but to find a promised land that they thought God had promised them. They thought they were the New Israel and set off to find a land flowing with milk and honey.
Of course you know the rest of the story. Many died off that first winter. Whatever crops did grow it wasn’t enough to feed the rest. It’s likely all of them would have perished had the Native Americans not come to their aid. Perhaps its a lesson in the providence our Lord provides and the unlikely ways and means He uses to do so. The Puritans celebrated the day with preaching, hymn singing, prayer and feasting. Thoroughly acquainted with the Old Testament it is quite likely they made use of the Deuteronomy text for this evening.
It bears saying first of all that these texts are not the texts assigned for a Day of Thanksgiving according to the lectionary, but those for a Harvest Observance. Not being a church holiday - and having the Gospel freedom to do so - it is our prerogative to read the lessons for a Harvest Observance which seem to more closely align with the intent of the national holiday anyway.
The writing from the Torah of Moses is the second installment of the liturgical order for the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles. In Hebrew it is known as Sukkot. It was a harvest festival usually falling around late September or October. The Jewish lunar calendar more closely aligns with the Church Year than our Gregorian solar calendar. This Sunday is the New Year. The First Sunday in Advent. Anyway, Sukkoth was meant to be the last Festival of the Hebrew year. I suppose for us this year, falling between the Last Sunday and Advent I, Thanksgiving is just that.
Booths were built. Temporary dwellings without permanent roofs, meant to remind the Israelites of their sojourn in the wilderness when they lived in dwellings made of skins and lived off the merciful bounty of the Lord who provided manna and quail each day for 40 years. The Sukkoth was decorated with plants and produce, the bounty of the harvest. As this was one of the three main feasts of the year, all Israelite males were required to travel to Jerusalem. They constructed the booths there, lived and ate in them for eight days, and went up to the Temple - the place that the Lord your God choose to make His Name to dwell there. In the Temple they took the required basket filled with some of the first fruits of the harvest, handed it to the priest, and together the layman and the priest swung or waved the basket as an offering as the proper liturgical creed was spoken in Hebrew, A wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, etc.
Now here’s the thing - this feast, Sukkoth, along with Passover and Pentecost, could only be rightly celebrated by the Israelites within vicinity of the Temple. In addition to the wave offering of thanksgiving, animal sacrifices were required, which could only be offered there. Since the destruction of the Temple in AD 70, the Jews continue to observe this feast at home, constructing booths outside their houses, minus the animal sacrifices.
But like Passover and Pentecost, the Feast of Booths has been fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. He did not come to be an Arbitrator of mammon, but a Giver of heavenly treasure. The Gospel reading for a Day of Thanksgiving is the healing of the ten lepers. Jesus commanded them to go to the Temple, while going they were healed. One returned to give thanks to Jesus. The other nine presumably went to the Temple to offer the appropriate sacrifice. If we make that reading simply into an obligation to give thanks - the way your mother always told you to send thank you cards when receiving a gift - we miss the point.
The Samaritan leper who returned to Jesus and fell down on his face in worship before Him, in fact went to the true Temple, the One made without hands. He went to God in the flesh, to Jesus the very instantiation of the glory of the Father. Who has distributed freely to us of His grace and mercy. He has given to we poor, miserable sinners, of His own righteousness which endures forever. St John writes, The Word became flesh and εσκηνοσεν - that is, enskinned Himself, tabernacled - among us. Jesus is Himself, in His person, the fulfillment and fruition of the Old Testament Feast of Booths. He is the very Temple, the High Priest, and the Once-For-All Sacrifice making perfect atonement by His blood. As it is written, He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by His will we have been sanctified through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all (Heb 10:9-10).
The Author to the Hebrews goes on: Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Holy Places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, and since we have a great Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water (Heb 10:19-22). Though sincere, the Puritans were mistaken about their views of the Old and New Testaments. In the Old Testament the New Testament is concealed. In the New Testament the Old Testament is revealed. Which is to say, Jesus is, in His Person, the very fulfillment of those Old Testament feasts and festivals. In His flesh He tore down the curtain that barred Israel from the Holy of Holies. He is the true Ark, revealing the very radiance and glory of the Father even as He is the Mercy Seat Sacrifice sprinkled atop the Ark, covering the accusations of the Law with His blood and making peace between God and man.
Beloved, your hearts are sprinkled clean from an evil, accusing conscience with the very Blood of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He has washed your bodies with the pure, baptismmal water flowing from His own riven side. And through this priestly bath you have been brought into the very body of Christ, you dwell in Him, your Tabernacle, your Sukkot.
Thanksgiving may not be a church holiday, but in a way the Church lives and breathes in thanksgiving, perpetually offering up thanks and praise to God our Father for the inexpressible gift of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, who by His blood has ransomed and redeemed us and made us His people. He sowed in the bounty of the Father’s sheer love and mercy and has reaped a harvest a hundred fold in the very souls of His dear children, Christ Jesus Himself being the first fruits from the dead.
So it is that you are pilgrims, not like the Mayflower ones, but more like the wandering Aramean, Jacob. You are bound for home, for your eternal dwellings, where you have the amble goods of joy and peace, mercy and love laid up for eternity. And you are the New Israel, that is, the Church of God in Christ Jesus. You sojourn here every eighth day for the Feast of the Eucharist; which, as you know, is the Greek word for thanksgiving; that which the Church has long called to the Sacrament of the Altar; taken from Christ’s own words of institution. Here He takes bread, gives thanks and distributes to you His Body, saying Take and eat. Here He takes the cup, gives thanks and offers to you His Blood of the New Covenant, saying Take and drink for the forgiveness of your sins.
And just like the Israelites of old, the liturgy guides your way, for it is filled with thanksgiving and praise. From the Gloria in Excelsis: Glory be to God on high and on earth peace, good will toward men. We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we worship Thee, we glorify Thee, we give thanks to Thee for Thy great glory. From the collect: as stewards of Your creation, may we receive Your gifts in humble thankfulness and share Your bounty with those in need. The Creed is a thank offering to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, for His works done and continuing. So too the offering. Then the Service of the Sacrament really gets the thanksgiving going: Let us give thanks unto the Lord our God. It is meet and right so do to. It is truly meet, right and salutary that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to You, holy Lord, almighty Father, everlasting God . . . And in the Our Father you pray for daily bread, which our Lord provides in abundance and teaches you to receive with thanksgiving. Then He sets before you the very Bread which is the Body of Christ in His Eucharist. Then, after having received the gift of this heavenly treasure, you sing, O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endureth forever; and you pray, We give thanks to You, almighty God that You have refreshed us through this salutary gift, etc. And finally, Let us bless the Lord. Thanks be to God.
The liturgy just bursts forth and overflows with thanksgiving to God each and every Sunday. Indeed it happens everyday. For you are baptized priests and the liturgy of your daily lives is lived when that which is directed at God is actually turned toward the neighbor in need. God does not need our sacrifices or good deeds, but the world is filled with people who desperately do. This is why He loves a cheerful giver. One who having by faith received in grace and mercy to overflowing, abounds in good works of love and charity to others. As it is written, Through Christ Jesus then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledges His name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God (Heb 13:15-16).
Beloved come, then; and taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him. In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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